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VacayHome 701 Old York Drive · Richmond, Virginia Ask for your datesAsk
Sleeps 8 in four bedrooms One full bath, one half Check-in 16:00 · out 10:00 Reading the calendar…

The house, and the two of us

A 1948 house that two people let, not a portfolio

We are Dana and Ray. We own one house, this one, eleven minutes from where we live. When the boiler goes it is Ray who drives over, and when you telephone at nine at night it is one of us who answers.

The screened porch: a wooden ceiling, a long sofa with cushions, a clock on the wall and the garden through the screens.

We bought it in 2013 from the family who had it since 1961, and the first two years were spent on the parts nobody photographs: the wiring, the drain in the alley, a roof, and the beam under the dining room that had been holding its breath for forty years. The kitchen cabinets are still the 1948 ones. The range is from 2022.

We let it by the week because a week is how long it takes to stop looking for the light switches. Maritza has cleaned it for nine years and knows it better than we do; she is the reason check-in is at four o'clock on a changeover Saturday and not at noon.

What we will not do: pretend the attic room is cool in July, let eight people into it without saying there is one full bathroom, or advertise a nightly rate that the cleaning and the lodging tax turn into a different number at the end. Everything the house costs is on this site before you write to us.

Where the money goes

A night at $285, taken apart

Guests ask what we make on a week. This is a leaf-colour October night, before the cleaning and the tax that you also pay, and we would rather write it down than be coy about it.

LineWhat it isOf $285
Mortgage and insuranceThe loan on the house and the short-term-let policy, which costs four times an ordinary one.$118
Property tax and the city licencePaid to the city and the county whether the house is full or empty. Not the lodging tax, which is yours and shows on your bill.$40
Maritza, and the laundryHer three hours a changeover, plus the linen service, spread across the nights of an average stay.$32
Repairs and the pot for the roofLast year: a washing machine, a window unit, the alley drain re-cut, and $9,000 put aside for the roof in 2029.$34
Power, water, gas and the fibreHigher in August than in April, averaged across the year.$21
Card fees and the listing sitesLess than it used to be, because most weeks are now booked from this page.$9
What is left for usEleven per cent of the night. Some years it is less, and in 2020 it was nothing at all.$31
Adds up toChecked against last year's return, rounded to the dollar.—

Guests, afterwards

Everything people have left us

6 ratings, unedited, and the longer accounts people gave us permission to print.

The figure on the website was the figure on the card. Ten nights, the cleaning, the tax, all of it, and nothing turned up at the end that we had not already seen.
The Okonjo family, ten nights in October
We took the winter rate expecting a compromise and got a warm house with a fire and the city to ourselves. The train at half past five is real. We slept through it after the first night.
Ruth and Del, a February week
They told us to leave the attic room empty rather than sell us a bed in it. Nobody in twenty years of renting houses has talked us out of anything.
Marcus, a week in July with six of us
Eight people, one and a half bathrooms, and they say so on the website in those words. We planned around it and it was fine. The round table takes all eight, which was the part that mattered.
The Vaughan party, eight for Thanksgiving
The price we were quoted in March was the price we paid in October, to the dollar, tax included.
★★★★★
One space in the alley and free street parking after that. Said on the site, true on the night.
★★★★★
The attic room is warm in July, exactly as warm as they say it is. Everything else was better than the photographs.
★★★★
No dishwasher for eight people is a real thing. We knew before we booked and we did a rota. Worth it for that kitchen.
★★★★★
Told us the beach is two hours away before we asked. We went once, which was the right number of times.
★★★★★
Train at 5:40, dog at 7:00. Both in the questions page. Take the back bedroom.
★★★★

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