New Venture

[Rose]

My husband and I want to buy a property to do B & B and/or holiday cottage let. Is one any more profitable than the other and how many weeks of the year can we realistically expect to have guests in say a rural Cornwall area?

[Gill Horsfield]

My husband and I want to buy a property to do B & B and/or holiday cottage let. Is one any more profitable than the other and how many weeks of the year can we realistically expect to have guests in say a rural Cornwall area?

I've just opened a small B&B in the Forest of Dean. Although I can't directly answer your questions about profitability and occupancy, I can say that if you do decide to go down the B&B route, you have to be absolutely prepared for the business to come first. I have just 2 rooms but when there are guests in, I'm on-call pretty much 24 hours a day. I'm constantly surprised by how much time it all takes.

I've been reasonably busy since I opened - well, that's to say busier than I had hoped for a first season and being very new to the business. My tourist office told me that I could expect to be busy for about 25 weeks of the year once established, but this is still a developing area for tourism, unlike Cornwall.

In conclusion, I would say that even though I'm loving it, this is not an easy way to make money. The outlay is substantial and there are no guarantees that people will come - it might be some time before you reap the rewards of your labour. Of course, there may be lots of people out there that will disagree with me, but I'm talking from my own experiences so far.

Whatever you decide, do think it through very carefully. Unless you've done this before, I think it's hard to imagine the impact it has on your life. Anyway, good luck.

Gill.

www.belvederehouse.co.uk

[MC0705]

My husband and I want to buy a property to do B & B and/or holiday cottage let. Is one any more profitable than the other and how many weeks of the year can we realistically expect to have guests in say a rural Cornwall area?
Hi there,
I have been running a two bedroom holiday let in East Sussex for the last three years. I don't have experience of B&B, we do have on average about 20 weeks let per year, which makes it easier to carry on with a full time job and have a family life. Though most Saturdays are spent, cleaning, setting the cottage up and welcoming guests. But at least we don't have to do that everyday.Money wise, holiday let is not ideal for making money, you have to invest not only time but also money into the business. My partner and I both love meeting guests, I enjoy preparing the cottage and making it comfortable, and I see it as a long term investment into property. I recommend it as long as you are aware of how hard it could be and if you want to invest in a property without going down the buy to let route.

[BVC]

Hello, I have run both a B&B and a self catering cottage business and I would say that the B&B is much harder work and more time consuming. For example with the cottage I only have to change the beds weekly whereas with the B&B I was sometimes changing and laundering linen for four beds every day. Also, like the earlier contributer I found that I was tied to the house almost all the time espcially at week-ends when as soon as one set of guests left, the next wanted to arrive. Although I tried to have a guest free zone between 11.0 am and 3 pm it didn't always work. With self-catering Saturday is a hectic day but apart from that and general admin there is nothing like the workload. Having said that it is obviously cheaper to start B&B than it is to start self-catering unless you already have suitable letting property available. If you were converting an existing outbuilding for example I would think the set up costs of either would be similar.I think you need to think about why you want to run the business, do you enjoy cooking etc and spending quite a large part of your day being available to and talking with your visitors or would you prefer the more hands off approach of self-catering. I did the B&B while my children were young and I was tied to the house anyway. Now I prefer self-catering.
You need to do market research to find out if either business is profitable in your area, ask the local tourist information office, speak to other accomodation providers. Here in the Scottish borders we get about 40 bookings a year for our cottage including the out of season week-end breaks. I have no idea what it would be like in Cornwall. As to profitability, you need to draw up a business plan for each option and see which comes out on top. Good luck.

[Karina Brennan]

Hi there - the BBC are currently looking for homeowners who have plans to start a B&B business - if you've decided you have the right location, a head for business, can rustle up a full English and are about to take the plunge - we'd be interested in hearing from you - please e-mail us at hth@bbc.co.uk or you can call us on 01612444353 (standard rates apply) Thanks!

[Ghislaine]

Hi

I would imagine it's more profitable to do a holiday let for a week or two weeks for the following reasons:
They have to leave it as clean as they find it unlike a b&b which needs you cleaning the rooms daily and changing the bedlinen regularly.
It is more likely to be a longer let minimising on voids. Most b&b lets are one or two days with a few for longer.
You won't have to plan, buy and prepare breakfast.
You won't have to put toiletries etc in the rooms.
I have heard the going rates certainly in my area of Kent are higher than for b&bs, and the rates for b&bs are always compressed under hotel rates.

Hope this is helpful
All the best
Gilly
http://www.TheLancers.co.uk

[peddars way]

Hi

We have a B & B also a Self Catering holiday let, first the B & B we are in a very rural location on a working farm, we have had the B & B for two years (3 rooms) I really think there is a lot of work in B & B but if operated right you can make a lot of profit, I love to cook, we even do evening meals which are very popular, we are full every weekend throughout the year, with quite a lot of midweek bookings, we make a very good living. To set up the B & B did not cost a lot of money, we already had the large farmhouse which is a listed building, which has lovely period features, we do not have any passing trade, and do not accept anyone coming to the door for a room, although the B & B is on a national trail, we get a lot of bookings from people that are going to walk the trail. We actually love the whole experience and that makes quite a difference, if you enjoy your business it comes quite natural.

Now the Self Catering, that is completely different, although you are only doing a linen change once a week, the cleaning of the accommodation takes a considerable time, as people do not leave the property as they found it, we have had people staying that have left washing up, all the cutlery, plates, etc glasses have to be washed wet towels left everywhere, oven is often left in a terrible mess, so I would say that the Self Catering is much more hard work.

Our Self Catering is a converted stables, which we had done ourselves is 5* rated, two bedroomed, it is booked for probably around 38 weeks of the year with a very good profit, we do not accept children under 12 no pets this is to minimize any damage.

I think to have the two B & B and Self Catering works really well because you get the best of both worlds and can make serious money if it is done right, also if the Self Catering is empty we use the two bedrooms for B & B for family's.

I hope this has been of some help

o:)

[BVC]

Hello, I was interested in the comments about the state in which guests left the self-catering accommodation. This is not something I have suffered from myself, but when talking to my assessor recently she said that there is a growing trend among self-caterers to offer two rates for their accommodation, one a 'leave it as you find it rate' and the other, an 'if you want me to clean up after you it is an extra £15.00' rate. She said it seemed to work well where she had seen it implimented. She also suggested that the messies should be asked to leave an hour earlier than the others. Does anyone out there operate this system? BVC

[Libra]

Hello, I was interested in the comments about the state in which guests left the self-catering accommodation. This is not something I have suffered from myself, but when talking to my assessor recently she said that there is a growing trend among self-caterers to offer two rates for their accommodation, one a 'leave it as you find it rate' and the other, an 'if you want me to clean up after you it is an extra £15.00' rate. She said it seemed to work well where she had seen it implimented. She also suggested that the messies should be asked to leave an hour earlier than the others. Does anyone out there operate this system? BVC

Hello BVC

On the whole we have found people do leave as they find. On the odd occasion my housekeeper has phoned to say otherwise I deduct money from the security deposit and point out the quote in the terms and conditions.

Some are not too happy but they have to agree to the T&C before we accept their reservation. If they do not respect our property we would rather they stayed elsewhere.