[Vignesh_N/A]

Airbnb has a stupid validation process. They do it without even actually visiting the place. Meaning, I was stuck in Kumily at 11 p.m without an accommodation after realizing the property that we booked through Airbnb doesn't exist in reality.

[manij]

I feel this thread/topic has parallels to rent vs. own - considering today's state of the Real Estate market, it definitely makes sense to rent rather than to own. Though how long in future it continues to be so is anyone's guess.

In my opinion, having a holiday home (or second home) in a place where one has strong (emotional / family / health-realted) ties to would be good. Anywhere else will require good amount of mental/physical stamina regularly over the years-or alternately inculcate a "chalta hai" attitude knowing the losses.

Originally Posted by Vignesh_N/A

Airbnb has a stupid validation process. They do it without even actually visiting the place. Meaning, I was stuck in Kumily at 11 p.m without an accommodation after realizing the property that we booked through Airbnb doesn't exist in reality.

Really! were there photos, etc. of the place when you booked on Airbnb and paid, and the landlord was faking it all? What does the landlord gain by faking? Or was it someone having fun through an elaborate practical joke?
My heart goes out to you, hope all finally went well. I guess you will stick to 'safe' hotels from now on.

[Vignesh_N/A]

Originally Posted by manij

Really! were there photos, etc. of the place when you booked on Airbnb and paid, and the landlord was faking it all? What does the landlord gain by faking? Or was it someone having fun through an elaborate practical joke?
My heart goes out to you, hope all finally went well. I guess you will stick to 'safe' hotels from now on.

Yes. It had everything from photos to phone number. The first time we called, a lady answered and denied that she had anything to do with the after mentioned property. We "image searched " the photo on google and the search result came up the actual resort at a different place. The user merely created an account with photos from other websites and Airbnb never bothered to validate. We called the customer care and they were clueless about how to proceed with this issue. We asked for an alternate stay and they denied. All this happened on the very first day of our 6 day trip, after spending 600+ kms for 13 hrs on a motorcycle saddle. Finally, Oyo came to the rescue. It was 12.30 A.M the next day when we reached Oyo Room. Needless to say, we stuck with Oyo for the remainder of the trip.

[i74js]

This is very disappointing. If the market capitalization / value of AirBnB is there, it is because of the aggregator model on which they are working. They must correct their act and bring things in order.

The very success of Uber and Ola is reliability ! and same rule applies to AirBnB.

[GTO]

Guys, let's not take the thread off-topic please. All Airbnb issues can continue here.

Thanks!

Originally Posted by GTO

I want to put the Deolali house on the block, but Mom has sentimental attachments to it.

Mom called me from Deolali yesterday and I jokingly told her "we should sell the Deolali house". Got royally chopped by her prompt reply "Ok, as soon as we sell the Jeep" .

[androdev]

Originally Posted by GTO

Mom called me from Deolali yesterday and I jokingly told her "we should sell the Deolali house". Got royally chopped by her prompt reply "Ok, as soon as we sell the Jeep" .

Ha ha. Wow she absolutely got your number! But that sums up the discussion very nicely. When finances are limited, it is the emotional attachment that is the deciding factor in matters like these.

[sivasain]

Originally Posted by abeerbagul

Wow.
This farmhouse looks so gorgeous. Congratulations.
I think most of the value of this property comes from its unique location, architecture and view.
If this was a cookie cutter bunglow in a farmhouse plot scheme, in the same location, it would not be so amazing.

When evaluating a holiday home, I think the most important attributes are a great view and the design of the place. If you can manage to secure a location where the view will not be disturbed / blocked even a few decades afterwards, then the property value will appreciate.

Thanks. It took a year of driving 100km to-and-fro thrice a week to get this done. I was lucky to get this location. The land is surrounded by tar road on one side. internal private roads on 2 sides and government kharab land on the other. The view will remain unblocked due to the height and also the land in front is temple. land.

We had sold a beach side land on ECR to invest here. It makes sense to have something close that i can use regularly. I can leave office at 5pm and be here by 6pm for dinner. so it is quite accessible from whitefield side.

Originally Posted by rdst_1

The only issues that scare most city folk from investing in something like this is land grab and land acquisition.

The risk is always there. One way to mitigate the risk to keep a local connected person on retainer to be the property manager. Thats what i have done on top of having a full time family to run the place.

I also have full time broadband connectivity (thanks to jio), IP Cameras, Electric Fencing, Remote controlled security system that communicates via SIM card. So that not a sheep enters the property without alerting me. Even caretakers who live there don't have access to the main building, unless they make a phone call and request us to disarm the system.

The property is fully lit up automatically thru the night and is backed up completely by inverters.

[aniketi]

You can have it provided -

1 You have enough spare cash to take a weekend home.
2 Its near from where you stay so that you can really go there whenever you want.
3 Its a safe place.
4 Its in some society where you don't have to pay attention to other things than your home itself.

One of my family friend has weekend home (Bungalow) near Pune (In Bhugaon) which is hardly 20 kms from where he stays. So he mostly goes there every weekend and enjoy the peace he gets there. I know one more couple who has weekend home near Panshet which is 30 kms from Pune. So its useful.

For me concept of weekend home is not really a holiday but its a gate-away from your daily routine, city traffic and noise, away from pollution, close to nature etc. For such reasons i guess weekend homes are very useful. Some people are really using it and enjoying it. I really wish i have such one small weekend home for myself. Hopefully i will buy one in near future

[Hayek]

Imho a holiday home makes no sense whatsoever.

I have several affluent friends who have beautiful holiday homes - in Alibag, Lonavala, Doolali, and Amby. For some of them, owning the holiday home makes it obligatory that they spend all their weekends there - it's almost a chore and you often hear their kids (or even one of the spouses) cribbing about having to go there instead of swimming in the Society pool. For others, it's turns into a barely used property - something they visit 2-3 times a year and where half the time of their holiday is spent cleaning.

Yes, a number of them have seen substantial theoretical "appreciation". But that is a speculative outcome and you can't count on that being repeated.

Financially they are a bad deal - cost a lot to buy, cost a lot to maintain, and if you are honest with your taxes, please note that you have to pay tax on notional rent as per circle rates even if you don't rent it out. Renting through Airbnb or even something like SaffronStays.com makes far more sense for the odd weekend out - and you can holiday anywhere in the world in much less than the tax on notional rent in most cases.

We have a old family home in a southern hill station - no one has used it full time in more than 20 years, and it gets used barely 6 weeks in a year (despite having a large number of cousins who all have a stake in it). Should we be selling it - certainly from an economic perspective - it's just bound up with too many emotions to ever happen.

So these make sense only if you are investing under 5% of your Net worth, and can pay the maintenance costs, taxes etc without even noticing you spent the money

[pathik]

Originally Posted by GTO

Mom called me from Deolali yesterday and I jokingly told her "we should sell the Deolali house". Got royally chopped by her prompt reply "Ok, as soon as we sell the Jeep" .

That's a lovely little place. We had a holiday home for a better part of 20 years before we decided to sell it few years ago. I have very fond memories of this place with many vacations spent in the bungalow at Lam Road. I loved how peaceful and happy I felt whenever I was there. Given a choice I would have never let my parents sell that place.

[Ferruccio]

I have got conned into a Club Mahindra membership. I chose the highest segment and most expensive period at that time - Season Red so that I would have the freedom of going in peak season. The SOBs introduced a higher season Purple thereafter and now I can only go to Rajasthan in peak summer and Kerala / Goa during the peak dengue season.

They want me to upgrade to Purple paying more money with the clear understanding that the moment I do so they can always create a super-premium Fuchsia season which will again restrict my booking window to a 3 hour stay at the top of Siachen in peak winter without the benefit of a bottle of Oxygen. So my Club Mahindra days have accumulated and are expiring rapidl. In the meanwhile every year I have to pay a usurious maintenance fee that increases exponentially year upon year.

By comparison, I spent 3 nights in Koh Samui in an AirBNB with attached private pool for Rs. 3000 per night and superb facilities. The air ticket judiciously purchased in advance was less than a Mumbai - Kolkata ticket purchased at approximately the same advance notice!

I have had colleagues who have gone even more adventourous on a cheaper budget with Couch Surfing, which arguably is best suited for younger people. One must be nuts to have a second home.

The mantra I am slowly headed for is 'Own Nothing'. After I retire, I intend to have a couple of manageable sized suitcases with my personal belongings and a few clothes and move every 3 -4 months from one picturesque Air-BNB to another, living off the rental income of my home that is in a high cost urban location.

Originally Posted by aniketi

For me concept of weekend home is not really a holiday but its a gate-away from your daily routine, city traffic and noise, away from pollution, close to nature etc. For such reasons i guess weekend homes are very useful. Some people are really using it and enjoying it. I really wish i have such one small weekend home for myself. Hopefully i will buy one in near future

Thats the idealistic view that I almost bought into . . . sold by Milind Gunaji on the Mumbai - Pune Expressway. Going to one such picturesque project (note they take you the site visit only during the rains when they are at their green best), we bumped into a similarly aged Doctor couple. The Doctors had bought a property early on and this is what they quite candidly (God bless them) told me -

First you go every weekend, then alternate weekends then progressively less frequently, until it is once in 6 months. Then you are forced to go because you have that money stuck. And perchance you go there you spend the long weekend cleaning and dealing with the awful smell of fungus and mould, dealing with the leakages. You are terrified at night becuase you happen to be the only 2 people staying in a 50 km radius

When we chanced upon them the Doctor couple had not seen a single human being for many days. Hence they were happy to bare their soul to us. The Doctors escaping from their highly stressed lives were in a higher stress situation as they were trying to burn down an ant-hill with fire-ants that had cropped up in the middle of their beautifully terracotta tiled 'drawing room' while simultaneously trying to avoid being bitten

[selfdrive]

It is excellent if someone owns a holiday home. i.e. if that someone happens to be a relative or a close friend.
A second home is anyway enjoyed more by relatives and friends than by the owner, who would spend most of his/ her time maintaining the place.

We are already in an age and generation which is even questioning the need to own a first home or even one car. So a holiday home is really too much of a stretch.
While we try to replicate our childhood memories of summer vacations spent with cousins in a big ancestral family home by buying a second home, the practical beings look at this as a dead investment; one which could be reused for the odd vacation abroad or investing for further gains. To each their own, but honestly speaking it does not make much sense to own anything these days. Renting is always cheaper and people can keep upgrading without additional cost, whether it is a vacation, a rented home or a rented car.

[Slick]

Great Thread Voted an 'emphatic NO'.

I have been living this situation for the past 10 years. It's been my parents' dream to own a village home + garden/small farm. The search for an appropriate plot has taken 10 years of their life with agents thugging us on many occasions.

We have acquired a 1 acre plot in an interior location owing to high costs near Bombay-Goa highway.

Fencing & Building a house will take 15-20 L, Plus village folks are not the same as Mumbai, making life more difficult.

I still support their project as it's been their dream but for the property to be functional, in my opinion, it has to pay for itself.

Since it's in the interiors tourism is out, So the farm produce should pay for the house maintenance, which means someone needs to supervise it and invest time.

With my current schedule & work-life balance issues it seems impossible for me to visit the place more than thrice in a year.

So while we will build a house and visit it a few times in the first year, in the long haul it's going to be that barbeque that we buy with romantic outdoor thoughts and then put in the store room for eternity, albeit much much much more costly.

- Slick

[Orange GTX]

This question is for the eternal battle between Dil and Dimaag
Companies like AirBnB have given a whole new perspective to traveling.
It does give many options as per one's budget.
Unless and until, you have that inner feeling/desire to have a holiday home, it does not make a sense. Here Dil plays the part. One Team-BHPian has shown that.
Otherwise, just be practical and help AirBnB grow.

[mathranik]

Hi SmartCat,

I was of a similar opinion as yours, until I further analysed the proposition. I was once in the market for a second home a couple of years back, and was torn between a conventional 2bhk (with the thought of furnishing it proper and put it to good use on AirBnB, just like you intend to do) and a weekend / holiday home. This was to be a cash-down transaction too.

- The opportunity cost of capital is almost always higher than the rate of appreciation for an unconventional house (Farm house, weekend home, specialty constructions at outskirts of Tier I/II cities). I have closely monitored many such investments made by friends and family, and they have seen low to no appreciation (across Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kochi) on their leisure homes. Also, many such built-to-purpose holiday homes cost you higher for their 'amenities' and 'quaintness'.

- Working for Uber, I am all in favour of marketplaces - including AirBnB. But having been on both sides of the experience for a decently long time, let me assure you that the RoI for a holiday home is extremely poor, unless one is a seasoned hotelier. From pure-play investment perspective, it is a no-go, given the crowded market (both, at AirBnB and hotels in general), large over-heads, seasonality in a country with four seasons, etc. If we build the house with a commercial angle, it wouldn't necessarily fit our lifestyle tastes and goals, and one would never be able to realise his/her utilisation value out of it.

- A 2bhk home, like you purchased and I ended up doing too as a secondary investment, makes sense for many reasons : rentals decided by fair market, robust appreciation, doesn't go out of contention overnight (unlike in unconventional outskirts that have multiple external factors governing it - highway planning, industrial zones coming up, etc) and can be AirBnb'd with more regularity if the society permits too. But one thing that it doesn't qualify to be called as is 'holiday home'. Yes, you can holiday in it - but I doubt that's the theme of the thread.

P.S. - I closely follow your investment recommendations , like the auto stock thread. Thanks, and keep 'em coming!

Originally Posted by smartcat

If the decision to own a holiday home is based on emotional or lifestyle reasons, then it does not make sense - thanks to AirBnB. However, if the decision to own a holiday home is based on purely FINANCIAL reasons, then it still makes sense. Let me explain -

Your networth = Fixed Deposits + Equity (stocks or value of own business) + Real Estate

If your real estate exposure is less than 33%, it still makes sense to buy a holiday home, with the following caveats -

• You buy cash down, without taking loans. Interest you pay on your holiday home will kill your returns. This investment will appreciate by a minimum of 8% (based on historical long term inflation rate). If you are lucky, it will appreciate more.
  
• You rent out the holiday home by listing it on AirBnB when you are not using it. Your holiday home has to earn rental income, without which it does not make that much financial sense. If you like AirBnB, why not explore the "other side" and rent out your holiday home? You might need to hire a trustworthy local to clean up the holiday home, before handing it over to a guest. But this expense will be negligible when compared to the rentals you receive via AirBnB.

I intend to do the above, but its not exactly a holiday home - it's an apartment that I intend to list on AirBnB, once the builder finishes the construction. Here is my logic -

• I have poor exposure to real estate
• I have booked a small 2 BHK apartment, cash down without taking a home loan (I save on home loan interest, and I can enjoy even small appreciation in prices over time).
• Once the apartment is ready, I will get it furnished and list it on AirBnB. I have already noticed that the area has very few AirBnB listings. I intend to hire professionals (Housejoy app) to clean up the apartment before guests come in.
• When the apartment is not occupied by guests, I will use it on weekends as a 'holiday home'. It's a 6 acre property with swimming pool, lawns and 80% open area. The kids will have a good time here (I stay in an 'independent house' with very little open areas for kids to play)

Next year, I will let you all know my AirBnB experience - as a host!