How to open your guest house? From business ideas to first clients

Have you decided to start your own hotel business? This is a fairly promising and profitable business, which, if properly organized, will pay off quickly enough. The main thing is to choose a place where to open a hotel and advertise it correctly. The best option for beginners is a classic mini-hotel with 10-15 rooms. It is not difficult to open it, and with the right approach, it makes a profit no less than a traditional hotel.

Market research

Thinking about how to open a mini hotel? First of all, study the existing market. Where should a hotel be opened? Where it will be in demand. These are resort towns, large metropolitan areas, popular tourist settlements. Think about who will be staying in your rooms. Students and young people usually choose hostels - they are satisfied with the low price and dormitories.

Mini-hotels are used by people from 23 to 65 years old, who prefer to live in a separate room. Mini-hotels are also popular with couples, couples with children and business travelers. Think about which of this target audience can become your client.

Please note: compose a portrait of your consumer, calculating his age, income level, services he needs. Based on this, you can build a future hotel promotion strategy.

Then start analyzing your competitors. There are probably already hotels and mini-hotels in your city, since this business brings good money. Research what room they offer, what price range and what additional services. Find out about the number of rooms, opening hours, etc.

Then find the market leaders. It is they who set the tone for the entire hotel business in the city, shape the habits of guests and certainly know how to dump. You will need to adapt to the leaders, while offering your visitors better conditions for less money. Or at least the same conditions.

In what format to open

If you do not have serious experience in the hotel business and huge start-up capital, then the easiest way is to open in the format of a mini-hotel. This is a small hotel with a maximum of 30 rooms. Such mini-hotels are located near the main key infrastructure:

bus stations ;
railway stations;
metro stations;
road junctions;
in the city center;
near popular attractions;
near gas stations or along highways.

Have you thought about your own hotel business? If so, then for sure having seen the cost of even a budget building of your complex, the desire to start a business in this niche often disappears immediately. But what if there is a more budgetary option? He is, and this is a guesthouse. A business format when an entrepreneur rents out his housing and at the same time lives in the house himself, is engaged in cleaning, cooking breakfasts and receiving guests. We will analyze this business idea in detail so that you can decide for yourself whether it is profitable to work in this market segment or not.

Project Concept

A guest house is a great option to start a hotel business with minimal investment. At the legislative level, there are no clear restrictions on the area and number of storeys of such guesthouses. But in order to pay less in terms of taxes, guest houses are located in buildings with an area of 300 - 550 sq. ., height from 1 to 3 floors, with the number of rooms 8 - 10 pcs.

The format of the guest house provides that the owners of the house themselves will live in it and maintain cleanliness and order, forming a kind of family business. This type of earnings cannot be called completely passive, since the whole family will be involved in the work process.

Guest house vs Hotel

The main difference between a guesthouse and a hotel is its legal status. When starting such a business, you will not need to assign and agree on the status of the hotel regarding the number of stars, there are no clearly stated requirements from the SES. Guest house owners pay taxes at lower rates. The amount of tax payments will depend on the area of the house and the plot on which it is located. This is due to the fact that the payments include land tax, single tax, tax on salaries of registered personnel, and so on.

Another difference between these business formats is the number of rooms. In a hotel house, there should be up to 10 of them, while in a hotel this indicator is not limited.

A guest house, unlike a hotel, offers its tenants a cozy homely atmosphere with an individual approach to each client. Such an object is private real estate, the owners of which rent it out in the format of renting an entire building or individual rooms. Often, guesthouses are made in a certain style, both in the facade and in the interior, in order to stand out from many competitors.

List of services in the guest house

The guesthouse in the complex can offer its visitors a whole list of services. It all depends on the equipment of the house and the local area.

Accommodation service. The cost of living is from $ 13 per day for 1 person.
Internet - free.
Parking for customers with video surveillance and markings for cars - free.
Breakfast - from $ 5.
Transfer - negotiable price.
The use of the barbecue area is free.
Laundry - negotiable.
Providing a kitchen for cooking - free.
Bath or sauna.
Others.

You can pay special attention to the issue of organizing a catering system for your customers. The lion's share of guest houses is limited to cooking breakfasts, which include scrambled eggs, snacks, sandwiches, pancakes, something sweet and fruit. You can offer your guests a comprehensive three meals a day, having previously discussed the menu issues with your customers. On average, the price of three meals a day will cost about $ 8 for an adult and about $ 4 - $ 5 for a child.

Pros and Cons

But before opening a mini-hotel in a private house, it is necessary to fulfill several legislative requirements, the first of which is to register an individual entrepreneurship (if the business owner is one person) or LLC (if the hotel is managed by several partners).

It should be noted that full-fledged management of the hotel business without the appropriate status is impossible - it will not be a hotel, but rooms for rent, therefore, the legal registration of the business is necessary.

Why is a private house better than an apartment in a high-rise building?

The presence of a backyard area, where you can equip gazebos, a swimming pool, playground, parking, additional premises.
Absence of neighbors from below, who can present claims to the owner of the newly created hotel (according to the legal requirements, it is possible to organize mini-hotels in apartment buildings only on the ground floor or above non-residential premises - shops, offices, etc.).
An opportunity to turn into a hotel not only a structure specially designed for this, but also the house in which the owners live at the moment.

The presence of several free rooms is already becoming an excellent start for the implementation of the idea of your own mini-hotel.

Categories of guests for a hotel in a private house

Thinking about how to open a mini-hotel in a private house, the owner should first decide what category of clients she will be interested in, and what level of room comfort must be created.

If the house is located in an area of historical value, you should expect tourist guests who are not so much concerned with the comfort of rooms, but with the possibility of a convenient transport interchange.

If this is an area with a well-developed business infrastructure, then the guests will be participants in various seminars and businessmen. Rooms for these two categories of guests are slightly different:

in the first case, one-room economy-class rooms with a standard set of furniture will do;
in the second - two-room suites.

It is necessary to provide for the availability of rooms with different levels of comfort, as well as for the stay of married couples with children, newlyweds and single people.

Next door to the hosts

Types of mini-hotels

The conventional classification of mini-hotels includes at least three types of these establishments. The differences between them are quite significant and each type requires a special approach to its organization. So, mini-hotels are divided into:

a) small hotels with all the attributes of their "older sisters", such as the reception desk, rooms with private bathrooms and staff on duty around the clock. Such hotels differ from ordinary hotels only in physical size and, it is they that most accurately fall under the definition of a mini-hotel. It is impossible to organize such a hotel in an ordinary apartment and, therefore, we will not dwell on this type of mini-hotel;

b) hostels. A very common type of mini-hotels in Europe. A hostel is a kind of hostel without amenities, in which the guest is provided with a separate bed for a certain period for a small fee. As a rule, the hostel has several rooms for four to five people each, a shared bathroom and a kitchen with a minimum set of accessories. These mini hotels are popular with young travelers, bikers, hitchhikers and short-term business travelers. They attract guests, first of all, at a low price for their services.

In our country, hostels are only gaining popularity so far, so novice businessmen should pay close attention to this niche in the hotel business;

c) apart-hotels. They are separate studio rooms with their own kitchen and bathroom, united by a common corridor and access to the street. Popular among couples: accommodation in apart-hotels is, of course, more expensive than in hostels, but much cheaper than in hotels with similar conditions. It is quite possible to organize an apart-hotel from scratch in a spacious apartment in Moscow. The ideal option is a Soviet communal apartment, which, after renovation and redevelopment, can be transformed into a good apart-hotel.

So, we got acquainted with the types of mini-hotels, now let's try to consider the stages of direct organization of a mini-hotel in an apartment in Moscow.

Mini-hotel in Moscow: how to open from scratch and make money

Today, our legislation does not have the concept of a "hostel". However, article 19 of the Housing Code of the Russian Federation states that the owner of a residential premises can freely use this premises for commercial purposes. Accordingly, any apartment can be turned into a hostel without changing its official purpose. The essence of organizing a hostel is precisely the lease of premises to third parties on commercial terms. Opening a hostel from scratch in an apartment in Moscow is not difficult - you just need to follow a series of sequential steps:

a) register a suitable apartment in ownership (it is assumed that you already have an apartment); b) make an appropriate repair in it;

The economic crisis has led to the fact that recently, mini hotels have gained particular popularity, which open primarily in large cities or tourist centers of the country. They represent economy class housing, but at the same time, they are usually located on streets with convenient transport links.

The clients of such mini-hotels are usually part-time students, people who come on a business trip, tourists, and others. The search for offers of such housing usually occurs on the Internet, after which the client contacts the administrator and books a room for the number he needs.

The cost of accommodation in a mini hotel varies from $ 5 to $ 50, depending on the level of accommodation. For all additional services in the form of a pool, sauna or cafe, clients pay extra.

In order to open a mini hotel, you need to understand what it is. This is a budget housing, which consists of premises for up to 10 rooms, bathrooms, kitchens, cafes. In this article, we will consider the option of launching a hotel with 4 rooms, and all calculations will be made for this format.

Facility format

Mini-hotel implies the availability of about ten rooms.

To begin with, it is important to use your own resources to decide in which format you will work. So there are several options for mini-hotels:

apartment type and budget option. These are cheap hotels that are not as geared towards customer convenience as they are for cheap accommodation.
middle class. Here comfort and price of accommodation are harmoniously combined.
VIP hotels. They usually have luxury rooms and high prices for accommodation.