A 90 square meter apartment, solid wood flooring, and large bay windows overlooking a breathtaking view of the Eiffel Tower and the rooftops of Paris: Michel and Gilles’ apartment, located on the 11th floor of a building in the 20th arrondissement, has everything to please tourists who would like to discover the capital during the Olympic Games. The couple, accustomed to renting their apartment for short periods, will happily give up their place to visitors during this period, when the use of public places and public transport promises to be more than dense. At 75 and 67 years old, the two men admit to having “no desire” to manage the reservations for their property on dedicated platforms or to make the necessary round trips when entering and exiting the premises. To rent the accommodation, they decided to use Keypers, a turnkey concierge service with which they have been working for several years.
The principle is simple: for a commission of “20 to 25% including tax, excluding cleaning costs”, the company offers owners support in creating their ad – from taking photographs to writing a text on rental platforms such as Airbnb or Booking -, booking stays, welcoming and monitoring customers, and carrying out a complete cleaning of the apartment at each stage. “We leave our keys, and they take care of everything. During this time, we can go on vacation and finance our trips through this sublet,” rejoices Michel. During this period of the Olympic Games, the recommendations of Keypers were also valuable to him: first offered at a high price on the platforms, for 480 euros per night, his property did not find any takers. “After taking advice from them, we finally lowered the price to 290 euros, and the dates were filled in three days, for three different clients,” explains the retiree.
“2,000 to 3,000 euros for two weeks”
As the competition approaches, and with the increase in requests from travelers, the owner is far from being the only one to be interested in concierge services. “At the moment, we are receiving 10 times more calls than normal. It’s almost too much, we are forced to refuse people, not counting people who are not eligible for short-term rentals, who represent between 30 and 40% of our calls”, indicates Paul-Farell Couche, co-founder of Keypers, who recalls that only owners of a main residence or tenants benefiting from clear authorization from their owner have the possibility of renting their apartment, for a maximum period of one hundred and twenty days and after proper registration on the city of Paris website. “We do not respond to owners who have a pure logic of profitability, for example, and sometimes offer crazy prices compared to market prices,” adds the co-founder.
Same assessment from Quentin Brackers de Hugo, co-founder of the HostnFly platform, who was forced to limit himself to the management of 1,500 accommodations in Paris and its inner suburbs. “Usually, HostnFly records 200 requests from owners per month. Since the start of the year, this figure has exploded, with 1,500 monthly requests on average,” explains the company manager to L’Express. The profile of its customers, usually “young and childless”, has also changed slightly, expanding to couples in their thirties with children, often residents of nearby suburbs, such as Clichy, Saint-Ouen or Saint-Denis. “With potential profits amounting to 2,000 or 3,000 euros for two or three weeks, many are taking the plunge,” explains Quentin Brackers of Hugo, citing a current average of “360 euros per night for four travelers.”
With an average occupancy rate of 50% for apartments already benefiting from comments on the platforms, and 25 to 30% for new accommodation, the service provided by HostnFly to manage tourist turnover is more than valuable for owners. “We respond to all travelers’ requests, on transport, the neighborhood, logistics… Before each arrival, we provide bed linen, towels and consumables, such as shampoo, salt, pepper or olive oil, so that owners do not have to worry about these additional supplies,” explains the manager, who pockets a 25% commission per night booked.
“Not all agencies are equal”
Demand is such that some concierge companies have even adapted to the Olympics, offering special offers for the event. This is the case of Checkmyguest, a company usually specializing in the transformation of commercial premises into seasonal rentals. “We had such great demand from individuals that we launched a special formula for main residences during the Olympics, and we brought in between 400 and 500 apartments just for this period,” assures Joffrey Ichbia, co-founder of the company. Here again, the manager notes profiles of owners from “all social classes”, for housing of “40 to 200 square meters”, generally offered for prices “2 to 3 times higher than the average”. Enough to generate additional income for Parisians who, without these concierge services, would not have dared to take the plunge into short-term rentals. “We would not have been able to manage the applications and logistics without them. But, be careful, not all concierge agencies are the same,” warns Michel. During a previous experience, the retiree believes he was “tricked” by an unscrupulous company, whose “housekeeping and customer care left something to be desired”.
“You have to choose the right company, so as not to risk ending up with cases of apartments being left in deplorable condition, seasonal tenants having changed the locks or who end up residing illegally in certain apartments after rental through platforms… These are rare cases, but they exist”, estimates Mᵉ Xavier Demeuzoy, lawyer specializing in the regulation of furnished tourist accommodation. In three years, he claims to have seen the practice of concierge services explode in Paris, with increasingly personalized monitoring and “ever more efficient tools”. “Some companies even offer to install sound level meters on the premises, directly connected to the owner’s Internet box and which send alerts if the decibels are exceeded,” he indicates.
Be careful, however, to respect the regulations in force. For tenants, in particular, who would be tempted to use these concierge services or short-term rental platforms without the agreement of their owners, Mᵉ Xavier Demeuzoy reminds that they are exposed to a judicial termination of their lease and to the obligation to reimburse all profits received to their lessor. “I have many cases of young people, in particular, who have turned their apartment into an illegal business. When they are caught, the bill can reach tens of thousands of euros,” laments the lawyer. “Despite the temptation of the prices charged during the Olympics, I really do not advise them to try the experience,” he warns.
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