Vacation properties are not just for the elite and wealthy!If you were a rich man… Stop right there! Just because you’re not rich doesn’t mean you don’t want a second home to get away from life as you know it. Whether you dream of living on the beach with sand between your toes or getting away from civilization in a mountain cabin, you don’t have to be a Rockefeller to enjoy your dream home.In Profit From Your Vacation Home Dream: The Complete Guide to a Savvy Financial and Emotional Investment, vacation home buying expert Christine Hrib Karpinski shows you how to not only make your vacation home dream a reality, but to get others to pay your mortgage when you’re not enjoying your home away from home. By renting your vacation home using Karpinski’s recipe for successful vacation home ownership, you will soon be on the road to buying, enjoying and profiting from your second, third – and even fourth home.Karpinski will show you how to: •Evaluate the different types of vacation properties and weigh the advantages and disadvantages of each. •Determine how many weeks you need to rent your home and how much you can charge to break even. •Become a master at managing real estate transactions –from negotiating the purchase price to maintaining the property – from the comfort of your hometown. •Determine if renting-by-owner or working with a property management company is right for you.
Vacation rental properties are rarely big moneymakers for their owners; more often than not, they're a money pit. So when Christine Karpinski discovered you really could make money with vacation homes, she knew she had to share her knowledge with others. For nearly fifteen years, she has done just that at her seminars with thousands of owners. From helping an individual purchase their very first property to training a whole team of employees for an owner of nearly 200 properties to anyone in between, Christine's seminars have transformed vacation property ownership into a lucrative investment.
Shortly after moving to Atlanta in 1996, Christine went to Destin, Florida where she fell in love with the beaches and dreamed of owning a vacation property. But there was one problem: the little one and two-bedroom condos were pricier than she realized, costing more than their home in Atlanta. Christine even considered rental income, but just couldn't seem to make the numbers work. For most people, this is where the dream ends.
Being determined, Christine didn't give up and realized the only factor that could make a vacation property on the beach possible was eliminating property management commissions (which are generally 20-50% of the rental income). From there she started researching "renting by owner". And yes, she did end up buying that dream home on the beach and had positive cash flow from day one!
Hearing of Christine's success, other owners wanted to know why she had so many more bookings than they did and made twice as much money! Fellow owners were also intrigued that she never had damage by guests and she wasn't paying commission to the management company.
Clearly, Christine had figured out how to profitably manage vacation rentals, so she started setting up seminars to teach other owners. Now Christine has become one of the most respected voices in vacation property ownership. Today, she can be found speaking all over the country at seminars, on radio, trade shows and she is a regular contributor to industry magazines and many online newsletters.
In March of 2004, Christine completed her first two books, How To Rent Vacation Properties By Owner -The Complete Guide to Buy, Manage, Furnish, Rent, Maintain and Advertise Your Vacation Rental Investment and The Vacation Rental Organizer, which were both on the best-sellers list and have sold thousands of copies.
In July of 2005, Christine's second book was released, Profit from Your Vacation Home Dream, The Complete Guide to a Savvy Financial and Emotional Investment.
In January of 2007, Christine releases a full rewritten second edition, How to Rent Vacation Properties by Owner, 2nd Edition: The Complete Guide to Buy, Manage, Furnish, Rent, Maintain and Advertise Your Vacation Rental Investment.
Christine has taught sold-out seminars throughout the country including The Real Estate Expo in NYC with Donald Trump, Suze Orman and Robert Kiyosaki. She has been a frequent guest on television and radio shows such as CNN, Bloomberg's "Personal Finance," CBS MarketWatch Radio, and HGTV Radio and is often interviewed on real estate topics for Realty Times, The Wall Street Journal, Kiplinger's Personal Finance and many daily newspapers. Her books, combined with her seminars and media appearances, have helped thousands of people manage and profit from their second homes.
In February of 2005, Brian Sharples of WVR Group, Inc. (now HomeAway, Inc.) called Christine and asked her to consult for his new company he was starting. In July of 2005, Christine became a full time employee and served as Director, Owner Community for HomeAway, Inc. In this roll she created the Owner Community website, a resource center for vacation rental owners. Under her direction, she conducted countless seminars for vacation owners, a weekly podcast series, over a thousand articles, and championed and executed HomeAway's first-ever owners conference. In November of 2010, under her direction a new community forum was built so that owners could communicate with each other online.
During her tenure at HomeAway, Christine also served as an internal consultant for products and services pertaining to vacation rental owners. She was also she was also a trusted advisor to the executive team- who relied on Christine's perspective for a myriad of key decisions that helped shape and influence what HomeAway has become today. One of her greatest accomplishments during her tenure at HomeAway was the work she did for the acquisition of VRBO.com.
In February of 2011, Christine left HomeAway Inc. and today is enjoying working as an independent author, speaker and advisor in the vacation rental industry. She and her family reside in Austin, Texas. She owns multiple vacation rental properties that she still rents "by Owner" and is often referred to as "The Most Respected Voice in the Vacation Rental Industry."
