32-year-old spent $2,000 setting up an Airbnb in her neighbor's barn—now her rentals bring in $2 million a year

Jamie Inlow's ears perked up when her neighbor said the luxe apartment above his rust-red barn sat empty.

It was June 2019. Inlow, her husband and their redheaded toddler had just moved to Scottsville, Virginia, 20 miles south of the University of Virginia, where Inlow worked as a student program director. Her neighbor was giving her a tour of his property — the barn, 150 merino sheep and the unfurnished apartment that the previous owner rented out.

The neighbor wasn't keen on running a rental himself, so Inlow went home, drafted a business plan and made him a proposition: If you give me $2,000, I'll furnish the apartment using Facebook Marketplace and list it for short-term rentals on Airbnb.

Inlow managed the listing — launching a company called Be Still Getaways to do so — and split the profits down the middle with her neighbor. After it started making money, the pair teamed up for a second listing. Inlow found another partner for a third rental unit, splitting the profits the same way.

Today, Be Still Getaways runs 119 vacation rentals in Virginia. The company brought in $2 million last year on rental platforms like Airbnb, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It.

Until last summer, Inlow kept her full-time job while growing Be Still Getaways as a side hustle — working upwards of 80 hours per week, sometimes with her toddler physically strapped to her chest, she says.

"If I wouldn't have kept my two jobs, I could never have scaled my business," Inlow tells CNBC Make It.

Here's how she did it.

Before Inlow started Be Still Getaways, she worked about 30 hours per week and made $50,000 per year between her university job and consulting work, she says. She wanted to cut down or find remote work, to spend more time at home with her son.

The plan changed when her neighbor agreed to let her list the apartment. She quickly came up with the name "Be Still Getaways," and had a former student design the company's logo.

She relied on Google for strategy: Upon learning that search engine optimization could attract new customers, she created an Instagram and a website. She paid a company to help her create hashtags and build her online presence — all for a single Airbnb property.

Then, Inlow noticed a local influencer, Julia Randall, interacting with several of Be Still Getaways' Instagram posts. She asked Randall to promote the Airbnb listing on her "Stays and Getaways" page, in exchange for a free stay.

Two months after being listed, the apartment was booked daily.

Wanting to capitalize on the momentum, Inlow went back to her neighbor-turned-investor and asked for $110,000, she says — this time to buy, build and furnish a tiny home off Craiglist.

The same business model applied: He funded the expenditure, she built and ran the listing on his property, and the pair split the profits down the middle. The listing went live on Airbnb in March 2020. Despite Covid-19 restrictions, it regularly rented out.

When a former middle school classmate reached out asking for Airbnb advice, Inlow said she'd redesign and run the property herself for $10,000. The pair split the profits, and one shared rental unit quickly turned into three.

By the end of 2020, Be Still Getaways managed 20 properties. "I was definitely spending 20 hours per week on research alone," Inlow says. "I was probably pushing 30 to 40 hours per week [at Be Still Getaways], on top of my other jobs."

By 2021, Be Still Getaways managed 30 properties. Inlow hired an operations director and part-time staff for cleaning, staging and repairs.

The company looked impressive on paper, but it ate into Inlow's time and paycheck: She paid herself just $10,000 that year, she says.

That fall, Inlow purchased another property management company, Cape Charles Escapes, to expand her rental portfolio to Virginia's coast. She co-founded a business called Carriage House with a local realtor, who found people wanting to rent their property — but unsure how — and directed them to Be Still Getaways.

The investments paid off. In March 2022, Inlow quit her full-time university job. Four months later, she switched from paying herself "whatever was left over" to an annual salary of $72,000, she says.

Now, Inlow and her husband both work for Be Still Getaways, and make a combined $150,000 per year, she says. The company has eight full-time workers, including an on-call repairman, and about 60 part-time employees.

It manages short-term rentals, mid-term rentals, inns and motels, some of which have been featured on their respective online rental platforms. Be Still Getaways appeared on rental management platform Eviivo's list of "Collective" properties — a group of "unique, notable and luxury independently-owned accommodations around the world" — in March, for example.

Inlow is still learning how to be a CEO, she says. Currently, her goal is to hire more people and streamline workflows so everyone, herself included, can get a break from the constant hustle.

She isn't exactly sure how to go about it. "My life is not chill, and I'm a workaholic by nature," says Inlow. "I have to practice strategies to create work-life balance."

For now, she adds, she'll continue going to business therapy and leaving her Apple Watch on "do not disturb" mode when it's time to play with her son.

This story has been corrected to reflect that Be Still Getaways brought in $2 million in 2022 revenue, and updated to reflect its appearance on Eviivo's "Collective" list in March.

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