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              <span class="preheader" style="color: transparent; display: none; height: 0; max-height: 0; max-width: 0; opacity: 0; overflow: hidden; mso-hide: all; visibility: hidden; width: 0;">
               Why a tiny mushroom-shaped dome in the California redwoods outperforms millions of other Airbnb listings. by Zachary Crockett.
              </span>
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                 The Hustle
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                Issue #172
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                 <img alt="The Hustle, Sunday, August 22, 2021" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fmost_booked_header.gif/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; display: block;" width="600"/>
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                Sunday, August 22, 2021
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            <h2 style="font-size: 30px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 25px;">
             <strong>
              Inside the world’s most booked Airbnb
             </strong>
            </h2>
            <p style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 120%; padding-bottom: 10px; font-style: italic; color: #737373; margin: 0;">
             Why a tiny mushroom-shaped dome in the California redwoods outperforms millions of other Airbnb listings.
            </p>
            <p style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 120%; padding-bottom: 24px; margin: 0;">
             <strong>
              BY
              <a style="color: #D62829; text-decoration: none; text-transform: uppercase;">
               Zachary Crockett
              </a>
             </strong>
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The world’s most popular Airbnb listing isn’t easy to find.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             From San Francisco, the journey begins with an hourlong drive down Interstate 280 and a windy traverse of “Killer 17” — one of the most
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              accident-prone
             </a>
             highways in California.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             In the small coastal town of Aptos, you ascend into the Santa Cruz mountains, past centuries-old redwood groves and herds of deer. A few miles in, you lose cell service and have to rely on paper instructions printed out in advance.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             When you spot the cluster of weathered mailboxes, you cut right and climb up a steep single-lane driveway until you reach an old, mint green shed.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             You park and walk up the driveway, past black cats, clucking chickens, and dense thickets of foliage.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Here lies the world-famous
             <strong>
              Mushroom Dome
             </strong>
             .
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fdome.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             Airbnb’s most booked property (The Hustle)
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Over the years, this 100-square-foot
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              geodesic structure
             </a>
             has hosted more than
             <strong>
              5.8k Airbnb guests
             </strong>
             from all over the world.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             People have traveled here from more than 40 countries — Djibouti, Mongolia, China, India, Australia, Peru — on 6 different continents. It’s been the subject of
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              news articles
             </a>
             ,
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              Instagram shoots
             </a>
             , and
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              video tributes
             </a>
             .
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The Mushroom Dome is the most booked and most wish-listed property on Airbnb’s platform, besting
             <strong>
              5.6m other listings
             </strong>
             , including a house shaped like an
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              elephant
             </a>
             , a
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              cave
             </a>
             in France, and a 12th-century Scottish
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              castle
             </a>
             .
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             What makes it so popular? Why do people flock here? And how has this tiny cabin’s fame impacted the owner’s life?
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             On a recent afternoon in August, I went there to find out.
            </p>
            <h4 style="font-size: 17px; height: 100%; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 22px; padding-top: 8px; margin: 0px;">
             <strong>
              The origins of a legendary cabin
             </strong>
            </h4>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Within seconds of stepping out of the car, I was greeted by
             <strong>
              Katherine “Kitty” Mrache
             </strong>
             , the Mushroom Dome’s 71-year-old proprietor.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             With kind eyes and a head of white feathery hair, Kitty emerged from her garden, a throng of hummingbirds in tow.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “You made it,” she beamed.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Kitty migrated to the woods in 1984 when her parents — a renowned
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              geologist
             </a>
             and an
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              anti-war activist
             </a>
             — moved here from the Bay Area suburbs in search of solitude. They asked her if she’d be interested in joining them if they bought her land next door.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “Hell yeah!” she said.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             For the next decade, she lived on the property, cobbling together an income as a Kumon instructor, a Montessori teacher, and a crystal healer.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fkitty.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             Kitty poses in front of the Mushroom Dome (The Hustle)
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             In the mid-’90s, Kitty’s parents allowed a friend who’d recently become homeless to build a small cabin on the 10-acre property.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Kitty agreed — so long as the structure was 100 square feet or less.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             A local builder sold the woman a set of blueprints for a unique geometric structure; with the help of an ex-Navy SEAL, she built it from scratch and lived there for the next 7 years before marrying and moving out.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             After Kitty’s parents passed away, her family sold off the property. But Kitty, who still lived next door, wanted to keep the strange cabin.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “We hired a crane and loaded it onto a flatbed truck,” she says. “And then, I got to see a house fly.”
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             A Jill-of-all-trades, she fixed up the relocated cabin as a crash pad for her kids. She cut out 144 wood triangles by hand, built a foundation, and retrofitted the roof with elastomeric paint.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             When she and her husband, Michael, became empty nesters, they decided to try their hand at renting it out by the night.
            </p>
            <h4 style="font-size: 17px; height: 100%; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 22px; padding-top: 8px; margin: 0px;">
             <strong>
              An early Airbnb adopter
             </strong>
            </h4>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             In July of 2009, Kitty listed her cabin on Craigslist for $60/night but quickly found out the site was rife with scammers and unreliable guests.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “People would book it and then cancel at the last minute, never to be heard from again,” she says. “They didn’t pay in advance, so I’d just lose out on the income.”
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             She looked for an alternative and stumbled across a newfangled, short-term rental platform called Airbnb.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             At the time, the company was 11 months young and relatively unknown.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Kitty decided to give it a shot and signed up.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fdpe.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             The Hustle
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The Mushroom Dome was the
             <strong>
              8,357th
             </strong>
             property to join Airbnb. Almost all of the other listings were urban properties in San Francisco and Manhattan. Kitty’s place — a weird-looking dome in the middle of the woods — was something of an oddity. And that worked in her favor.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Within 2 weeks, the Mushroom Dome was fully booked.
            </p>
            <h4 style="font-size: 17px; height: 100%; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 22px; padding-top: 8px; margin: 0px;">
             <strong>
              Since then, the cabin’s popularity hasn’t let up
             </strong>
            </h4>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Today, the Mushroom Dome is so popular that it only has
             <strong>
              2 or 3 vacancies
             </strong>
             in a typical year.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Guests typically have to make reservations up to
             <strong>
              8 months in advance
             </strong>
             . Even Kitty’s own children — now fully grown adults — have to contend with the masses to get a night on the calendar.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Despite its popularity, Kitty has chosen to keep her property relatively affordable at
             <strong>
              $156/night
             </strong>
             , ~$100/night cheaper than hotels in town.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “I don’t want just the techies to stay here,” she says. “I want it to be accessible to all different types of people.”
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Her guests run the gamut from millionaire founders to lower-middle-class families who save up all year to stay here.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Finside_dome.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             The Hustle
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Part of Kitty’s success can be chalked up to Airbnb’s marketing love affair with her cabin.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             She joined the platform when the company was just a few employees working out of an apartment. To this day, she knows the founders on a first-name basis — and they see her as an embodiment of the company’s stated purpose: helping everyday people monetize their extra space.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The company featured the Mushroom Dome on a series of billboard ads in 5 US cities, with the caption: “Millions of Airbnb hosts. Only one like Kitty.” It also had a replica of the structure installed on the 4th floor of its San Francisco HQ.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fkittys_billbaord.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             A billboard featuring Kitty’s abode (Via Emilee Goo)
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Airbnb says the Mushroom Dome’s prosperity is part of a larger trend on the platform: a rise in the popularity of unique-looking properties.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “Travelers are turning to unique abodes like cabins, tiny homes, and treehouses to break up the monotony of the past year, with the type of stay — not the exact location — becoming the destination,” a spokesperson for the company told
             <em>
              The Hustle
             </em>
             .
            </p>
            <ul style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 20px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 12px; margin: 0;">
             <li style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 0 0 0 15px; padding: 0px;">
              The platform says it has
              <strong>
               170k+
              </strong>
              of these listings — a
              <strong>
               30%
              </strong>
              jump from 2019.
             </li>
             <li style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 0 0 0 15px; padding: 0px;">
              Searches for “unique” properties (like
              <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none;">
               <u style="color: #d62829; underline: none; text-decoration: none;">
                hobbit holes
               </u>
              </a>
              and
              <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none;">
               <u style="color: #d62829; underline: none; text-decoration: none;">
                potato houses
               </u>
              </a>
              ) shot up
              <strong>
               94%
              </strong>
              during the 1st half of 2021, compared to the same period 2 years ago.
             </li>
            </ul>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Kitty chalks up her success to a focus on the human touch.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “It’s kind of woo-woo to a lot of people,” she says. “But to me, it’s important to focus on service, not what I can get out of it.”
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             She decries Airbnb hosts who leave a key in a lockbox and never make contact with their guests. Her property, she claims, is more than a place to sleep: “It’s a doorway for people to discover themselves.”
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The guest books in the cabin are full of notes from travelers who describe the dome as a conduit for transformative experiences. In these tight quarters, guests have proposed to each other, taken pregnancy photos, and celebrated major milestones in their lives.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fmap_guests.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             Kitty holds a map showing where all of her guests have come from (The Hustle)
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Kitty wants to be a central part of that experience.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             A 40-year practitioner of meditation, she often guides guests on mindfulness quests and metaphysical journeys.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             During my 2-hour chat with her — which was intended to focus on what makes an Airbnb listing popular — we discussed:
            </p>
            <ul style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 20px; padding-bottom: 10px; padding-left: 12px; margin: 0;">
             <li style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 0 0 0 15px; padding: 0px;">
              Telepathic dogs
             </li>
             <li style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 0 0 0 15px; padding: 0px;">
              Quantum physics
             </li>
             <li style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 0 0 0 15px; padding: 0px;">
              Mineral healing
             </li>
             <li style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 0 0 0 15px; padding: 0px;">
              Thought field therapy (“tapping”)
             </li>
             <li style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 0 0 0 15px; padding: 0px;">
              Tectonic plates
             </li>
            </ul>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Reared in the countercultural chaos of the ‘60s and sculpted by the New Age spirituality of the ‘80s, Kitty is as unique as the property she rents.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             She regaled me with tales about alchemic substances, spirit channeling, and the night her activist mother once spent in a jail cell with the singer-songwriter, Joan Baez.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             We talked about the immortal Indian yogi,
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              Babaji
             </a>
             , ‘70s rock band Supertramp, and
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              Mellen-Thomas Benedict
             </a>
             , a man who supposedly died and came back to life in 1982.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             At some point during the conversation, it struck me that Kitty — not just the dome — is integral to the listing’s popularity.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Flogbook.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             Kitty reads through reviews left in an old logbook from 2009. “We chose this place as a part of our honeymoon,” wrote one guest. “Thank you for providing us with a beautiful place to start our lives together.” (The Hustle)
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The Mushroom Dome isn’t for everyone, though.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Kitty’s gotten a few bad reviews for being too talkative. Others don’t understand just how rustic the property is.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “I had one woman bring her mother here from China. They drove all the way up, took one look at it, and drove straight back down the hill,” she says. “It wasn’t her idea of a good time.”
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             But by and large, guests know what they’re getting into — and a break from city life is a part of the charm.
            </p>
            <h4 style="font-size: 17px; height: 100%; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 22px; padding-top: 8px; margin: 0px;">
             <strong>
              A live-saver
             </strong>
            </h4>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Financially, the Mushroom Dome has been a lifesaver.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Before she joined Airbnb, Kitty was struggling to get by on her $250/mo. Social Security checks.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Today, the cabin brings in
             <strong>
              $8k/mo.
             </strong>
             (
             <strong>
              $96k/year
             </strong>
             ) — more than 8x what the
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              average Airbnb
             </a>
             makes.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The extra cash helped her husband, Michael, retire from his job working with international students at the UCSC extension school.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “For the first time in our lives, we don’t have to worry about money,” Kitty says.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fexterior.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             The Hustle
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             She is well aware of the
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              controversies
             </a>
             surrounding Airbnb. The platform has been derided for having a detrimental impact on housing stock, rising rent and home prices, and gentrification.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             But there is a difference, she says, between renting out a remote cabin in the woods and snatching up a property in a housing-starved urban neighborhood solely for use as a vacation rental.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The cabin has been a boon for Santa Cruz County: It brings in
             <strong>
              ~$50k/year
             </strong>
             in transient occupancy taxes, and more than 2k other property owners in the region — mostly empty nesters over the age of 50 — have followed Kitty’s lead and rented out extra rooms of their own.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The success has allowed Kitty to renovate and rent out a 2nd property on the land -- a den that she calls the
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              Hummingbird Haven
             </a>
             .
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Outside the door, dozens of hummingbirds congregate around red feeders, sucking up 2 liters of nectar every day.
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td align="center" style="text-align: center;">
            <img alt="" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fmedia.sailthru.com%252Fcomposer%252Fimages%252Fsailthru-prod-6ks%252Fhummingbird.jpeg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZtZWRpYS5zYWlsdCJ9:1mHkyY:cZEUK4-q8MnDjZehRXyxa2CX-FkjjVvVkp1VbLyKEbQ" style="width: 100%; max-width: 600px; height: auto; padding-top: 10px;" width="600"/>
            <p align="left" style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #5f696c; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; text-align: left; line-height: 20px; margin: 0px; padding: 8px 5px 20px;">
             Hummingbirds zip through the air all over the property (The Hustle)
            </p>
           </td>
          </tr>
          <tr>
           <td class="h2020 ignore-defaults" style="padding: 0px 10px;">
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Like many Airbnb hosts, Kitty was
             <a style="color: #d62829; text-decoration: none; -webkit-text-fill-color: #d62829;">
              strained
             </a>
             by the pandemic.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             Last year, she had over 70 cancellations and the Mushroom Dome sat empty for nearly 2 months. She stayed positive, using the time to install a new hardwood floor and build a new couch.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             The lull in bookings — a 1st in more than a decade — also gave Kitty some time to reflect on everything this odd little cabin has given her.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “I’m 71 now, and sometimes I think I’d like to go travel and see the world,” she says, gazing out at the redwood trees that enshrine the deck.
            </p>
            <p style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 140%; margin: 5px 0px 10px;">
             “But then again, the whole world has come to me instead.”
            </p>
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