Passive Potential

“We form a partnership with them for three years. We do all of the promotional material, all of the PR, the marketing, optimization, and we fill the cabin for them. And in return, they essentially do the cabin management, and then receive a decent percentage of every booking fee.”

But the biggest – and sometimes most appealing – difference from the regular Airbnb model is that the hosts don’t have any engagement with the guests.

“We manage that whole entire process for them. They don’t see the customer. They don’t hear the customer. They don’t deal with bookings, they don’t deal with cancellations. And we train them as to exactly how to use everything in the cabin, and how to manage it effectively in the most efficient way possible.”

With cabins across the UK, Australia and NZ, the company pitches itself towards urban millennials – busy people that haven’t spent much time outdoors and for whom the idea of being disconnected from their screens, the internet and their hectic lives is a refreshing and much-needed novelty. Its mission is to provide a space for guests to “feel free in nature” and attain a sense of presence and mindfulness that they wouldn’t normally feel in their daily lives.

And while that might be more relevant in Australia and the UK than NZ – an outdoor-mad country that enjoys an abundance of accessible camping sites and tramping huts – it doesn’t lessen the delightful experience of staying in one of these cabins.

Custom-built in Australia to provide a rustic yet rudimentary feel, the solar-powered cabins are equipped with mostly the basics to allow guests to more easily attain the presence that comes from a distraction-free experience. Linen and bedding is provided, along with a shower, composting toilet, a gas cooker, and a mini fridge. Some of them have other features such as gas heaters or outdoor wood-fire hot tubs.

Knowing that its target clientele are millennials who might struggle to be relieved of their usual comforts, Unyoked also stocks the cabins with boutique coffee beans, an arsenal of coffee-making paraphernalia, craft beer and canned cocktails.

“Our cabins are designed with a huge amount of intentionality to slow down and only have what you need to have a really good experience in the bush. Sure there’s a few creature comforts but it’s not a chocolate on the pillow kind or Instagram photo with a cheese board type of thing. It’s more minimal than that, but it’s extremely comfortable.”

To guarantee guests a restorative, disconnected experience, Unyoked vets properties to ensure they are the right fit for a cabin. A property must have sufficient scenic features or vistas and

be large enough so that the guests can enjoy privacy without encountering the landowners or other people. When a landowner contacts Unyoked, Charlie will head out to meet them and have a look at the property. If it goes ahead, all the landowner has to do is ensure access, and potentially level out a small platform for the cabin’s trailer.

The cabins must also be within two hour’s drive of a large city to allow urban customers to access without too much car travel. But it’s not all comfort and convenience – guests can’t drive directly to the cabin, instead having to park elsewhere on the property and walk 10 minutes or so the rest of the way, carting their gear with supplied wheelbarrows. As Charlie says, it all fits in with Unyoked’s mission to get people outdoors, off-grid and thriving in nature.

“The idea is to replicate that feeling that you get after coming back from travel. So there’s a big mental health element to it, and there’s an environmental aspect as well. There’s huge amounts of research indicating the benefit of nature to reduce stress and improve cognitive function. And when you’re facing a big wide landscape, you have this feeling of awe. And so we’re all about accessing that feeling for when you need it the most.”

For Chris Vella, who hosts three cabins on his property two hours outside of Sydney, Unyoked’s marketing strategy is paying substantial dividends. Looking for ways to make a sustainable passive income from his property, he first considered selling timber from pine trees, or else planting something that could yield a profitable harvest. None of those options felt right, but then he came across the idea of cabin accommodation and Unyoked’s model. He met the founders, the cabins went on the land, and the customers – and the money – appeared almost straight away.

“I was extremely surprised at how full they were from day one until now. We went through months of 100% occupancy – not one day available. We’re at about 95% most of the time.”

“If I wanted to, I could rely only on the income from those cabins to support our family. It would be enough.”

Earning enough from the cabins, Chris is able to hire cleaners to prepare each one after each guest. All he has to do is change the gas bottles, and clean the firepit out and some cobwebs off the cabin, which takes less than an hour in total each Sunday.