The photos decide. Everything else confirms.
What to shoot, in what order, and why the photo set is the part of a direct booking site worth spending money on. Including the eight-image floor that structured data imposes.
Guides
The parts of renting short-term that catch owners out.
Permits, lodging tax, the UK rule changes, and where direct bookings actually come from. Written for owners, not for search engines — each one is useful even if you never hire us. We are not attorneys or accountants, and every guide says where you need one.
The safety paperwork a UK holiday let actually needs
Fire risk assessment, gas certificate, EICR, alarms, PAT and Legionella: which of these a UK holiday let genuinely needs, how often, and which ones an insurer will ask for after an incident.
What Google needs from a rental site, and what it ignores
Server-rendered pages, one real page per property, structured data that is actually complete, and local content only you can write. Plus the things that make no difference at all.
Planning, licences and registers: where UK short-term letting stands
Scotland licenses, Wales registers, England has been about to for two years. What is actually in force for UK holiday lets right now, and what to have ready.
The ADA rule most owners meet by letter
A federal rule from 2010 says reservation systems must describe accessibility features in enough detail to let a guest book with confidence. Here is what it asks, how far it reaches, and what to do about it before a demand letter arrives.
Where direct bookings actually come from
Not from a website existing. Four real sources of direct bookings, in order of how much they produce, and the cheapest one that almost nobody does properly.
1099-K, Schedule E and the seven-day rule
The federal paperwork behind a US short-term rental: when a 1099-K shows up, why most rentals are Schedule E, what the 14-day rule really says, and where the seven-day average stay changes everything.
The furnished holiday letting rules are gone
The FHL tax regime ended in April 2025. What UK holiday let owners lost, what the transitional rules preserve, and why the commission on every booking suddenly matters more than it used to.
Does your permit number have to be on your own website?
Most short-term rental ordinances require the licence number in every advertisement, not just in the portal listing. Your own booking site is an advertisement. What that means in practice, city by city.
The lodging tax Airbnb was collecting for you
When a guest books on a portal, the portal usually registers and remits the lodging tax. When the same guest books on your own site, that job is yours. Here is how to be ready before the first direct booking.
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