We had a useful discussion this week with Lawrence Pemberton, owner of a highly successful property in Lanzarote.

He explained the dilemma he has with the soaring costs of pool heating, a problem a lot of owners are having to deal with as energy prices climb.

To keep a pool permanently warm during a guest’s stay can be enormously expensive. The cost can also vary wildly depending on time of year, the weather or even guest taste. (We’ve all met the person who shivers in anything colder than a hot bath.)

The temptation with this issue is to make pool heating an “optional” extra and we agree the logic makes total sense when looking at your property budget.

But we think optional extras are the wrong approach.

Unavoidable extras annoy people

The point is widely proven in the rest of the travel industry. Lets think about some examples.

Think first about all inclusive holidays whose popularity is growing; they are popular because people like the simplicity and ability to budget for their break. Love ‘em or loathe ‘em – customers like the model.

Conversely the companies who attract holidaymakers’ ire year on year are low cost airlines.

Their unavoidable “extras” and opaque, tiered pricing annoys people to distraction. They only overcome the bad publicity with headline grabbing low rates and vast marketing machines, neither of which is a luxury the average holiday rental owner can afford.

Option 1: Go All Inclusive (recommended)

Customers like simple, transparent pricing. Period.

It makes you easy to book with and the lack of quibble over whether the pool will be warm or not avoids friction. A good relationship with guests is built right from their initial enquiry so it is paramount you get off to a good start.

The solution when calculating your rental prices is to assume your pool will be heated during every guest stay, then amortise the costs over the entire season. Build this into your prices to create a simple, all-in, price.

Option 2: Work backwards by discounting

This is messier but may offer a halfway house.

Calculate prices with heating costs built-in (as in option 1) then offer a discount when guests ask NOT to have the pool heated.

Why would anyone want this? People love discounts – that’s the reason they hate extras! So reverse the psychology by incentivising guests to reduce heating bills.

With this technique, some guests staying in the hottest periods can easily convince themselves heating isn’t really necessary when it’s 30 degress outside. Some will take the discount and ditch the heating. It’s the same result – better presented.

Happy renting!

(Thanks again to Lawrence, ever a hard working and inspiring owner, who’s made Villa Madera in Lanzarote a huge success.)