August Home, HomeAway partner on keyless access for vacation rentals

By Lulu Chang Published April 18, 2017

August Smart Lock — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Awkward interactions with your vacation home rental’s owners may soon be a thing of the past — at least, insofar as getting keys from them is concerned. Thanks to a new partnership between smart lock provider August Home and vacation rental platform HomeAway, hosts and guests can easily (but securely) access their homes using an August Smart Lock and August Smart Keypad.

No longer will you have to find the neighbor to get the key to get inside — rather, just receive a secure PIN once you’ve made a reservation through HomeAway, and spend your vacation worrying about what drink you’re going to have next, rather than wondering if your keys fell out of your pocket on your last swim.

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“Our partnership with HomeAway puts an end to leaving keys under the doormat, lost keys and coordinating key exchanges with guests,” said Jason Johnson, CEO of August Home Inc. “We’ve focused on the Smart Lock and Smart Keypad to offer the most convenient and simple way for guests to access any property. All guests need is the PIN code, that is automatically sent to them in the HomeAway app, to enter the property. This simplifies managing the rental process for both hosts and guests.”

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According to a recent August Home survey, 80 percent of savvy vacation guests of the 21st century say they’re more likely to complete a rental reservation with a property featuring smart home technology. And more telling still, 60 percent of guests are actually willing to pay more for a home with a smart home feature.

August makes having a smart home a no-brainer, as hosts need only create an August account, then connect if with the HomeAway.com host page. From there, hosts simply generate a PIN code that will appear in their HomeAway Owner Dashboard for each guest reservation, and guests will receive a notification to let them know that they have access to the property they reserved via a Smart Keypad PIN code in the HomeAway Guest app. Once the guest leaves, the PIN expires.

So the next time you go on vacation, you may want to consider finding a HomeAway rental featuring August Home’s smartlocks. After all, how else are you supposed to fully relax?

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