Here are some key questions you can ask a vacation rental or short-term rental manager before letting them manage your vacation rental home, Airbnb or property.

Partnering with the right property management company for your dynamic pricing, management, guest care and more can be a huge benefit to your bottom line when done correctly.

However, not all property managers are made equal. Some get stellar results for their homeowners (better than they can do on their own) and provide 5-star full-service experiences for guests and homeowners. Others provide real estate services on top of long-term property management and short-term rental management too. A bad property manager may take the same exact “fee” as an excellent property manager but perform far worse: the “fee” should never be the only point of consideration for managing your property.

A vacation rental management company can be right for one owner and not right for another, depending on their core skills and competency as well as costs. Some vacation rental property management companies focus on more asset care, not maximizing bookings in favor of keeping every guest as “stress free” as possible, while others cater more to folks buying investment property and attempt to maximize bookings by any means necessary. A real estate investment-only property is often treated quite differently than a pure second home vacation rental property.

Most full-service property management companies will take a personal tour of all properties and view any listing photos from a recent sale if relevant.