This week we were working on another executive rental, or corporate rental, in the Jacksonville, Florida area. This will make our 3rd one in that market. Executive Rental and Corporate rental are the same thing. Executive rental is just the new buzz word, but the baby boomers remember them as corporate rentals. It simply means a furnished unit that could be anything from a studio to a 4-bedroom home.
We don’t cater to vacationers, although we have them in our units, we cater more to travelling professionals who are staying longer than a week. Our average guest is 3 weeks to 3 months and they call it a mid-term rental. So we are setting them up with their needs in mind. Do we have a comfortable office type workspace? Do we have good lighting for conference calls? This 1st picture is of a great little dog park on one of our properties. You may not think much of it, but a working professional who works all day needs an easy place where they can take their dog to get exercise and maybe even play with neighbor dogs. Many of our travel nurses come home so exhausted that the dog park is a great way for their dog to get some energy out.
Even our living room set ups are designed with them in mind. This second picture shows a great sleeper couch that has a built in chaise lounger. So, if they fall asleep while decompressing after work, it is still comfortable. We also put recliners in place for those who like to kick back while they are working, or just get their feet up after a long day.
We even make sure our pictures hanging work well for backdrops in their conference calls. We create guidebooks for them to easily find good restaurants, places to visit, and things to do. We want them to not only enjoy their time there, even if they are working, we want them to look forward to it because we become a trusted friend. We price our units so that they can stay under their per diems and not have to pay out of pocket to have a great stay.
Thinking this way can make it challenging when I’m staging because I have pick things with them in mind instead of what I would rather decorate with. I’m thinking about how it will look in a picture or backdrop, not just what I like. This means it takes longer than usual with all the rising costs and supply chain issues. But it is also a new adventure each time and I always enjoy a new adventure. This one led me to a new supplier called Old Time pottery which had the best selection of wall hangings I’ve ever seen. Bet you wouldn’t have guessed it based on the name. The only reason I figured it out was by accident. We had an amazon package delivered to a locker inside their store. So I took the time to actually see what the store had, it was a huge warehouse full of all things home decoration it was great.
But now that adventure is in the books, and it is onto the next one!
