On todays episode, Rachel interviews Vanessa Cella, a top-100 travel planner at Fora Travel (out of about 22,000 advisors), about what travel planners need from vacation rental partners and why the relationship between rentals and advisors is still harder than with hotels. Vanessa shares her background, focus on luxury travel, and why she books only vetted, professionally managed rentals rather than Airbnb/Vrbo. They discuss how hotel booking is streamlined through advisor tools and contracted perks, while vacation rentals are inconsistent, often require manual email back-and-forth, and create friction around availability, payment terms, cancellation policies, rate parity, white-labeling, and one-off commission negotiations—sometimes through intermediaries that slow guest issue resolution. Rachel argues the industry needs better tech distribution, standardized contracts, and pre-set commissions/perks so both owners and advisors can work more efficiently.

Connect With Rachel: rachel@abodeluxuryrentals.com

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Connect With Vanessa: vanessa.cella@fora.travel

https://www.instagram.com/luxurytravelbyvanessa/

Please Do Disturb Preorder – https://promo.porchlightbooks.com/pages/promotions/pleasedodisturbps

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Rachel's first book, Please Do Disturb, is now available for preorder. Co-written with leadership experts Linny Jones and Harte Logan, it shares the leadership principles Rachel has used to build Abode Luxury Rentals through practical stories, actionable tools, and a simple three-question framework. If you enjoyed this episode, we'd love for you to preorder your copy. Thank you for your support!

On The Hospitality Breakroom, host Rachel Alday of Abode Luxury Rentals and longtime reservations lead Rachel “Tilly” Tilton discuss why vacation rental growth may depend more on relationships with travel planners than OTAs, and why booking vacation rentals through the travel-planner ecosystem remains difficult. They contrast hotel workflows (GDS-based distribution, preset commissions, price parity, and established protections) with vacation rentals’ property-by-property complexity, owner approvals, nonstandard ADA details, and lack of a shared platform. They share a successful example: a Park City Olympics/Paralympics family viewing-party booking that worked because the planner researched Abode’s portfolio, communicated needs clearly, and respected response times. Key friction points include requests for “white-labeled” property info, mismatched commission expectations, reluctance to share guest contact details needed for operations and emergencies, third-party intermediaries adding layers and confusion, and payment delays, while highlighting positive partners like TTW Group Brazilian Travel Agency and Shelton and James and calling for industry-wide solutions and collaboration.Connect With Rachel:rachel@abodeluxuryrentals.comhttps://www.instagram.com/aldayrachel/https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelalday/https://abodeluxuryrentals.com/

Rachel Alday launches a new season of The Hospitality Breakroom focused on the growing relationship between vacation rentals and travel planners, noting that while hotels have long partnered with advisors, vacation rental operators have struggled, partly due to GDS systems being designed for hotel room types. She explains how more travelers—especially mid to high-end—are using planners, increasing her interest in improving distribution and getting professionally managed vacation rentals in front of planner clients. Alday introduces herself as co-owner of Abode Luxury Rentals, operating for about 18 years in Park City, Jackson Hole, and Sun Valley with roughly 200 high-end properties, and shares that she started the podcast to share lessons learned. She also previews her October book, Please Do Disturb, about hospitality and leadership frameworks, and teases the next episode featuring Vanessa Chella, a top 100 FORA travel planner.Connect With Rachel:rachel@abodeluxuryrentals.comhttps://www.instagram.com/aldayrachel/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelalday/

https://abodeluxuryrentals.com/