BeachHouse: Waterfront Rental? All You Need to Know

What is BeachHouse?

BeachHouse is a sales and rental site that focuses only on ocean-front real estate in the U.S. and a handful of international locations.

How it works

The site’s formula is pretty simple. If you have a beach house to rent, you can buy a basic advertisement with 10 photos for $149 annually. If you want to add more photos; manage your calendar on the site; or get other bells and whistles, you pay more.

BeachHouse review

Beach House is simply advertising your rental. You manage the rental from start to finish, listing your name and contact information in your advertisement. When you secure a rental, you check out the potential tenants and collect payment yourself.

While this is more time-consuming for the homeowner, it also gives you more control. And since you’re communicating with the tenant yourself, you avoid some of the communication issues that both renters and homeowners complain about when they go through competing sites, such as Airbnb and VRBO.

Fee vs commission

It’s also worth noting that Airbnb and VRBO charge both you and your renter a commission. And these commissions can be costly for both homeowners and renters, particularly for expensive and long-term deals.

Consider a $10,000 rental. Airbnb’s 3% commission charged to homeowners would shave $300 off the homeowner’s take. However, it would also charge the renter another 10% to 15% — roughly $1,000 to $1,500. In this case, paying the $150 annual fee is a relative bargain for everyone.

That said, the fee is a sure thing. Commissions, on the other hand, are only charged when you get a rental. So the question of which is better boils down to how popular your beach house is. If you think you’ll get plenty of rentals, the fee-based structure is best. If you’re not sure, go with a site that charges commissions. Or use both for a year and see which is most cost-effective.

Recommendations

If you don’t mind the management and you regularly rent out your beach house, this site’s reasonable listing cost seems well worth the price. BeachHouse shows up high in search results for people looking for beach houses in many major tourist markets, so it may bring in ample renters without having to pay commission-based charges.

However, if you want to keep your house rented, we’d also suggest listing with Airbnb. The industry leader is just so well-known that many potential customers never look further.

Want to try BeachHouse?

Here’s a direct link to the BeachHouse site.