Villas & Vacations - in the AlgarveVilla Club Ltd

Why rent?

If you do not intend to live in your property on a permanent basis then renting your property is an excellent way to cover the running expenses of your property and generate a return on your investment.  To give a general guide to the expected level of income,   if the property was available for rental from May to October the projected income could be anywhere between 3-6% of the value of the property.

Worried about damages to your property?

Of course nothing in life is risk free - but we believe it can be minimised. Here is a discussion of how we deal with potential damage to properties at Villas & Vacations.

Marketing

With our marketing strategy and co-operation with other agents around the world we attract over 1500 groups per year. Our marketing includes advertising in national newspapers, up to date web sites and our very successful colour brochure which is printed annually and is sent to over 15,000 people. We are more than just an accommodation agency. We also organise and book other activities to "add value" to holidays. This includes car hire, golf, tennis etc. and we even have our own Tennis Centre and Kid’s Club. We refer clients to airline charter and scheduled flight agencies in their own country to book their own flights. Our rentals team consists of five professionals backed up by our own in-house computerised reservations system. Our rental personnel will inspect your property and depending on the size, number of bedrooms, location, features and the area, we are able to provide you with a marketing plan customised to your requirements.

Pricing

Our pricing policy is based on categorising properties into a price band, however other features and the standard of the accommodations can also affect the price range. Once we have agreed the price band with yourselves this becomes the public price which we will market it at, and for ease of calculation we categorise the price band with a letter (see the price list in our brochure). The price band has five different prices depending on the time of year. The most expensive range being middle of July to end of August which we classify as Peak.

We can further increase your bookings by promoting your villa through other tour operators and agents and, in addition, offer last minute discounts to fill as unoccupied weeks. Both these will involve offering incentive discounting from our public prices but we can discuss this with you on an individual basis or part of your marketing plan.

Rental contracts

We have two main types of rental contracts and these are as follows:

• Our standard "Rental Contract". This is where Villas & Vacations control the availability and properties under this contract are generally offered first. It is of course advantageous to both parties if we can offer the property to clients without the delays involved in checking availability.
• A "Request Rental Contract" is where the availability of the property is controlled by the owner or some other agent. It is more difficult for us to work this way as our clients usually want to know what is available straight away and do not wish to wait until we have contacted owners or other agents.

Deductions

Our rental commission is 20%. This figure is taken from the gross figure of the rental income and IVA is charged at 5%. For example, a property at price band J is £ 1520 per week in Peak. If this week was sold through one of our agents with a 10% discount the gross price would be £ 1368 less our 20% commission and, if required, 5% IVA leaving you the owner £ 1026.

From this figure we would also deduct the cleaning charges, if Villas and Vacations carried out the cleaning. Our cleaning charges include the maid’s labour and travelling expenses, all laundry and cleaning products. To simplify these charges we make a charge per bedroom per day occupied (see our Management contract for current prices). In general terms for the above a typical example of a 3 bedroom property would cost around £ 85 per week. Therefore nett to the owner would be £ 1026 less £ 85 which is £ 941.

If we had the property from 1^st April to end of October we should rent anything from 20 to 32 weeks and the percentage of direct and agent weeks is normally about 60/40 and our direct clients are increasing every year.

Next step

If you wish to rent your property we would first view the property with the intention of giving you a written confirmation of which price band we would offer the property at, with any recommendation of improvements or safety features, e.g. gas certificates, pool depth markers, glass door stickers etc. If you agree and contracts are signed we will appoint one of our rental team to your property, who will keep you informed on how your rentals are progressing and be your main point of contact.

Before we can do any rentals for your property you must ensure that you have someone responsible for the property management, either this can be done by Villas and Vacations or a third party who can respond 24 hours, 7 days a week.