Software Episodes

Join Alex and Annie in this exciting episode of "Alex and Annie, The Real Women of Vacation Rentals," as they sit down with Assaf Karmon, the CEO and founder of Turno. Discover Assaf's journey from being an Airbnb host to creating a revolutionary platform that transforms the vacation rental turnover process. Assaf's Journey: Assaf opens up about his struggles managing cleaning and turnovers as a host, leading to the birth of Turno. The hosts delve into the challenges hosts face in finding relia...

In this episode, Alex & Annie are joined by Marcus Räder - Founder & CEO of Hostaway. Hostaway is one of the fastest growing vacation rental management software companies, perfect for those with 5 to 1,000+ listings. They make it easy for you to get more out of your business while spending less time with tedious manual tasks by offering a variety of pre-made software-based solutions. Last time Marcus was on the show, we spoke about what companies really learn as they attempt to grow with investm...

On this episode of Alex & Annie : The Real Women of Vacation Rentals, Alex is joined by D. Brooke Pfautz, Founder of Vintory - a company that is laser-focused on helping vacation rental managers grow their inventory. Brooke stumbled into the vacation rental space right before the global economic crisis of 2008 when he founded Vantage Resort Realty which quickly grew to 500+ properties under management and became one of the country’s largest vacation rental managers. After exiting from Vantage in...

Today joining Alex & Annie is Kimberly Miles, Executive Director of the Vacation Rental Management Association (VRMA) - an international, professional trade association of the vacation and holiday rental property management and hospitality industries. Kimberly has been with the VRMA for 2 years, and previously had an impressive 19 year tenure at American Hotel & Lodging Association, where she advanced up to becoming their SVP of Operations. Our very own Alex Husner is also a board member of the...

In this episode, Alex and Annie are joined by Dora Du, CMO of WYND - venture-backed startup that has built proprietary sensor technology that helps homeowners take control of the air in their properties. Their first use case is a product line that monitors and improves in-door air quality, and more recently they’ve released a new product that detects noise and smoke. WYND was founded by MIT engineers and scientists, with their first focus being to create products for the residential market. Dur...

In this special edition of our “Spotlight on Exceptional Property Managers'' series, presented by Casago, we sit down with Stacy Wesson of Casago Cascara Vacations. Stacy shares her stories and experience in the industry running the family business in Sun River, Oregon that joined forces with Casago in April of 2022. The story of Casago Cascara Vacations for Stacy is one that begins in her early childhood. Her parents opened the business when she was only 5 years old, so she’s seen the evolutio...

Welcome back to another exciting episode! Today, we have a special guest, Bart Sobies, who is an expert in vacation rentals and technology. Bart is the visionary behind The Accommodation Show and iBooked.Online. He has a long history of success, starting his first online business at just 15 years old. With his passion for technology, marketing, and investment, Bart has helped many hospitality owners generate extra revenue through direct bookings and digital products. He is also the founder of a ...

Join us for an enlightening conversation with Jeff Iloulian, the CEO of HostGPO, a game-changing buying group for short-term rentals. Discover Jeff's remarkable journey from lawyer to successful vacation rental operator. He founded HostGPO to solve the challenge of sourcing high quality, affordable products for vacation rentals. By leveraging collective buying power, HostGPO transforms the industry, making it easier for operators to access top-notch products at discounted rates. In this episo...

This is a must-see episode: Today, we are joined by Dana Lubner, Director of Community Development at Rent Responsibly and host of the podcast "How to Save Your Vacation Rental Business." With a background in marketing and advertising, Dana fell in love with the short-term rental industry while working with her brother's company, Effortless Rental Group. However, her real passion emerged when she witnessed the industry's need for advocacy and education. As a founding member of Mile High Hosts, D...

For today’s episode, we talk to Melanie Brown. Melanie is the Director of Data and Analytics at Key Data, the leading analytics and benchmarking company for the vacation rental industry. Melanie has a strong background in data-driven decision-making. She is excited to help property managers and destinations around the world better understand their data. Key Data is the leading provider of trusted, real-time short-term rental market data around the world. Key Data Dashboard was created BY proper...

In today’s episode, Alex and Annie feature two special guests, Jason Sprenkle, CEO of Key Data Dashboard, and Ben Coleman, President of Rev & Research. They unveil a new partnership between their two organizations to better service their co-customers. Key Data is great at helping customers visualize data, especially with the increasing use of purely automated pricing platforms, while Rev & Research excels at walking customers through the process. Ben shares how genuine care to help customers ...

In today’s episode, Alex and Annie feature Salar Tanzif, the VP of Sales at Guest Ranger. Security has become a primary concern for both property managers and homeowners. As a result, screening guests is essential to ensure that bad actors are detected and prevented from causing harm or damage. Guest Ranger, a risk management company, offers screening services that help to detect shady backgrounds, fraudulent activities, and other red flags that could indicate a problematic guest. Salar discu...

In today’s episode, Alex and Annie feature Suneel Goud, the CEO and Co-Founder of GuestView Guide, a SHARP NEC company. Suneel discusses their in-unit digital concierge designed for property managers and operators to enhance the guest's experience. GuestView Guide provides guests with everything they need to know about the property and the local area while saving time through the automation of tasks and facilitating communication. The device is customizable and comes with a management console...

VALUES AND ETHICS ARE THE FOUNDATIONS OF SUCCESS In today’s episode, Alex and Annie welcome Steve Schwab, CEO of Casago. He shares his unintentional entry into the vacation rental industry and how working with the local community is at the core of his success. Steve also talks about Casago University, the company’s in-house training institution, and how this empowers local heroes because their success is the franchise's success too. Find out more about Steve and the owner-centric systems he c...

IMPROVE YOUR GUEST EXPERIENCE WITH SEAMLESS TECHNOLOGY In today’s episode, Alex and Annie welcome Thomas Schaper, the Head of Product at DACK Inc. Thomas shares his experience in creating DACK as an app that improves the guest experience and makes vacations easier. He also discusses details about DACK’s model from how it was named to how it works. Find out more about Thomas and DACK in this latest episode of Alex & Annie: The Real Women of Vacation Rentals. “REAL” TALK THOMAS: FREE UP YOUR...

SUCCESS IN THE VACATION RENTAL SPACE ISN’T ALWAYS INTENTIONAL and Arthur Colker is proof of that. Arthur is the CEO and founder of StayFi, and in this episode, discusses how he accidentally fell into the short-term rental and vacation rental space. He talks about how he helped a friend develop an independent brand, and how he saw the value in controlling and owning guests’ data. Arthur built a solution that helps managers and operators capture guest data and then monetize it through tools lik...

Luca Zambello joins us for today's episode to share the journey of creating Jurny, the industry's first MOS (management operating system). With roots in property management, Luca shares how he changed software 5 times - then finally realized, he wanted to create a solution to empower property managers to more efficiently run their businesses...and that he wanted to be a technology company rather than a hospitality company. His journey is nothing short of inspiring and impressive! This episode...

Francois Goello who is the founder of Enso Connect joins us today for an interesting tale of how a terrible guest experience led to him founding one of the slickest guest apps on the market. Francois tells us how Enso Connect was built from the guest perspective first - rather than the property first - and how this frame of mind is enabling them to solve communication issues that PMS's (property management systems) were not made to handle. An entrepreneur from a very early age, Francois shares ...

Dennis Goedheid has built a budding empire in Orlando, that has recently spawned into Miami and Aruba. His entrepreneurial journey began in Belgium, where he learned the fundamentals of marketing and branding which he has applied to his Orlando based vacation rental business. Dennis is as humble as he is successful, and an asset to the vacation rental community. You'll never miss the Casiola team at conferences - they are always ON brand, in their bright fuchsia shirts! We love simple touches l...

Lance & Elaine Stitcher are owners and co-founders of Seaside Vacations & Sales, a premiere vacation rental management company that represents nearly 300 properties in Chincoteague Island, VA and Ocean City, MD. This power couple has grown their business rapidly in the past decade by staying focused on the fundamentals - company culture, happy homeowners, work/life balance, innovative marketing and dynamic pricing. This episode is part of our Spotlight on Exceptional Property Managers, brought ...

Robin Craigen and his wife Heather had a unique beginning in their hospitality journey that started on the high seas with their luxury yacht charter business. During this time, they developed a formula for creating exceptional guest experiences that would later lead them to trade their swim trunks and flippers for snow suits and ski poles. They moved to Steamboat Springs and opened a ski chalet business with just 2 properties, applying the same principles they learned from the yacht business to ...

Terry Whyte joins us today for an insightful look at the past, present and future of the vacation rental industry, and he shares his candid predictions for who will win the long game in vacation rental technology. Named as part of the "Top 20 Most Influential People in Vacation Rental Technology" by VRTech, Terry brings an incredible combination of experience and passion for the industry to any conversation he engages in. Terry and his wife Sandy have built a legacy of excellence over the past 2...

Last week we talked to Matt Loney, CEO of Xplorie about consolidations within vacation rental tech, and one of the areas he projected would consolidate was Operations software. Today, we have Koryn Okey from Breezeway to share her perspective on why operators are choosing to use an external tool like Breezeway for housekeeping & maintenance, and how they've internally consolidated several similar services into one - from messaging to checklists and vendor invoicing, Breezeway positions their val...

Today we're joined by Matt Loney, CEO of Xplorie, for a conversation about the current state of guest experience and tech in the vacation rental industry and what the future holds for consolidation between overlapping products. Matt predicts there will be 3 main sectors of vacation rental technology that will see consolidation: Guest Communication/Acquisition / CRM In-room technology Operations (housekeeping & maintenance) The influx of new technology pouring into vacation renta...