We recently connected with Kristi Adkins and have shared our conversation below.

Kristi , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Let’s start with a story that highlights an important way in which your brand diverges from the industry standard.

Many people, homeowners and guests, think that working with a property management company means less personal interaction, more automation, longer response times, and a lack of care for a property in general. This is where StayEasy is different – we have proven time and time again that we are available nearly 24/7, our response times are within minutes, and we check on our properties whether it’s through our eyes, or our trusted vendors. We pride ourselves on the service we provide for both or clients and guests.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?

Hi! Husband and wife duo here – we created StayEasy after we moved from the Midwest to the West Coast and realized that traveling is something we must imbed in our lives, and in our kids lives. We have been in the customer service and property management business for 15+ combined years and decided to take our experience to the vacation rental level. We are driven by guests and clients feedback and compliments – our goal is to provide the “I want to stay there again” experience. We hope you enjoy what we offer and continue to grow with us – either as a renter, or a client.

We manage long term rentals, mid term rentals, and short term rentals. On Airbnb alone we generated over $2.77M in revenue in 2022.

We are a family-owned and operated Property Management Company based out of Orange County, but manage homes near and far to our home base. We pride ourselves on our communication, skill level, knowledge of the industry, and guest satisfaction (currently 4.93 star rating on Airbnb with 2000+ reviews) – We are Premier Partners with VRBO, Super Host on Airbnb, and every year given the Booking.com Traveller Review Award

Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.

Our side hustle turned into our main/full time business and career.

Kristi went from a medical sales representative in 2013 to an operating room nurse in 2016. We had our son in 2018 and we came to the cross roads in our life of how best to manage work and parenthood. We decided it’s best for Kristi to stay home and care for our baby. At that time we had always had to hopes of growing our income enough to purchase 1+ properties for rent. We took a big leap and purchased our first property in Lake Havasu City, Arizona and at the time, it took almost all of our funds to do so. This was scary and stressful, but we had faith in our experience with customer service, and Josh’s 12+ years in property management for long term rentals. We started from the ground up, no help or guidance along the way, and we have grown to something unimaginable.

Never did we see ourselves owning and managing over 70 properties in this amount of time. We put our heart and souls into our first owned rental property, spend sleepless nights learning how to manage/communicate/operate a vacation rental – especially from afar.

Ultimately our drive for success and growth resulted in success, and we created StayEasy in 2021 (officially) as our friends, family, and referrals came flooding in for us to manage their properties. This was such a turning point in our lives, and we completely shifted to this business. We haven’t looked back – 2 kids later and still many sleepless nights – our goal is to provide a service that doesn’t compete with anyone in the industry. Our personal relationships with clients and guests is next to none. We have what it takes to be the best, and we plan to continue with this business plan for years to come.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

Our reputation in this market is solely from our clients and guests. We could not be where we are at today without them.

It starts with our clients – our clients provide the product… we partner with them to make sure their home is vacation rental ready… we then ensure their listing outlines all their unique features and stands out amongst the competition. Throughout the onboarding process and beyond we are in touch with our clients often, and have open lines of communication 24/7 for questions, concerns, observations, and more.

This leads to our guests – guest satisfaction is the most important metric for our company. They determine whether the entire experience before, during, and after their stay was worth a 5-star review. If a home doesn’t have good reviews, it won’t be at the top of the platforms search. We strive to ensure every one of our guests is communicated with throughout the booking process, and any questions or concerns are addressed within minutes. Because we provide a personal experience and a trusted product, we have many repeat customers that only want to stay in StayEasy managed homes.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.stayeasyllc.com
• Instagram: Stayeasyllc
• Facebook: stayeasyllc
• Linkedin: Kristi Adkins
• Twitter: stayeasyllc

Image Credits
Joshua Adkins Hudson Adkins Maddison Adkins