Vacasa Turnaround Exec Cites the Need for a Vacation Rental Reset Post-Covid

25.08.2023 - 13:56 / skift.com / Dennis Schaal / Rob Greyber

T.J. Clark, property manager Vacasa’s new chief commercial officer, is in the proverbial hot seat, charged with reversing unacceptably high rates of homeowners leaving the platform, and increasing sales after the company laid off up to 300 sales and marketing staff and 1,000 field personnel in January.

That came after Vacasa fired 280 employees in October.

Clark, who previously headed the company’s business development and was co-founder of TurnKey, which Vacasa acquired in 2021 for $619 million, mostly in stock, assumed the position under new CEO Rob Greyber in February after Clark’s predecessor left the post following a four-month stint. Clark wasn’t a speaker during Vacasa’s fourth quarter earnings call last week, but the CEO and analysts mentioned his name nine times.

During the call, Greyber seemed to say that competitors are likewise subject to homeowner angst over diminished revenue following the Covid-era boom. However, others in the industry acknowledge that owner revenue expectations may be unreasonably high and colored by the industry highs achieved in the latter portion of 2020 through the first half of 2022, but none of the privately held property managers are admitting to elevated churn rates like public company Vacasa did — or had to.

We spoke to Clark about the challenges ahead of him and Vacasa, and how he intends to address these issues.  Clark said Vacasa isn’t privy to competitors’ churn rates, but Vacasa’s issues came in the broader industry context of homeowners feeling revenue pressures after a couple of banner years, coupled with high interest rates and concerns about inflation.

Clark argued that Vacasa can establish enhanced direct relationships with homeowners even though it just cut 17 percent of its staff, and that tech and improved coaching will contribute to more focused execution.

On Vacasa’s under $1 share price, Clark said there can be a disconnect between stock price and performance, and the company expects to be profitable in 2023.

An edited version of the interview follows:

Dennis Schaal: OK, so here’s the thing, you guys seemed to be saying that the churn was an industry-wide problem and not just a Vacasa-specific problem. Other people in the industry are telling me they’re not seeing this. So what makes you feel that it’s an industry-wide problem and that it wasn’t just your problem?

T.J. Clark: I think the first thing we would say is we don’t have the churn data on our competitors. So we don’t know that and can’t say that. Specifically whether this property manager or that property manager is losing units at a given clip. We of course keep an eye on our competition and we can see what listings our competition have on their websites. That stuff is public. As