How She Designed a Luxury Haven in the Blue Ridge Mountains That Got Wander's Attention

Meet Taylor Bates, the creator of The Afton House — a stunning, luxury home made for gathering and nestled in the heart of Virginia wine country.

Growing up, Taylor wanted to be an architect or a Fortune 500 CEO — she’s always loved the intersection of marketing, design, and business.

After working in a few marketing management and nonprofit leadership roles, Taylor wound up starting her own boutique interior design firm focusing on residential and commercial projects.

And it was around this time when the idea of building a luxury short-term rental that was conducive to multi-family stays, first began to percolate.

Tune in to here the story behind:

• How Taylor designed a truly unforgettable stay in Afton, Virginia 
• Her process for approaching a design project — the room she loves designing most and the room she loves designing least
• Getting approached by Wander about joining the Wander network, Wander’s new managed service option
• And so much more…

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Connect with Taylor on Instagram 

This episode is brought to you by Summer. 

Summer takes the headache out of owning a vacation rental by taking care of sourcing, designing, furnishing and managing your home.

What makes Summer especially unique is the pathway to ownership that they offer — think of this as an option to “try before you actually buy an Airbnb” 

Here’s how Summer’s Gradual Ownership model works:

1. You work with Summer to find the perfect vacation rental — one that’s in a market that you want to vacation to and also in a market that makes sense for a vacation rental.
   
   
2. Summer guides you through the whole discernment process of where, when and what kind of home to buy.
   
   
3. When you find the right home, put down a downpayment of 15+% but Summer buys the home for you and holds it for up to two years — during this time you can buy back the home from them any time you are ready or, after the two year period you can decide you DON’T want the home and get a full refund of your down payment.
   
   
4. Also, Summer covers all of the closing costs and fees for the upfront purchase on the home, as well as furnishing and design. This means you pay far less out of pocket than you would if you bought the home yourself from day one.

So if you’ve been looking for a way to beta test the whole Airbnb game, this is your sign. Go and chat with my new friends at Summer and tell them that Zach from Behind the Stays sent you there way.

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About the Show

Behind the Stays is brought to you twice a week by Sponstayneous — a free, biweekly newsletter that brings subscribers the best last-minute deals and upcoming steals on Airbnb.  

You can subscribe, for free, at www.sponstayneous.com. 

Behind the Stays is hosted by Zach Busekrus, co-founder of Sponstayneous, you can connect with him on Twitter at @zboozee.