Countdown to our B&B opens

Bed & Breakfast / Short Term Rental Host Forum

Help Support Bed & Breakfast / Short Term Rental Host Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

GrandKlintDK

Member
Joined
Oct 27, 2010
Messages
5
Reaction score
0
Hi all!
We're a new couple on the website and we're really excited about opening our own B&B in Ibiza in March 2011. We've lived in Ibiza before for 2 x 6 month, but now we're taking the leap and moving there for good. We have a lot of great contact and friends already and we're just so looking foward to realising the dream we've always had.
We haven't quite decided which house is the perfect one for us, but we will be going there in december to sign the final contract. We've decided to do a rental with the possibility of buying, it gives us the time to figure out if the place is perfect for our needs and how the size are with rooms and outdoor area. We're planning on signing on a house with only 4 bedrooms, one of them for our selves and the rest is up for rent. Is this enough? We will be working both of us while having the B&B to make everything possible money whise and to make sure we're not broke withing half a year.
Well thats our story, looking foward to learning a lot more of the inn keeping business and reading all about all of you :)
Regards Sofie & Christian
 
welcome.gif
Best of luck!
 
WELCOME!
I have no idea where that is, I better look it up! ALL THE BEST!
welcome.gif
 
Whether three rooms will be enough is up to you. If you're counting on it to be your sole income...it probably won't be enough. If you're looking to run it with no outside help, It might seem like plenty.
Hard question to answer without knowing anything about your situation, the area, or the type of Inn you are looking to operate. Any other B&B's in the area you're looking at?
 
welcome.gif
You are definantely in the right place--many many good innkeepers that have many great ideas and suggestions-we tell it like it is and don't cloud the truth.
Many happy Innkeeping days....how exciting!
 
I would love to do this in Ibiza. My concerns would be,, the market is only 4 months long and the island pretty much closes for the winter. Or at least that is what my friends who live there say. Also with a rental would you be able to make changes like add baths etc and not be concerned about the long term picture.
 
Best of luck! Ibiza is great!
Both of you working f/t & running the property...will you have outside help? My husband & I run 5 rooms alone (no outside help) & wouldn't have a spare second for another job. This one is full time PLUS! (think, cleaning, laundry, marketing, interacting, electric probs., plumbing difficulties, questions about restaurants, questions about local attractions, late checkins, late checkouts, etc., etc., etc.,).
 
It is all about your market: upscale or budget, young and party or quiet and restful ...
That tells you what you need in bathrooms and furnishings, service. Are you offering what is already there? If so, ask them how it goes. If you want a different market niche, such as more restful, off-season, you will have to figure out how to attract it.
Good luck!
 
Not even knowing what country Ibiza is in, I did some Wiki research. While it is absolutely gorgeous, the following phrases gave me pause......
"Ibiza is considered a popular tourist destination, especially due to its legendary and at times riotous nightlife"

"Due to Ibiza's notable tolerance toward misbehavior from young adult tourists, it has acquired the sobriquet "Gomorrah of the Med".

"The island's government is trying to encourage a more cultured and quieter tourism scene, passing rules including the closing of all nightclubs by 6 a.m. at the latest, and requiring all new hotels to be 5-star"
!!!!!!!!
Not exactly the type of place where I would vacation, but if one does not mind riotous young Germans and Brits (top two foreign visitors), then it might just be your cup of tea.
Beware GRAND....consider the short season and what your guests are likely to be before you take this plunge. Sometimes the place you most love to visit is not the best place to open a B&B.
 
Is this the same place that EASTENDERS would go on holidays? Where all the fantastic Spanish restaurants serve up chips chips and more chips and are irritated by the Brits who come there to drink and party?
So the clientele would be YOUNGER PARTIERS? Bringing hook ups back to the rooms etc?
It's the Cancun of Spain. LOL
 
WOW ... thank you all for the great comments and fast replys.
We've now decided to start off with a newly-built apartment and renting out 2 rooms at first.
Ibiza is really not at all our dream-place to be for long term, but we've spent so much time there and have a lot of friends there, who are willing to help with all the transaction of moving to a new country and starting something. Our main goal is to get to know the B&B lifestyle before deciding on buying a big property and focusing mainly on the B&B. We are planning on living in Ibiza for a year or two and then be moving to Barcelona or Mallorca maybe, whereever our hearts take us. For now we just need to do it and hopefully when we're living in spain and have a functional B&B the next step of buying a place or moving to a nearby place will not be that hard.
At least we're getting closer :) We're really looking foward to going there and we feel like we have a great opportunity already. The apartment we're moving into is the nabour apartment to my very dear friend, who is already running a B&B in her home with 2 bedrooms for renting put, which means we will be learning so much from her and probably be getting some of the costumers she does not have room for by paying her some sort of fee. But just having someone visit us quite easy will make us try it and hopefully people will come back to visit us when the find out in some years that we will be moving somewhere else. We where looking for a villa with 3-4 bedrooms to rent out at first, but since we had this one offered with 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, terrace of 80m2 and a roof terrase of 300m2, plus a rent of 750 euros instead of 1600 euros for a villa, we just couldn't say no. It will mean that we do not need to stress about having to rent out all the time the first year and we can always size up if the B&B is really working.
Does all this sounds like the worst idea ever?
 
WOW ... thank you all for the great comments and fast replys.
We've now decided to start off with a newly-built apartment and renting out 2 rooms at first.
Ibiza is really not at all our dream-place to be for long term, but we've spent so much time there and have a lot of friends there, who are willing to help with all the transaction of moving to a new country and starting something. Our main goal is to get to know the B&B lifestyle before deciding on buying a big property and focusing mainly on the B&B. We are planning on living in Ibiza for a year or two and then be moving to Barcelona or Mallorca maybe, whereever our hearts take us. For now we just need to do it and hopefully when we're living in spain and have a functional B&B the next step of buying a place or moving to a nearby place will not be that hard.
At least we're getting closer :) We're really looking foward to going there and we feel like we have a great opportunity already. The apartment we're moving into is the nabour apartment to my very dear friend, who is already running a B&B in her home with 2 bedrooms for renting put, which means we will be learning so much from her and probably be getting some of the costumers she does not have room for by paying her some sort of fee. But just having someone visit us quite easy will make us try it and hopefully people will come back to visit us when the find out in some years that we will be moving somewhere else. We where looking for a villa with 3-4 bedrooms to rent out at first, but since we had this one offered with 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, terrace of 80m2 and a roof terrase of 300m2, plus a rent of 750 euros instead of 1600 euros for a villa, we just couldn't say no. It will mean that we do not need to stress about having to rent out all the time the first year and we can always size up if the B&B is really working.
Does all this sounds like the worst idea ever?.
GrandKlintDK said:
Does all this sounds like the worst idea ever?
Not the worst idea ever, just unrealistic and not properly thought out. Once you pour a bunch of money into opening your business, how will you get out of it to move anywhere else? If you plan on selling the business in Ibiza and then moving to Madrid, don't count on taking your guests with you, unless you want to open yourself up for a lawsuit.
Will you have private space for yourselves in this three bedroom place with two rentable rooms? Will you share living space with guests? Will your two guests share the second bathroom, or will you share a bath with guests? What does the municipality allow in terms of B&B, breakfast and such...do you even know the legalities? Will you mind being stuck in your house most of the time, and not being able to party or enjoy the beauty of the area?
I could ask you a thousand such questions. Perhaps you should work for someone else's B&B/Inn/Hotel in that area first before striking out on your own. You might hate it...there is no faster way to ruin your favorite vacation spot than to open a B&B there.
Honestly, this sounds to me like pie-in-the-sky dreaming. If there is one thing this forum can do for you, it's showing you a realistic picture of what the B&B business is like....and it's NOT what dreamers think it is....I don't think anyone on the forum here would disagree.
Sorry to slam the door on your fingers, but I don't feel you are anywhere near ready to make the decision, you have alot of research to do.
 
Hi Wendy :)
Please feel free to "slap the door at my fingers" so to speak ;) I'm greatful to hear all of your experiences and what to do or what not to do.
We really don't know at all if the B&B idea is us and that is one of the reasons why we're starting out really small. We've pretty much got the rent covering through our other jobs, so it's not a neccesary, just something we need to try out to figure out if it really us to have people living where we live. We are NOT buying anything right now, it is a newly built apartment, which means we don't have to do anything renovating to it and we have plenty of new furniture to fit the style we wish.
This is not really opening a complete B&B for now, we're just taking the first step of moving from Denmark to Spain and trying it out before deciding on anything final. It would be so sad to buy a really nice place, renovate it, start a B&B and then figure out it's really not what we wish at all. That is why we're doing it this way and we will not have to fully book our apartment, we can manage by renting out the rooms with free spaces between the renting and see along the way how it goes, how much work it is, if it fits our personalities, if there is even costumers for it.
Regards Sofie
 
Hi Sofie
Good for you to take the comments and to keep going anyway! Nobody is trying to scare you or any other aspiring innkeepers, but they are telling you the real facts of B&B life. I find the people on this forum to be very knowledgeable and open. Above all they are very, very, passionately about their profession and have no problem in sharing this.
If you want to explore the idea (or dream) of running a B&B … your rent/apartment plan seems (in my humble opinion) a good low risk option to get a feel for the issues. More importantly you find out what living in Spain is instead of vacationing - seems at least as important to me.

My advice (as european innkeeper)
don’t burn all your bridges, have a plan B
check and double check the legal issues - can you rent out, tax?
focus on experience of B&B owners in Spain, visit many B&B’s there, a B&B means different things in different countries/regions (and no B&B is the same)
buy some books on innkeeping
 
Back
Top