Availability calander

Everything to do with using your own website to advertise your rental property. Design, usability, hosting, getting listed on the search engines, optimising your site, pay-per-click, etc, etc.
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debk
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Post by debk »

Yes, Brooke, agreed. It is a major headache updating those sites that don't hook to the standard rentors.org calendar. Hello, holiday-rentals, are you listening?? It may not be fancy, but rentors.org is easy to use (for guests and owners alike), already the default calendar for several major listing sites and rental management software, and readily allows you to "push" updates to it yourself, if you wish.

I'm harboring a faint hope that the acquisition of h-r along with greatrentals (which uses rentors.org), etc, will force h-r to ease up on two of their most annoying practices: insistence upon using/updating their private calendar and no link to personal websites. A faint hope.
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livinginitaly
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Post by livinginitaly »

We're currently working on a rental site for Italy and the subject of availability is causing us some problems.

Rentors.org seems too popular to 'not' include, but if we provide our own calendar we can allow users to search all our listings for availability .... something i'd consider pretty important from everyones viewpoint.

However, if we use both, then I know that people will only update the rentors.org calendar. For the simple reason that it is probably used on other sites too.

Ever get the feeling that customers / clients are working against you ;)

Anyway, are we correct in thinking that 'everyone' uses Rentors.org?
Last edited by livinginitaly on Wed Jul 13, 2005 9:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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roxytoo
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Post by roxytoo »

thanks for everyone that has replied, certainly given me food for thought though have not made a concrete decesion as yet, I think it will come when I decide how the website is going to go!
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

There is a solution, I think, to the availability calendars condundrum but involves XML, Javascripting and access to the rental sites' APIs.
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

Rentors.org is the way to go, or villarenter.

Awful names though, don't these people have any clues about branding?
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vrooje
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Post by vrooje »

I use Rentors.org, but only because I have to -- it's the only thing VRBO links to.

My own availability calendar (which I've just linked to via our rates page on the property site) is more that just that -- it's a fully-functional booking calendar. I have an administrative section which allows me to book weeks or place them on inquiry, keep track of clients, prices, weekly costs, annual profits, special circumstances, etc. If I need a printed booking schedule, I just print an accounting statement for the given time period. If I could figure out how to get my other sites to link to it, I'd do that in a heartbeat!
Brooke
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livinginitaly
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Post by livinginitaly »

Thanks Garri,

Not exactly the answer I 'wanted' to hear ..... but nonetheless, certainly the one I expected.

Rentors.org continually amend the structure of the calendar feed in order to disrupt 'non partner' sites that 'share' their data.

This can be dealt with, but as for them allowing xml feeds for external use? I'm guessing that'll never happen!
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

but as for them allowing xml feeds for external use? I'm guessing that'll never happen!
Tony, they may have no choice if someone comes up with a solution that owners want.

Thinking about it more SQL commands sent to your rental listing site could do the trick but you'd need info about the database. The rental sites should open that up for you since it's your data - not theirs.

I can see how messy availability calendars become when you have a large number of owners listing on a handful of sites. That could explain why, as a person using these sites to look for holiday rentals, I've not had a good experience with them.

If I haven't had a good experience using the front end as a customer then I can only imagine how bad the user experience could be for owners in their admin screens.
jacmgr
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Post by jacmgr »

I created XML feeds of calendar data for external use for Rentors.org, VacationHomes.com, CyberRentals.com, VacationRentals.Com, and jAC. Feel free to use them in your own applications. (If you have other calendars you want an XML feed for, it is fairly straightforward, email me and we'll hook you up.)

http://jhplace.net/jrac/home2/aboutxml.php

It is not standard (as there are no standards yet), but they are XML and processable by anyone who can work with XML.

I have a couple sample applications that work on the XML, including availability search for multiple properties from these listing service calendars.

(I sent Tony some info on this seperately).

Also I think that RO display format will settle down once they get through their growing pains of their new system. I don't think there is anything intended to frustrate others!

John Del Ferro (jAC Calendars)[/url]
John and Hyonmi Del Ferro
http://www.vacationrentalworkshop.com
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livinginitaly
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Post by livinginitaly »

I stand corrected, keep up the good work John!
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debk
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Post by debk »

Awesome, John. Thank you for your generous spirit... not to mention your technical prowess!
Jayjan
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Post by Jayjan »

another good site for calendar availability for your personal website and its free is rentcalendar.com ragards jayjan
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