From 2 to 70: Declan McGonigal’s Blueprint for Vacation Rental Success

Alex Husner  
Welcome to Alex & Annie: The Real Women of Vacation Rentals. I'm Alex 

Alex Husner  
and I'm Annie, 

Alex Husner  
and we're joined today by Declan McGonigal, who is the owner operator at My Beach Vacation Rentals. Declan, it's so good to see you.

Declan McGonigal  
Yeah, happy to be here. Thanks for having me on

Annie Holcombe  
so I have to ask the question, McGonigal, are you any relation to Professor McGonagall from Harry Potter?

Declan McGonigal  
I'm not. I'm not. I've fallen in love with the series lately. It's really good. It's funny. My cousins and other parts of my family really liked it, so they and their mcgonagalls, they're on my, you know, dad's side. But I never really got the joke until, like, this past year.

Annie Holcombe  
Now, you embrace it right now, I

Declan McGonigal  
embrace it exactly.

Annie Holcombe  
Okay. Well, so aside from your Harry Potter fame that we're going to tie you to. I'd love to hear your story. We're going to talk about that, but tell us a little bit about your journey into vacation rentals, where you started and how you got here. Yeah,

Declan McGonigal  
yeah. So I basically got started in it pretty soon after college. So went to school for engineering, gave that a try up in DC. Didn't really turn out to be my thing came back down to North Myrtle Beach, which is where I'm from, born and born and raised. My family's in the hotel business, so they've always kind of been in the hospitality world. My dad and my uncle had a few short term rentals, and basically were just, you know, kind of having me manage them, because they were essentially self managing them. So I started with two, and then kind of fell in love with it. I really enjoyed the I kind of enjoyed the mix of, you know, the numbers and the investment side of it and revenue management and whatnot, but also getting out and about and actually going around, running around all the rentals and and checking on them, doing inspections, all that sort of stuff. So I kind of fell in love with the mix and decided that, you know, my dad, again, is has his own business. Why not I start kind of my own and learn a bunch from from an early age. So started it with like two, like I said, and then probably grew to six after a year, and then maybe a year and a half later, I grew to 10. So I wasn't, wasn't really seeing a lot of growth, but it kind of kind of took off from there after I got some help from some people in the business and friends in the area. So that's kind of how I got into it.

Alex Husner  
And how many properties you're up to now,

Declan McGonigal  
we're at about 70 now. So

Alex Husner  
huge compared

Declan McGonigal  
to it was a big jump. Like I said, the it was really slow at the beginning. I just didn't really know what I was getting into. I also had probably a little bit of, like, young, kind of stubborn ambition as well. You know, I thought, Oh, I'm young guy. I'll come into Myrtle Beach with all these old guys and just kill it. But turns out, business is a lot harder than that. It's a lot harder than just coming to a place and having good ideas. So it took me a little bit of time, but, but got it going, and now it's been about three and three and a half years, three years or so, and like I said, about 70 rentals. So it's been, it's been good. Yeah,

Alex Husner  
that's a good portfolio size, and you're just just slightly north of where I live, in Myrtle Beach. And have gotten to come and watch your journey over the last few years. And just super exciting to I remember, like, at one point early last year we had spoke, and I think at that point you were at like, 30 or 40, and then all of a sudden, I saw you last fall, and you're like, Yep, we're at 70 now. So really, really impressive growth. But tell us a little bit about how you did grow to that level. Has that been referrals, or are you doing any sort of like homeowner marketing? I know our audience curious to hear how people grow that fast, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Declan McGonigal  
So a lot of it came through realtor referrals, which kind of makes sense, right? Like, I'm from the area, I knew a good amount of people. I didn't necessarily know a ton of Realtors, but knew a good amount of people. And like I said, that first year was really, was really a struggle. After, probably, after probably about a year and I was really considering just like quitting, because I was like, This is too hard. I'm not I'm not growing at all. But I had a buddy in on the real estate sales side of things. He was super helpful in kind of just one keeping me in it and keeping me motivated, but also kind of giving me sort of a framework to work with, to kind of connect with realtors and network with them and and grow the referrals from there. So a lot of it, like the early days, was just me, just cold calling realtors and just seeing how I can add value to them. A lot of that was rental projections, right? I think that's a pretty common thing today, and it's, it's a pretty, I'm not gonna say, easy thing to do, but we use key data, and they, they have a really good tool for creating rental projections. So started doing that with realtors. It was received like fairly well, you know, you get the majority of the calls, they'd say, Ah, we're good, right now. We don't need anything, but just follow up, follow up, follow up. Three months later, you start to kind of get some people, Hey, I've got this guy here. Hey, I've got this guy here. And you jump on it quick, right? Because I've, again, I only had 1015, rentals, you know, I didn't, there wasn't necessarily a ton of work on my plate, so I could get to those things really quickly. And I think the realtors appreciated that I was always available to help them. Still, I'm available today. I'm, you know, I really try to maintain those relationships and give as much value as I can. And that, just like I said, it took off from there. It took time. Know, again, it took a few years to get it going, but it kind of blew up. I also think we were, you know, it was fast growth, but I also think it was a time when a lot of transactions were happening. So I've noticed lately, for example, with the referrals have slowed down a little bit. So now we're trying to figure out how to diversify, sort of, our marketing approach. But the early days that, yeah, it was, it was all real to referrals. That's really how I got from from two to 60, you know,

Alex Husner  
yeah, and you were doing some meetups, too different events and, like, networking type things that you were hosting. I think that was really, really brilliant to do to make those connections.

Declan McGonigal  
Yeah, that's actually, I'm I'm even thinking about starting those up again, because we kind of got not lazy with them, but we, we stopped doing them in the summer, and then I let someone else do them, but, but, yeah, we were doing a host meetup once a month. We just go out to a bar, you know, for essentially a Wednesday or Thursday happy hour. And I put a post out in the Facebook groups. You know, Myrtle Beach has a lot of real estate investment and short term rental Facebook group. So it was just putting a post in there, saying, hey, any investors, realtors, anybody in the real estate business, or anybody that's interested, please come out. And the turnout was, was small to start, you know, maybe 10 to maybe, you know, eight to 12 people. But then it started to pick up. And you kind of, there were a few realtors and mortgage folks that would come consistently, so I built really good relationships with them, and that kind of helped my network a lot too, because I noticed the the people that would come to those were usually young and and kind of hungry in their own industry as well. So just by virtue of building relationships with them, I also got connected with some of the people we that they knew. So it was kind of a compound effect, but, but, yeah, doing anything unique like that, you know, again, just to kind of stand out and differentiate yourself from any other property manager that's asking, I think goes a long way. 

Annie Holcombe  
Yeah, Ithink that's one thing that we, we know for certain from our experience in the industry. But just in talking with other people, it doesn't matter what market it's really about. You know, the statement of like your network is your net worth, and the bigger you can build that network up and really consistently work within that network. I mean, it just sort of feeds on itself and helps build things so very smart. Because a lot of people, I think a lot of people that start in the business, think that they have all the answers when they start and they don't try to reach out to other people, they think, I'm just going to go the way I want to do it. And probably would have given up, you know, if they hadn't tried. But I did want to ask one thing that we do talk about a lot with for our listeners, is our tech stack. So you started out and you grew and so you had to, you know, with your Dad's experience from the hotel side, he probably had some really great insights on technology, but technology for vacation rentals and hotels is very different, yeah. How did you approach that? You know, you obviously had this, this great idea of like, working within your community, but the technology piece of it is something that you really kind of have to find in your own way. So how did you approach that. So

Declan McGonigal  
I guess the engineering background, I love technology. I love reading about it. You know, I love I love technology. I feel like a lot of a lot of people in are in the industry are kind of the same way where, you know, you can get just fascinated with all these different tech pieces out there. But we started on, on guesty, my dad actually had that in place on on the two rentals that he had, so I played around with that. Kind of got to using it real. And there were a few things I just didn't like on it early on. I think they've fixed those things since, but eventually I just made a switch from them after doing some, you know, sort of millennial research, I guess, just, you know, I'm looking up, like Top 10 PMS systems on YouTube and that sort of thing, yeah. And to your point, and I didn't you know there wasn't at that time there, you're kind of right. There wasn't really anybody else that I knew, Alex at that time. I don't even think I knew you. As far as, yeah, asking people in the industry what's a good one to move to. So kind of just YouTube and reviews online. I landed on host away and used host away for a good period of time, and then recently upgraded to track, just because I feel like we had to make a jump and we had to build out a website, and a few other things that that track could do well for us. But yeah, definitely the early days it was a lot of just looking on YouTube, you know, looking on online and whatnot. But I will say that once you meet people in the industry, they'll give you much better advice than than what you find online. So since then, I've, I've kind of learned, and before I make a move on anything, I definitely ask around and figure out what's good versus what's not. But the early days, yeah, it was just a lot of a lot of research online and testing things, right? We were I was playing with it. I didn't like this, didn't like that, and then change to a different solution, and figured out what I liked didn't like. So kind of just learning on my own, yeah, yeah. I

Alex Husner  
think that's, that's like the natural metamorphosis of getting into this business. And it's interesting now seeing, I see a lot of those Facebook groups of people asking, you know, what's the best PMS, or what's the best this? And you. Have a bunch of people weigh in, and the person will say, okay, cool, I'm going to go sign up for that. But you need more than that just, I mean, it's great to have a vote of confidence, especially if you know the person, if you don't even know the person, right their business. I mean, that makes it a kind of a blind decision, to be honest, but it really it makes a much bigger difference when you actually start meeting people, and you go to these conferences, which I know you've gone to several the vrmas now, and you kind of start connecting the dots. Of, like, okay, now I know what I really want, but stuff first.

Declan McGonigal  
And I've noticed too, like, I'm, I'm one of those people that kind of jumps into things probably a little quicker than I should. So even now, like, I look back on, like, some of the, some of the tech we've used in the past. I'm like, Yeah, I should have done a little bit more research there, or reached out to somebody, or, you know, gone on LinkedIn, or found somebody, but I kind of just figured it out at the time. But the conference is, yeah, to your point, Alex, are huge what you find online, you can learn 10 times more by going to a conference and and talking to the people that work at the companies or talking to people around the conference. So, yeah, once, once I got to the conference level, saw that it, it was eye opening. There's, there's really only so much you can find on YouTube and whatnot too. Yeah, it's so different from, I feel like we talk about this a lot. It's so different from market to market, what everybody needs. So even if you have a YouTube video from some guy in Colorado, you know, may not be as applicable to your business in Myrtle Beach or in Florida or wherever it is, right? So you always got to take things with a grain of salt, but definitely talking to talking to as many people as you can on that sort of stuff is is so important because it's hard to make a switch once you're now, now it's 70 units. It's like, okay, I've got a stick with what I've got, because the the switch would just be kind of taxing on the team, you know? So I would definitely, definitely do, do a good amount of research before you make a move on anything. Yeah.

Annie Holcombe  
PMS is painful if you have to make a switch, especially when the switch is having to made on someone else's timeline, it can really, really hammer your operations in that. Do you feel like you there's any things that you wish you'd known when you started. So like, if somebody comes to you now and says, Declan, like, what are the things I need to look at? Do you feel like you have a good sense of things that you missed? Yeah? Yeah. I'm

Declan McGonigal  
thinking, I think about this a lot, because I go back and forth on track. I've got good things to say about track, but one thing I've realized is, like, you've just gotta figure out, like, what's important to your business, you know, like, for us, when I think back on it, it's a lot of, like, simple stuff that just needs to be done. Well, it maybe not simple stuff, but a few things that need to be done. Well, you know, distribution to the channels is super important. A good messaging slash, like, contact inbox is really important to us the accounting side, that's something that I struggled with, kind of on guests and a little bit on host away was, you know, once you're getting up to 40, 5060, rentals, the accounting side of it gets pretty, pretty dang important. I can't even imagine what it's going to be like at 200 or 250 but early days, I was just doing the Owner Statements, kind of in a in a manual way, because, for whatever reason, I can't remember why it was, but I just could not get it to work for me correctly, or as I wanted to, on host away and guesty. So I was doing 20 to 30 statements a month manually. Again, once you get to 5060 you can't do that. So the accounting piece is is so important. Again, just figuring out, like, what pieces are really important to you? Or even asking your team, you know, if you've got, like, a small team, ask them, like, Hey guys, what do you like? What's important? Because a lot of it is, at least for us, and what we use is just fluff. Like, we could get rid of half the stuff that the PMs offers, probably more than half, and we wouldn't really need it. So just figuring out exactly what you need and what's super important to the core function, and what you guys do, I'd say, is the most important

Alex Husner  
part. It's good advice. Yeah, yeah. And we do see a lot of top down decisions being made, which that typically doesn't end well, that, you know, the one person that went to the conference, whether it's the owner or the GM, they come back and they say, this is what we're going to do. And then they, you know, didn't take into consideration what what is really needed on the maintenance side or in the accounting side. And I've definitely seen a lot of teams actually fall apart because of that, or really struggle. It's tough, and you want to have that buy in. So I think how you made your decision sounds like it made a lot of sense. Tell us a little bit more about your team. What does that look like? And what's the working model to keep those 70 units marketed and cleaned and rolling down? Yeah, definitely.

Declan McGonigal  
So we've got a team of seven of us now, including myself. So myself kind of, you know, kind of oversees a lot of the divisions, if you will. I try to focus a lot of my time on marketing, the properties, revenue management, marketing to homeowners and doing the sales on that side. Then we've got one guy that handles sort of the maintenance, cleaning inspections side of the business. I've got one guy that helps on a lot of the owner communication and guest communication. And then I've actually got three virtual assistants that handle all the guest communication as San. Actually, and then also do some admin work for different things. So helping with work orders, you know, helping with, you know, random social media things, or just random sort of administrative tasks they sort of help with. So, and then I've got one guy that I just added on the business development side trying to help me grow the business. So doing homeowner sales, reaching out to realtors, building relationships and in the local area with other people that could potential referral partners and whatnot. That's kind of the team right now, and that's, I don't know. I've really got to start asking other people what their team makeup looks like at my size. Because, again, I haven't really, like, taken a model from any other business that I know of. It's more so just been like figuring out, first it's like, what's the most time consuming stuff that's been taken up the majority of my time I need someone to fill that, I'd say early on the most time consuming stuff was running around the properties, you know, handling cleaners, doing some of the minor maintenance, coordinating with contractors, that sort of stuff. So that was the first position I filled, then the guest service side was the next position I filled, just because that's time consuming and and I'm one of those people that I need to get, like, big, important work done. I need no distractions. If I get distracted, which is extremely tough in this business, during the day, it's almost impossible. But if I get distracted, like, my focus is screwed, I need another 15 minutes to focus back on on what I need to do. So, so I got someone for the guest service, got someone for the maintenance team, just to be honest, one one of, one of my probably least favorite parts of the business is communicating with owners and that that sounds really bad, but I'm one of those people. I just want to get stuff done and move forward. I don't want to, like, linger on it and talk about it, but sometimes that's what owners want to do, and that's totally acceptable. I'm totally fine with that, but I found someone else that is better in that role and can kind of handle that communication. So at first it was figuring out stuff to make me more efficient and more valuable. And then now I'm starting to, I guess, fill in, like my weaknesses or parts of the business that maybe I don't love doing, that's kind of right,

Alex Husner  
yeah, yeah, that's really smart. Yeah. And Steve trover, he always comes to mind when we talk about, like, setting up your team. He's really good, better talent working with companies to, you know, outline their what their org chart should look like, even if you're not there yet. But like, what you need to be thinking about as you get to those certain breaking points and inventory, because you definitely do see, I mean, like, you're, you've got a nice, healthy team right now, but a couple years ago, I think it was basically just you and maybe one or two of those people, right? Yeah,

Declan McGonigal  
yeah. And we've got a little bit lately, yeah, I remember that conversation I had with you. We were having lunch, and you were like, Well, that does not seem like enough

Alex Husner  
directions. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And

Declan McGonigal  
lately, you know, to those people, I've hired pretty recently, so that seven person team necessarily hasn't been in place this whole time. And to be honest, we're probably a little overstaffed at this point. You know, at least we're in the off season, so it seems very slow and not not as much to do. But our goal is also to grow and and, you know, have smart growth and get quality rentals, but we want to grow. So that's kind of why I brought on a business development person, and, you know, some of the other guys to

Annie Holcombe  
help out along the way, like, just on the staffing note, going, kind of going back to technology. One thing that I've noticed is that a lot of younger startup companies, entrepreneurs, people that are newer to the business, have been quicker to adopt technology for different pieces of the business. And so, you know, the people employing, like offshore staffing for, you know, call center, stuff, those type of things. Have you brought on any technology or any pieces that you don't need to run there day to day within the business that can be either technology or people elsewhere working,

Declan McGonigal  
yeah, yeah. So definitely, the the virtual assistants have been huge, you know, for that stuff, actually, the buddy that kind of helped keep me in the game and kind of help with the marketing plan early on that I was alluding to, he also was the one that's connected me with the VA. So he's kind of the one that does the outreach or recruiting, whatever you want to call it, and kind of connects me. So he's been super helpful on that. Yeah, and then as far as technology, you know, you're talking about other technologies that make the business more efficient. Man, that's good question. I don't know. I've kind of flipped my attitude on technology. You know, we've got, like, the basic tools, right, the PMs, we've got a revenue management system that's super helpful, actually, here, here's one that may, may answer that question. So we're actually, I guess you call it like partnering with a professional revenue management company now, because I've realized the revenue management piece is obviously extremely important. And the time it's taking me for at least the process that I've had is kind of breaking, or not, not necessarily breaking, but it's just taking exponentially longer than it was at, you know, say, 40 properties, 50 properties. So I've had to kind of adapt in that way look at a revenue. Management company and bring them on. And then some other stuff I know we want to talk about happy guests. They've been super helpful. Whereas before, I wasn't collecting stuff like reservation agreements and security deposits, you know, for like direct reservations, that sort of standard stuff that you know that a lot of the old school companies do. I wasn't. I wasn't really doing that because I didn't really have an efficient way to collect that stuff that was, that was feasible for us, but, but happy guests, for example, is probably, they're probably the best tool that I'd say is made life easier, you know? I would say a lot of the other technology tools that we've implemented have are necessities. You know. I'd say Happy guest is probably the one that's made things easier. I know there's some maintenance tools out there, like breezeway, that I should probably do a little looking into, just because our maintenance process can definitely be be improved and organized better. But I'm actually trying not to get, like, too overwhelmed with technology right now. I'm looking again, like, at the core stuff that we absolutely need, and kind of shedding the rest well,

Annie Holcombe  
it can the overwhelming can happen, yeah, very quickly. So that's that's good. And I think it sounds like you're a student, so you want to continually learn, so that Exactly, exactly,

Declan McGonigal  
exactly. Yeah. So and track, you know, track offers a lot of stuff, so I'm trying to use as many features as I can in there without having to go to other other sources of technology. But yeah, that's kind of been my philosophy lately.

Alex Husner  
Yeah, you've got to take one project on at a time and understand, you know, what the benefit is going to be of not necessarily even just what you're investing from a monetary standpoint, but the time to onboard, the time to get your team using it, the training, all of that stuff is, I think sometimes, you know, here are companies that they're going to launch a new PMS and they're going to launch breezeway at the same time and revenue management at the same time, and it's like you're going to blow up the house, like you've got to take things kind of in chunks, unless you've got a massive, you know, really, really well organized and flexible team that doesn't mind change, which I've never met such a team in my life. So,

Declan McGonigal  
and I'll mention, I'll mention the virtual assistants. And I, honestly, I don't even like using the word VAs or virtual assistants anymore, because, because I feel like it has a bad connotation or an old connotation, but they've been our international team, if you will. They've been, they've been amazing. They're really, really good. And I think a lot of people think like, oh, you're hiring, you know, virtual assistants. They're not, you know, they're not going to do the job as well. But, you know, and there's a little bit of a language gap there, and kind of a cultural gap, I guess, if you will, but at the end of the day, they're also humans, you know, they're working eight hours a day, just like anybody over here would. They're actually working a little bit longer for us, but they're working, you know, non stop, like we are, and they've done a really good job for us. So I don't think we could have grown as quick as we did without virtual assistance. Now, I think we've also been very lucky with who we've got, I was, we've got a, you know, a few girls that are really, really strong and do a tremendous job on on the guest service and communication side of things. So that's probably Annie to your point, that's probably filled up a lot of like, what would otherwise be, maybe some technology solutions the international team has done great for us.

Alex Husner  
So I'm curious on the happy guest side, because that does relate to Guest Services. Has that implementing happy guests has that helped with the back and forth between your customers once they're here, when they have questions, things of that nature?

Declan McGonigal  
Yeah, it has. It's been, like I said, I think, I think the most valuable thing for us early on was, you know, when, when, when the guest first goes into happy guests, right? They got to go through four steps. They've got to do, they've got to agree to house rules again, sign a reservation agreement, upload an ID, and then do a security deposit or damage waiver. So before again, we were not collecting the reservation agreements. It was just it was hard to keep it organized, and, you know, just didn't have really an automated way of doing it. Now we are on the vast majority of our guests. All of our direct guests are, you know, completing those so that's been massive for us. It's just kind of, uh, it's also, it also helps me sleep at night, you know, like it was kind of scary before having, yeah, reservations, and we didn't have many, to be honest. You know, it wasn't, it wasn't long ago that we were getting, like, minimal to know, no direct reservations, but, but now it's, you just feel a lot more confident with the guests coming through, that they're going through that process. And then you get the added benefit of of the upsells, right? So that's that's been huge. And then, yeah, when guests come, it definitely helps. I think having a guidebook is amazing. We're gonna, we're gonna also start adding some like, physical copies of happy guests in the homes, because we still get some older folks that just refuse to use the virtual guide. But, but I do think that a guidebook for your guest is like, it's funny, I'm seeing a lot of people. They almost expect it. You know, we have a lot of people that say, Hey, you know, I'm sorry to bother you, but normally we come to a place and there's like, a guide. Cure for us. Or, you know, there's a virtual one or whatever, and we see you guys don't have that, or at least we didn't before happy guest, and I didn't really have an answer for them. I'm like, well, we can, you know, we're happy to help you guys over the phone, or we can come out there and fix it for you. But it's funny, like a lot of guests that are staying in vacation rentals, they almost expect it, in a way. Well, I

Alex Husner  
think in our market too, I mean Myrtle Beach, Panama City Beach, very similar to North Norway too, that, you know, these markets traditionally used to have, like, the big chamber book that was on on the coffee table, right? So it's like that had printed every year, that had all the restaurants, the attraction, stuff like that. Those obviously are not as much of a thing anymore, but for people that have come back, and both of these markets have a lot of repeat guests that that's what they're used to finding when they get into vacation rental. So, yeah, to be able to do it digitally, obviously makes a lot more sense from a cost standpoint and but yeah, something that you can have in the unit too, if you have something that can be replicated for for print, you know, fairly easily. I think that's really smart.

Declan McGonigal  
Yeah, yeah. I think having some combination of them is useful and not to go off topic, but now we're trying to figure out more ways to educate guests on like, Hey, we're, you know, we're a vacation rental company. It seems like, no matter how many times you're

Alex Husner  
not just an Airbnb, yeah,

Declan McGonigal  
exactly how many times you included in the messaging, like, they still don't understand that, you know, we have other rentals or, you know, we're a company that they can come back to and book direct with. So, you know, I'm trying to think of new ways, and I think one of those ways is, is just, you know, getting the message across as much and as in many mediums as possible. So I think having it on your virtual book, you know, that has your company name, and then also stressing that in a physical book, and, you know, having it in a survey and an email, just getting that across, I think, if you're a company in as many ways as possible, is super, super important. So

Alex Husner  
Declan, you're also involved in the Myrtle Beach Chamber of Commerce and CVB DMO board, which I was on for many years here. And just interested to hear how that's going, and what you've maybe learned from being on the board, but I think a full year now, yeah, yeah, just

Declan McGonigal  
about a year. So I guess I started in January of this year with the Myrtle Beach chamber, and it's, it's been amazing. Like I said, it's been, it's kind of been a surprising It's been, like, a really enjoyable, surprising thing for me, my dad was, you know, he's a big proponent. He's a big proponent of networking, getting to know people, being involved, you know, whether that's politically or just in the community, community service, whatever it is, you know, he's big about getting out there and, you know, sharing your voice, or sharing, you know, stuff that you know. So he really encouraged me to get into it. I wasn't really sure what to expect, you know, I just, I thought it was kind of one of those, you know, lame things that was just gonna be boring. And, yeah, politics and it was gonna be slow, and, you know, old people, but, but, turns out, those old people are actually a lot of fun. Probably, some of them are probably more more fun than my friends. Yeah, someone that we both know, Alex, but, but it's been, but it's been, it's been amazing. I thought I knew a lot about the area being from it, but just being on there, you learn so much more. And I think the biggest thing is, just like, the people I meet are incredible, you know, like, it's just a amazing room. It's, it's amazing to be in that room with those guys and girls once a month, like it's a the resumes in that room are, are incredible. So even just talking to them and and learning more about them and asking them random questions here and there has been, has been so valuable. But, but, yeah, it's, it's been amazing. It's been really cool. Yeah, I

Annie Holcombe  
always found it was good when I sat on the chamber board that the kind of, like the cross section of people that you would never have run into, you know, in your daily, you know, your daily grind, or even in the business that you were in, you generally wouldn't have a meeting where you sat down with a banker and a teacher and a lawyer and, you know, doctor and like all these, all these different minds who have different perspectives. But I think it's good that you took that leap to be involved, even if you had to be involved with a bunch of old people like me. Yeah, it's good it and I think, you know, so many people in this industry. One thing that we talk about all the time, like in vacation rentals specifically, but I think in hospitality in general, is that people are pretty giving, and they want to share their knowledge, and they want to impart it on like the next generation. So help you not make the mistakes. And they want you to ask questions, and if you jump into it and realize that you don't either have to be intimidated or you don't have to go in with all the answers, and know that there's this whole group of people that wants to help elevate you as a as a person and as a business, and that's what the chambers of commerce do a great job. I think people sometimes forget that they're not there to just make sure that, you know, the report outside the market is that the sun is always shining. You know, there's lots of things that they do to help the destination. So, you know, being a young business, that's, that's really smart of you to have jumped in there. Yeah, absolutely.

Declan McGonigal  
And I try to encourage a lot of my friends, who are, you know, some of my friends have started their own businesses and, you know, and some others have kind of grown in the businesses that they started with. So I've encouraged all them to get involved as well. You know, some, I think they're kind of thinking the same thing I was, you know, that that, you know, you're, it's, it's maybe not for me, but, but I've really encouraged people to get out there and, yeah, and it to your point, it's, it's amazing. I think you learn so much. I think it's good to be involved too, right? Like, you know, it's so easy to go through life and just think about yourself and and what I've got to do, especially if you're a business owner, right? Like, you're just focused on, you know, keeping the thing alive and keeping it going and doing better and but, but if you take a step back and really think about the long term and what you're really trying to do, you know, getting involved in the community like that is, is gonna it's gonna help you, and it's also, more importantly, gonna help, you know, the community and others around you. So getting in, getting educated, getting involved like that is, I can't, I can't stress it enough, it's, it's so important. Yeah,

Alex Husner  
we definitely agree with that. And I think, you know, the nice thing about our destination here is, I think everybody, or the wide majority of people, really embrace that too. And I will say, you know, different areas and companies that we've talked to, not everybody. Most areas don't have as robust of a chamber that we do. I mean, it's the fourth largest in the country, and, you know, just crazy advertising budgets and a lot of political power there. But even beyond the monetary side, a lot of areas don't have that association as something that really brings tourism together. And I think because we are a chamber and a CVB together, that's where it becomes a little bit different there, that there is such a big focus and an emphasis on tourism that, you know, a lot of what the chamber does is explaining to locals and people that move to the area that you know tourism works for us. I mean, the reason that you're able to move down here and your taxes are so low and you have all these great restaurants and shops is because of the tourists. It's not, there's not enough locals here to be spending all that money that justify, you know, that commercial development. But it is. It is amazing to see, just over the years, how much things have changed here. And a lot of that, you know, it's comes from the work of a lot of great people getting together and putting together a plan.

Declan McGonigal  
Yeah, yeah. The team there is so talented too. I mean, Stuart Butler is amazing on the marketing side. And you don't really, I didn't really realize how, how much of an impact you know, the chamber had here locally in Myrtle Beach. And then you get in there and you and you see the budget, and you see, kind of the different things they're doing to get our name out there and stay out there and stay in front of people, and it's so competitive, right? Like, there's so many great destinations, but you consistently see Myrtle Beach is, you know, like on TripAdvisor, or top five destination in the country and in North America. I think that's, that's incredible. And I don't, I don't really think people realize, like, a lot of that can be attributed back to what the chamber does, you know, because they're doing these big, macro sort of things that you know, you're like, how does, how does that help my vacation rental, right? Marketing is complex, and that team handles it, handles it really well, and and does a great job with the resources they have. So it's that's been the other cool part of it is, is the ideas that they're thinking about and and trying to take Myrtle Beach to the next level is, is, uh, incredible. It's cool to be a part of, yeah,

Alex Husner  
yeah, definitely. Well, so what's next? Declan, I mean, you're at the 70 units now. What are your plans for 2025 Do you have any goals set for how much you want to grow, or just different parts of the business that you're looking to expand upon? Mm,

Declan McGonigal  
hmm, yeah, definitely. So, you know, the goal over the next three years is really to get to that around a 250 you know, 300 rental mark. That's kind of where I want to, want to get. And I think, I think that's very I think it's ambitious, but I also think we can achieve it. And I think that's kind of where you where you want to be as sort of a professional management company in this market is, is to that level. I also want to going back to one of my one of my weaknesses is organization and and it's so important in this business. So I really want to get all of our processes and systems organized and then bring in, you know, a CEO or a manager, whatever you'd like to call them, to really manage the business, because that's one area I'm weak in, is that organization overseeing people, you know, it's just kind of one of the things I'm a little weak in. So I think bringing somebody in for that position, once it once it makes sense here. And, you know, maybe the next six months or so, I think could really, really start to propel us, and then that way I can kind of focus my efforts on on the marketing side, and then just, and then just growing the business. Like some of those, the people I've mentioned on my team have have really been with me since, like, the early days. So really, I just, I want to get it to a point where, like, you know, they're being kind. Compensated very well, and they're really enjoying what they're doing, and, and they have people under them to manage. So growth isn't just necessarily, like, I want to get to this arbitrary number, there's, there's, you know, purpose behind it and, and you know, want to do well for the team and all that

Alex Husner  
fun stuff. You've got the right attitude. Yeah, really well said.

Annie Holcombe  
Yeah. So before we wrap up, I did want to ask you about because we're fellow podcasters, so you've started a podcast, yeah? So it's really exciting. So what's it called? And where can people find it? Yeah,

Declan McGonigal  
so I think what we have it called now is just the my beach podcast, or no, sorry, sorry, it's STR unlocked. We've been changing around the game. Actually, I think there's another STR unlocked out there, so I've probably got to change that. But, yeah, we've got a, like, I was saying we've got a few episodes going. I'm trying to focus more on the property management world. Now, early on, I was just trying to get guests, and a lot of that was just local folks. But now I'll have to have you guys on there soon. Yeah, but yeah, just trying to focus on the property management world and, like, it's kind of twofold. One is, like, selfishly, I just want to kind of pick the mind of other property managers a little bit. Yeah, yeah. But then two, I think I'm a big believer in, sort of, like, the abundance mindset, right? Like, you know, you you get what you give. Like, I want to, I want to put as much information out there that people are willing to share as possible. And I think there's definitely a lot of cool stuff that people know, that they that we can share and kind of get out there to people that are maybe in my position, or or maybe starting off, or even, you know, a little bit ahead, and really have an established business. So that's kind of, that's kind of the approach with it and trying to be consistent. I've probably been lately. I've probably been averaging like an episode every two weeks. So that's that's time with it. Yeah, yeah.

Alex Husner  
I mean, that's still pretty good, though. I mean, most podcasts fail after Episode Five. I believe the stats say there are, like 9090, something percent don't do any more than that, because it is, it is time consuming, but I think your intent behind it and what you're trying to get out of it, that's, that's what's going to keep you going with it. Because I would agree completely. I think Annie and I have learned as much as we've, you know, put out to the world. We've learned so much from the guests that we have on the show. So selfishly, we love that, but it's also, it's just great to share the stories of people who have done it, and, you know, it's inspiring to hear how somebody else built their business and what they ran into. And there's a lot of great stories in our industry. So, yeah,

Declan McGonigal  
absolutely no, no. And I'm inspired by you guys. I think what you've kind of done, you know, it's cool because, you you know, it's like, when did you guys start this?

Alex Husner  
Three years ago, three

Annie Holcombe  
years ago,

Declan McGonigal  
three years Yeah. And I remember Alex, I think after I met you, I listened to a few episodes, so that was probably, like a year and a half years ago or so. Yeah, you guys. I mean, you guys, like, now you've got all these, these awesome sponsorships, and have grown a ton so it's been, I feel like you guys are kind of like the podcast of the STR world, yeah. I mean, you guys are up there. So it's been, it's been cool to kind of follow you guys. And I definitely, you know, I think what you guys do really well is you have such a wide range of people that come on, right? It's not just like, Yeah, this guy that's doing vacation rentals in Myrtle Beach, there's, there's such a wide range of of topics. So you guys do a great job and keep it up.

Annie Holcombe  
Oh, thank you so much.

Alex Husner  
Well, thank you so much for coming on today, Declan. If anybody wants to get in touch with you, what's the best way for them to reach out? You

Declan McGonigal  
can find me on Instagram. I think it's, uh, at Declan McGonagall, I believe. Or you can go to our website. That might be the easier way. It's my beach rentals.com. If you submit an inquiry, you can, it'll come straight to me. Or if, if you go to our contact us page, I think it's still my phone number might be one of the numbers, yeah,

Declan McGonigal  
but, but yeah. Either those methods, feel free to reach out. I'm always happy to to share what I know and get the word out there. So yeah. So much. Yeah. Well, if

Alex Husner  
anybody wants to get in touch with Annie and I, you can go to AlexandAnnie podcast.com and until next time, thanks for tuning in, everybody.