Is one of the biggest hotels in this town a pseudo-hotel?

One of the biggest hotels in Cairns might actually be a pseudo-hotel rather than one physical building, accommodating up to 350 people on any given night.

Some 104 homes are available in the city on Airbnb through the same manager, Julie George, who has made a career out of the short-term stay platform.

The former real estate agent doesn’t own most of the properties herself but manages more than 100 listings for investors from around Australia.

It all began in 2016 when she was looking to replace her long-term tenant for her one-bedroom unit in the holiday destination and struggled to find anyone.

That’s when she turned to letting her investment property for short stays on Airbnb and found she was earning more than twice as much as a long-term rental, consistently making $600 a week. 

“We started identifying properties in the right location and we were offering to set it all up [for owners],” Ms George said.

“Buying the linen, connecting the internet and earning them twice as much income than a long-term rental.”

While Ms George doesn’t make beds any more, every guest is still greeted individually by one of her staff.

“[Guests] don’t know they’re coming to a business. They believe they’re coming to Julie’s house. It looks like Julie’s got a lot of properties in Cairns.”

In the first year, she turned over $1.4 million. In the second year, $2.9 million. She takes a 25 per cent cut and uses it to employ 14 full-time staff through her Airbnb management company, Host My Home, while most of the revenue goes back to investors.

“We’ve created one of the biggest hotels in Cairns but [it’s] all over the town from Gordon Vale [the most southern suburb] through to Palm Cove [the most northern],” she said.

“We can sleep up to 350 people per night in Cairns if all our properties were full and that’s in two years that we’ve been able to amass that.”

It comes as there are currently 600 properties sitting on the market for long-term rent in Cairns, a city of 240,000 people, starting at $170 per week for one-bedroom units. Unit rentals were on the market for an average 33 days while houses were on the market for 38 days.

Several of Ms George’s clients are real estate agents, many of whom own investment properties that are leased out for short stays while waiting for a buyer.

“And then we can provide the real estate agents with a sales tool showing interested buyers the [potential] rental income,” she said.

“Because the market is so flat in Cairns, it’s helped widen the reach of the property investors, too.”