Shop Until You Make Money

People assume the secret to five-star reviews is the location or the price. Those help, but the truth is guests remember the details: whether the shower pressure was good, whether there was a real coffee maker instead of a single-serve pod machine nobody asked for, whether check-in felt smooth instead of like retrieving a spare key from under a rock in the dark.

Over several properties and a lot of trial and error, I have built a running list of the products that consistently earn a mention in reviews, the ones worth the extra money, and the ones that look nice in photos but fall apart after ten guest turnovers. Lighting matters more than people think. A statement fixture in the entryway photographs beautifully and costs less than you would guess. So does a proper blackout curtain in every bedroom, which solves more one-star reviews than almost anything else on this list.

I put the whole list on one page so nobody has to reverse-engineer it from my Amazon order history. Shop Until You Make Money is exactly what it sounds like, a running, honestly reviewed list of STR must-haves, updated as I find things that actually earn their keep. Take a look, and I will keep adding to it as new products prove themselves.

Up next, I am leaving Richmond behind for a bit and heading north, to a small Pennsylvania city that surprised me more than I expected it to.