- Business rates reliefs – There will be a three-month 100% business rates holiday until 30 June 2021. For the remaining three quarters, there will be a two-thirds relief (66%), BUT the value of the relief on these nine months (1 July 2021 to 31 March 2022) will be capped at £2 million. Any business that has a rates bill over £4m will therefore be subject to a cap on their relief.
- UK Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) Fourth and fifth grant rounds are confirmed - SEISS fourth grant – the fourth SEISS grant will be worth 80% of three months' average trading profits, paid out in a single instalment and capped at £7,500 in total. The grant will cover the period from February to April and can be claimed from late April. Self-employed individuals must have filed a 2019- 20 Self Assessment tax return to be eligible for the fourth grant.
- SEISS fifth grant – there will be a fifth and final SEISS grant covering May to September. A turnover test will determine the value of the grant. People whose turnover has fallen by 30% or more will continue to receive the full grant worth 80% of three months' average trading profits, capped at £7,500. People whose turnover has fallen by less than 30% will receive a 30% grant, capped at £2,850. The final grant can be claimed from late July.
- Add prices for 2022. Having prices ready is a major influential factor! Because so many are sold out for this year, many people are booking for next year while there is plenty of availability.
- Bring your calendars up to date.
- Add recent guest testimonials.
- Walking Holidays
- Cycling Holidays
- Fishing Holidays
- Games Rooms
- Eco Cottages
- Cottages with electric vehicle chargers
Where Will You Escape To After the Lockdown?
Self-catering holiday cottages offer several advantages over hotels and bed and breakfast establishments that make them ideal for dreamy summer holidays, a season when the latter are likely to be fully booked with other guests.
Here are some reasons why they are a great choice:
1. Flexibility and Freedom
One of the greatest benefits of self-catering cottages is the freedom they provide. You have the flexibility to create your own schedule and enjoy your holiday at your own pace. You can come and go as you please, without worrying about strict meal times or hotel policies.
2. Space and Privacy
Self-catering cottages often offer more space compared to hotel rooms, providing you and your family with room to relax and unwind. You'll have separate bedrooms, living areas, and often outdoor spaces like gardens or patios, allowing everyone to have their own space. If you want to dine outside on a warm summer evening, its nice to know you won’t be haring your patio with a dozen other tables with noisy guests. They will all be together – not along a corridor share with other guest bedrooms. This privacy is particularly valuable when traveling with children. What’s more, you can stay up and run around for as long into the night as you please without worrying about disturbing unknown gusts in adjoining rooms. Likewise, if you have a baby, you won’t need to worry about who else (outside the family) they are disturbing if they wake up crying in the early hours.
3. Home-like Comfort
Self-catering cottages are designed to make you feel at home. In fact, they can often feel even more comfortable than at home. They are equipped with amenities such as fully equipped kitchens, comfortable furnishings, and sometimes even extras like fireplaces or hot tubs. This homely environment can enhance your summer holiday experience and create a cosy atmosphere – just like at home.
4. Cost-Effectiveness
Renting holiday cottages can be a cost-effective option, especially for families or larger groups. With a kitchen, you can prepare your own meals, reducing the expenses of dining out for every meal. Additionally, some cottages offer competitive rates, particularly for longer stays, making them budget-friendly.
5. Culinary Freedom
One of the joys of self-catering cottages is the ability to cook your own meals. This is especially advantageous during summer when local produce and farmers' markets are abundant. You can explore local ingredients, try new recipes, and even have barbecues in the garden. What is more, you'll be able to choose meals you know everybody will like and meeting all dietry requirements without a lot of fuss.It's a wonderful opportunity to indulge in culinary adventures and savour the flavours of the season.
6. Location Choices
Self-catering cottages can be found in a wide range of locations, including coastal areas, countryside retreats, or picturesque villages, often in areas where hotels are unlikely to get planning permission. If you really want a room with a sea view or gorgeous rural view, don’t risk being allocated a room in a B&B which only looks out onto a side passage or the back garden. You can choose a location that suits your preferences and enjoy the natural beauty and attractions of the area at your leisure.
7. Your Choice of Music
No matter where you go in a holiday cottage, you get to choose the music or radio channel you want to hear. No so in communal dining rooms, bars and lounges in hotels and B&Bs.
Overall…
Self-catering holiday cottages offer the perfect blend of comfort, freedom, and affordability, making them an excellent choice for dreamy summer holidays. Whether you're seeking relaxation, adventure, or quality time with loved ones, a self-catering cottage provides the ideal setting for creating lasting summer holiday memories.
Explore a little more. Check out our selection of Countryside, Eco, Romantic and Large Holiday Cottages for couples, family holidays and large group accommodation. You'll find that relaxing isn't going to be so hard this summer.
Click to view and find your favourite:
Five Sensible Steps to Renting Out Your Holiday Cottage
Are you just starting on the road to letting out a holiday cottage? Your business's success will be influenced by the research you put into preparing and marketing your property. Read this times Newspaper article that lists five critical steps to renting your property:
1. Grab Those Tax Breaks There are some available
2. Save on Energy Bills Many guests seem to turn everything on when they arrive and leave it that way.
3. Get the right insurance. One day you may be very grateful that you did.
4. Furnish With Care, Especially if you want to attract repeat bookings and keep maintenance costs down
5. A Blindingly Obvious One That Too Many Owners Overlook at Their Peril But Which You Should Enjoy Doing.
It's a quick and easy read but contains some excellent advice for newbies - and might also be of interest to those who have been renting out for a year or two and need a few reminders.
Here's the link: Five Steps to Renting Out Your Holiday Home
And then, of course, remember to advertise it on My Favourite Holiday Cottages! See what we give you by clicking here.
2021 Budget Update News for Holiday Cottage Owners
Three things from the 2021 Budget that could benefit Self-Catering businesses in the UK
The Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, outlined his tax and spend policies in the Budget. Below is a summary of the budget for the tourism and hospitality industry. You can read what you need to know page summary here or view the budget document here. Highlights include: • VAT reduction for the UK’s tourism and hospitality sector - The temporarily reduced rate of 5% VAT for hospitality businesses has been extended until the end of September. From October to 31 March 2022, the rate will revert to an ‘interim’ level of 12.5%. There is no change to the scope of the VAT reduction.
Thanks to Visit Exmoor for this information.
The Holiday Homefront: March 2021
MARCH ON!
Well, it is nice to see Spring ushered in with blue skies. Let us hope this is a harbinger of a long, warm, dry summer. We need it not just for the bookings but also to reassure people that a UK Staycation is a sunny vacation to ensure they return in 2022.
Welcome to the March issue of The Holiday Homefront.
How it Works
The Homefront features the best and most helpful articles we have tracked over the past few weeks that we believe will be of interest (and help) to holiday property owners and businesses. It's free, so if this is your first time here, click on the link at the bottom, and we'll email you a copy of each issue once a month.
The link will be blue-green when an article is a synopsis of a more extensive article. Click on it, and you'll be taken to the full article.
How to Track the Recovery of Vacation Rentals 2021
In the old days, when it came to pricing, many an owner would be guided by similarly sized and equipped properties in their location with a goodly number of bookings, and they would settle for something similar. With the arrival of a new financial year, prices tended to be put up either by 'inflation' or to recoup the cost of any investments in the property, e.g. hot tub or 'free' WiFi.
Nowadays, and especially with the turmoil wrought by the double Pandemic and Brexit whammy, such methods, while not technically wrong, are less reliable. These days, new kids on the software block can provide a more scientific and reliable approach to accurately maximising rental yields.
This article by Marcus Rader, a man whose passion lies in rental property pricing, looks at how and what you should measure to help you achieve the best possible price/booking yield. It also comments on some of the better pricing software packages available to give you a helping hand.
Airbnb SEO: How to Rank Higher on Airbnb
Yes, I know that Airbnb may be considered one of our competitors, but if they've come up with something that will help you get more bookings for your holiday cottage, then it's our job to tell you about it in The Homefront. So, here are nine ways to get more traction from your advert if you're an Airbnb user.
How Higher Prices and Stricter Policies on OTAs Get You More Direct Bookings and Better Cash-Flow
SERIOUSLY? Yes indeed! And don't let the title jargon alienate you. OTAs are Online Travel Agencies – websites that take and manage your bookings when you advertise on their site.
The Three Things Every Visitor Wants
When you read these, they may be blindingly obvious, but look again at your website's Home page: do you make a big thing of all three being something visitors will get if they stay with you? An inference is not enough! I've just looked at six holiday cottage websites randomly; of these, only two scored an obvious three out of three.
This easy-on-the-eye article by Susan Briggs at Tourism KnowHow is one you should read if you have a sneaking feeling that your home page could deliver better results!
The Importance Of A Blog Section On Your Website
Blogs are a great way to nurture relationships with potential guests and enjoy a high percentage of repeat bookings. They are a free and valuable marketing tool if you maintain them properly. It's also a relatively inexpensive addition to make to your website. Read this to find out How and Why.
For MFHC Holiday Cottage Owners
Website Update
Since Christmas, we know the site has been running more slowly. We have been taking steps to address it. Work on this has taken a little longer than I envisaged. We are making progress, and faster download speeds should resume shortly.
Spring Clean Your Adverts
Every day we read lots of Tweets and Facebook postings from owners telling us how thoroughly they are making their properties ready to welcome guests as we (hopefully) emerge from our third and final lockdown in April. It's great to see how much work people are putting into maintenance and refurbishment in anticipation of a busy season ahead. However, do remember to invest adequate time in bringing your adverts up to date to ensure that your new-look cottage gets all the bookings it deserves.
Here are the key things you can do to improve your adverts on MFHC at no additional cost:
To get more visitors looking at your advert: Check to ensure that your cottage appears in all relevant search boxes, including those we have added in the past six months:
Just log in and go to your edit page to tick the relevant boxes, and your property will appear in lots more search results.
Images: The most influential part of your advert. Check to see if your pictures expand to the maximum size. Bookers love really large good photos. When clicked on, they are too small if they don't expand to a size about ten times the thumbnail image's size.
It only takes a single image to be too small, and your gallery won't expand to the maximum size. Images should be 1920x1080 pixels. Log in and go to your image section to see if any are below this. Any images that are too small will have a little orange box in the corner of the image, giving the image size in pixels, e.g. 1500x675. These are the images that are too small.
We believe that having large images is so important that we will resize and upload images for you free of charge if you are not sure how to resize images.
Allow Us! Please send us the largest possible size images to ensure they keep their quality. Send them via a free file-sharing app such as www.wetransfer.com or Dropbox. We find the former is very easy to operate, even for technophobes. All you have to do is send up to 20 images (these can include locations and even photos of floor plans).
NB: If sending images for more than one cottage, send one folder per cottage, as we won't know which one goes where.
Click here to Email them to Rick Bond.
That's it for March. If you have any questions or suggestions or need assistance with anything, email Rick. You should know us well enough by now that he is always at his happiest when he can help.
Do feel free to provide feedback on any of this month's articles. See you in April, when hopefully your next guests will be arriving.
Click Here If you would like to subscribe to The Holiday Homefront. It's accessible to every UK holiday cottage owner or manager and is published once a month.
Onwards and Upwards
Rick Bond
Director