Dave,

I get the sense that you want a reply before your visit on the
20th., so I'll bang out a quick reply.

Bad news first. Even if your builder meets his completion date
of May 2009 it means that you will find it hard to get many
rentals until 2010. You are going to have to rely on your own
marketing for early bookings as the better tour operators will
want to see excellent pics of the completed project, and visit
it before accepting it.

Guarantees. A bit like the stereotype of the bank manager when
you ask for a loan. If you don't need one, he'll give you one.
Their financial security is the key.

20 years ago you could find companies giving you a commitment on
rentals, and even putting 60% up front, with 40% at the end of
the season. Others more conservatively paying in stages
throughout the season. I don't know of any tour operators doing
the guarantee thing now.

The history of when and why the market changed is well known but
you probably don't want to hear. Right now the internet means
that the old tour operator packages are not in demand. The
market is much more volatile. So if the tour operators can't
depend on the consumer, they can't give guarantees.

Many operators went bust who followed that now outdated model.
Some owners are still owed money by those operators who gave
guarantees and didn't pay up when the bookings didn't come in. A
guarantee is not worth the paper it's written on if the company
can't meet it. Spending more money in legal process will not get
the funds into your bank account when you need them.

So, the best guarantee is to make sure your property is marketed
and managed as well as, and hopefully better, than the
competition.

If you can't market it yourself, or even if you can, put it with
tour operators, agents, or web sites, who are already filling
properties in the area your property is in. Ask other owners
there about who is giving them their bookings.

Locally you may find an agent in the town or village your
property is in who will give you a promise. Check out the owners
of the other properties the agent represents to see what return
they are getting. But to some extent this will depend on the
type of property and the market you are aiming at.

If you find anybody giving guarantees then please let the
readers of this blog know. Meantime I suggest using several
marketing techniques all at the same time to maximise your
return:-

1. Your own internet web site/domain.

2. Give the property to multiple tour operators on a non
exclusive basis. Many tour operators will list your property at
no cost to you.

3. Local agents in your nearest town in Portugal.

4. Advertising within a closed and friendly market at home.
Company newsletters, factory notice-boards, places where people
know and trust you.

5. Free Internet web sites that don't require you to pay to put
your ad on them.

6. A limited few web sites that do ask you to pay to advertise
with them, but only providing owners in your area are getting
bookings from them

7. Free newspapers in your home town/country.

Don't hang around. Get as many of your free ads on the web as
you can in place now so that all the search engines will have
found them by May. In any case item 4 and item 7 may be your
best route to early bookings when the property is completed.

There are a couple of companies that I would recommend putting
your property with if they will take you on. They both require a
good local service who will clean manage and maintain your
property...

Portugal Holiday Destinations

and

The Portuguese Portfolio

Also place a free ad on u4it for the Silver Coast, the site
takes rental as well as property sales ads and then place a free
link to your free ad on World Holidays and Villas Portugal
directory for Lourinha.

If, or should I say when, you want a web site created for your
villa, I'm your man. You'll find my email address here...

"Silver Coast Property - About the Author"

good luck and best regards,
David