Vacation rental management company Vacasa says it is focused
on addressing the continued high rate of homeowners opting to pull their properties
off its platform.
It’s one of the challenges the company has faced since going
public in December 2021.
In a letter to shareholders accompanying the company’s
financial results for the first quarter of this year, co-signed by CEO Rob
Greyber and CFO Jamie Cohen, it said, “the business continues to experience
elevated levels of homeowner churn, which we believe is primarily due to
concerns about levels of homeowner income as the industry comes off two record
years. The churn rate hasn’t increased since we issued our last letter in
March, but we are focused on, and continue to take steps to address, the
elevated homeowner churn.”
To provide more “peace of mind and transparency” to homeowners,
in April Vacasa launched its “Homecare Dashboard” that provides details on when
the property was last cleaned, the status of maintenance requests, guest
cleaning reviews, etc.
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According to Vacasa’s website, it has more than 44,000 homes
on its platform, with two strategies to add properties: a sales team onboarding
individual homeowners and a “portfolio approach” to acquire local vacation
rental management companies. In the shareholder letter the company reiterated that
the individual sales approach is a priority for this year, and March
represented its highest per sales representative productivity over the past
year.
But costs and lack of profitability have continued to be
issues for the company. In January Vacasa laid
off 1,300 employees – about 17% of its workforce in an effort to bring down
costs. The company says it finished Q1 2023 with “staffing levels that better
matched demand,” which helped it to improve adjusted EBITDA to negative $12
million, compared to negative $22 million in the same period one year prior.
Meanwhile, Vacasa’s stock has continued to struggle, falling
below $1 per share since early April and putting it at risk
of delisting from the Nasdaq Stock Market.
In other updates to shareholders, the company says Cohen
will step down as CFO and will be replaced by Bruce Schuman, most recently CFO
of Kiavi, beginning June 1. Cohen will remain as an advisor until October 1,
and the company said, “The transition was not the result of any disagreements
between Cohen and Vacasa.”
In the first three months of this year, Vacasa’s gross
booking value reached $521 million, up 5% year-over-year. Revenue was $257 million
in Q1, up 4% compared to the same period in 2022. Net loss was $44 million for
the first quarter of 2023. Vacasa is reiterating its full-year 2023 revenue
guidance of low-double digit to high-single digit percent decline compared to
2022.