On the surface, Jessica Abrego’s vacation rental origin story is a common one. She discovered the magic of short-term rentals as a guest on a trip to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico and decided to try renting out her Temecula, CA house in 2015. She immediately fell in love with being an ambassador for her hometown and decided later to purchase a second home in San Diego. Not long after, her friends began asking for her help in renting out their properties, too. A few months into cohosting, Jessica realized she had a business opportunity on her hands and launched her own property management company, Barefoot Vacation Rentals, in January of 2018 and never looked back. 

“I love what I do,” Jessica said. “I feel like this is what God has made me to do. Some days are harder than others, but for me it comes easy. I enjoy hosting people. I enjoy getting to know people. I enjoy taking care of making sure that when someone comes in, they are going to get nothing but a five-star experience.” 

Today, the 32-year-old manages 20 homes in Temecula and San Diego, California and one in Beaufort, South Carolina. Each of the California homes has a clever wine-themed name like Everything Happens for a Riesling and Hakuna Moscato, cheeky nods to Temecula Valley’s more than 40 vineyards. 

The region draws nearly 3 million annual visitors, many of whom come to explore the southern California wine country or attend one of nearly 5,500 weddings that take place there each year. 

Working with her daughters

Jessica estimated she hosts about 10,000 of these guests annually. She does so with the help of a small team: a virtual assistant in Beaufort (who also helps manage the property there) and an assistant in Temecula. She also partners with a few local cleaning companies, a local photographer, a gardener, and a pool technician. This week, she posted her third job opening for a handy(wo)man.

Whomever she hires will have some great trainers: 11-year-old Aurelia and 10-year-old Audrey, Jessica’s daughters. The girls don’t just “help” their single mom with the business, they work. They take care of office administrative tasks, call Airbnb to handle cancellations, participate in city council meetings, and tackle common vacation rental maintenance issues. 

They even hosted a YouTube series called Girls of All Trades that taught viewers basic home maintenance skills, like replacing broken towel racks. In that tutorial, the girls stand side by side on a chair in glittery shirts and tool belts and explain every step of the process, helping each other and giggling throughout. 

As a bonus, each video also comes with a joke of the week. “Audrey, who cleans the sea?” Aurelia asks. After a few guesses (Octopuses? Farts?), Aurelia reveals the answer: a mermaid. It’s no surprise that grumpy guests are swiftly charmed when the sisters show up in response to their complaints, tools in hand ready to save the day.

The trio’s handy skills came from Jessica’s career as a refrigeration tech in the Air National Guard, where she has served for 14 years. “I couldn’t do what I do if it wasn’t for the military,” she said. The combination of hands-on mechanical skills and experience managing contractor projects has translated perfectly into managing vacation homes. 

That, and her effervescent personality. She’s open, cheerful, and giggly, traits she clearly passed down to Aurelia and Audrey. Owners in her program describe her as honest, trustworthy, and good to her word. 

Barefoot’s homeowners are also prior military, town residents, and some are elderly – and they all have their own story, Jessica said. “Most are just people like me, all just making by and enjoying the benefits of having a vacation rental.” They know that if they like talking to her as much as they do, guests will, too. 

And they do. Barefoot’s five-star reviews recount Jessica’s hospitality the most. For her, “hosting means giving the best experience someone can have,” she said. “You can go to hotels and get a stay there that’s just a standard bed and a kitchen and a bathroom. We want to go above and beyond.” 

A touch of local business

In doing so, Barefoot has partnered with dozens of local businesses to drive her guests to them by offering buy-one-get-one wine tastings, discounts at restaurants and wine tours, and other experiences. 

“I love that the vacation rental business keeps the money with local people,” she said. “We’re not a hotel corporation, we’re not some huge honcho living in Beverly Hills. We are local people, helping local people, coming in and keeping the money local… I don’t send any of my guests to Chili’s. There’s nothing wrong with Chili’s, but I’m sending them to the mom-and-pop, hole-in-the-wall local taco shop that has the best tacos in town.”

So many of her guests follow her recommendations and take part in the offerings that many local businesses know Jessica before she even meets them. 

It’s not just her guests, homeowners, contractors, and local businesses who get something special out her and her daughters’ magnetic hospitality. One of Jessica’s most profound hosting experiences started with a noise monitoring alert. The guests in her private home, an Afghan family, were playing music too loudly. When Jessica and the girls stopped by to address it, the family graciously turned the music down and invited them in for a traditional Afghan dinner. Later, they taught Jessica and the girls traditional dances in their living room. She told Aurelia and Audrey, “This is the joy of doing vacation rentals. You get to meet people from all around the world, different cultures, different foods, different ways of doing things, but we are all enjoying life.”

It’s time for moments like these that make vacation rentals Jessica’s passion, the why behind what she does. The business grew enough in its first nine months she was able to quit her full-time job by September 2018, freeing up her time to spend more of it with others. 

“I enjoy the freedom that the vacation rental business has given me,” she said. “I work more than 40 hours a week now, but I have the flexibility of when those 40 hours are.” She can work from her phone and her computer wherever she is, which allows her to travel with her daughters.

When they aren’t traveling, Jessica gives much of her time back to the community. She currently serves as the president of the Short Term Rental Alliance of Temecula, educating fellow hosts and property managers as the city considers banning short-term rentals and advocating on behalf of the group. She also raises funds for Door of Faith Orphanage, sponsoring two children monthly and inviting guests to join the cause, and she organized a massive birthday party for 75 foster kids with Royal Family KIDS.

But for Jessica, the thing she cherishes most is the extra time she gets with her girls every day. “The greatest thing is being able to take my kids to and from school. I never was able to do that, ever,” she said. “Now, with the girls in fifth and sixth grade, I can.”