Carolina Seas from the air — oceanfront at Cherry Grove, North Myrtle Beach

Vacation rental management · Grand Strand

You hand over the keys once.

We take the calendar, the guests, the turnovers and the statements from there — so the home earns its keep without becoming a second job.

Start a conversation See the homes

Robbie & Rob BranhamFather and son, running it themselves

Myrtle Beach & the Grand StrandCherry Grove to Pawleys Island

Years managing rentals with iTripNow under their own name

Marketing run in-houseBy Matthew Willey

The homes

One real home, and the ones like it.

Carolina Seas is under management now. The rest are labelled examples of the homes Tidal Stays takes on along the Strand — there to show the shape of the work, not to pad a portfolio.

Real listingCarolina Seas Cherry Grove, North Myrtle BeachA custom-built oceanfront home on the shores of Cherry Grove, built for the kind of trip where everyone comes at once.Sleeps 18OceanfrontPrivate pool

ExampleThe Marsh House Murrells InletA quiet creekside house on the inlet, ten minutes from the causeway.Sleeps 8CreeksidePet friendly

ExamplePawleys Porch Pawleys IslandOld-Pawleys plainness, a deep porch, and a short walk over the dunes.Sleeps 10Beach walkDeep porch

ExampleLitchfield Dunes Litchfield BeachA smaller house behind the dune line, built for two couples or a family.Sleeps 6Dune frontQuiet street

ExampleGarden City Cottage Garden City BeachA second-row cottage with the pier in walking distance.Sleeps 8Second rowPier walk

ExampleSurfside Sands Surfside BeachA wide house on a family street, set up for two families at once.Sleeps 12Two kitchensFamily street

ExampleCherry Grove Cove Cherry GroveChannel side, with the boat in the water and the beach a short ride away.Sleeps 10Channel sideBoat dock

ExampleOcean Drive Walk Ocean DriveTwo blocks back from the sand, in the part of town that still dances.Sleeps 6Two blocksShag district

All fifteen homes

What we do

Four jobs, done properly, every week of the year.

Short-term rental management is not one service. It is four, and most owners discover the hard way that doing three of them well is the same as doing none.

Calendar & channels

A booking anywhere closes it everywhere

Your home is listed in more than one place, so the calendar has to be one thing. Green is a week you kept for yourself — it blocks exactly like a booking.

One calendarIn sync

Direct siteListing channelSecond channelOwner block

MTWTFSS

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Guest communication

Questions answered without you

Enquiries, arrival details, the gate code, the question at eleven at night. Handled in your home's voice. You can read every thread; you are not expected to answer any of them.

Guest inboxHandled

What time can we check in on Friday?

From 4pm — I'll send the door code that morning.

Perfect, thank you.

Turnovers & upkeep

Between one guest and the next

Cleaning, linens, restocking, and the small repairs that decide whether the next guest writes a good review or a bad one. You can watch it happen or ignore it entirely.

Turnover runOn schedule

1Guest checked out

2Clean and linen change

3Restock and check

4Ready for arrival

Owner statements

Money, in plain language

What came in, what went out, what reached you. If a line needs explaining, the statement has failed, and we would rather rewrite it than have you chase us about it.

Owner statementMonthly

Booking income

Cleaning

Maintenance

Management fee

Paid to you

Layout shown. Figures appear once your home is live — we do not publish sample numbers.

How it works

Three steps, then it runs without you.

The point of handing a home over is that you stop thinking about it. That only works if the handover itself is thorough.

Step one

We walk the home

Room by room, with a camera and a list. What needs replacing before a guest sees it, what makes this home worth choosing, and what the honest nightly rate is once the season is taken into account.

Step two

We list it and wire it up

Photography, the listing copy, and the calendar connected across every platform the home should appear on — so a booking on one closes the dates on all of them.

Step three

Then we run it

Guests are met, turnovers happen, and the statement arrives. You get the part of ownership you wanted — the income and the occasional weekend in it — without the part you didn't.

Owner portal

The screens behind the service.

You get an owner login, not a monthly PDF. One calendar, one inbox, the turnover run, and a statement written to be read. This is a demonstration — nothing here is live data.

One calendarIn sync

Direct siteListing channelSecond channelOwner block

MTWTFSS

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One calendar, every channel

A booking on any platform closes the dates on all of them. Your own weeks block the same way.

Open the portal demo

Marketing department

An empty week is a marketing problem.

Most managers stop at listing a home and waiting. We run marketing as its own department, in-house, because the difference between a good season and a quiet one is usually made before the enquiry ever arrives.

Photography & listing copy

The listing is the shop window. We shoot the home properly and write it so the right guest recognises themselves in it.

Channel placement

Which platforms a home belongs on, how it is positioned on each, and which ones are wasted effort for that property.

Direct booking site

A booking page for the home that you own outright. Every direct reservation is one that does not pay a platform commission.

Past-guest email

The people most likely to book your home are the ones who already have. We keep in touch with them ahead of the seasons they came for.

Local & social presence

Guests choose a place before they choose a house. We market the location, and the home as a way to have it.

Seasonal campaigns

Shoulder season is where most homes lose money. Those weeks get their own push and their own pricing.

Where guests come fromMix

Your own booking pageReturning guestsListing channelsReferrals and local

Illustrative. Real mix figures appear once homes are live.

Shift the mix toward the bookings you own

Platform reservations are the easy ones and the expensive ones. The work of a marketing department is moving that ring, season by season, toward direct.

MWMarketing is run in-house by Matthew Willey.

The coast

Cherry Grove to Pawleys, end to end.

Guests choose a place before they choose a house. Part of marketing a home is marketing the reason someone wants to be there at all.

Placeholder photography, openly licensed and credited in img/MANIFEST.md. Captions are the towns we work, not the locations of the photographs.

Who runs it

Run by Robbie and Rob Branham, in Myrtle Beach.

Robbie Branham and his son Rob have spent years managing vacation rentals on the Grand Strand with iTrip. Tidal Stays is them, working the same coast under their own name — and this is how they work.

Robbie Branham

Myrtle Beach. Years managing short-term rentals on the Grand Strand with iTrip before starting Tidal Stays.

Rob Branham

Robbie's son, and the second half of the operation. Same coast, same homes, same standard.

Matthew Willey

Runs the marketing department in-house — listings, direct bookings, and the seasons that need filling.

We quote per home, not per brochure

A fee that fits a two-bedroom cottage does not fit a six-bedroom house on the water. We would rather price your home honestly than advertise a number we have to walk back.

You hear bad news from us first

A cancellation, a breakage, a bad review. You will hear it from us before you find it yourself, with what we have already done about it.

We say no when we are the wrong fit

Some homes are better self-managed, and some markets we do not know well enough yet. Telling you that costs us a client and saves you a year.

The statement is readable or it is rewritten

If you have to ring us to understand what a line item means, the statement failed. That is our problem to fix, not yours to decode.

Ways to work together

Keep the calendar, or hand over the whole thing.

Owners arrive with different appetites for involvement. Fees are agreed per home — the right number depends on the property, the market and the season, and we would rather quote honestly than advertise a rate we would have to walk back.

AssistedYou keep the calendar

Listing written and photographed
Channels kept in sync
Rate guidance by season

ManagedWe run everything

Everything in Assisted
Turnovers and upkeep
Guest communication
Marketing department
Owner statements

PortfolioMore than one home

Everything in Managed
Consolidated statements
One named point of contact

What you get	Assisted	Managed	Portfolio
Listing written and photographed	✓	✓	✓
Channels kept in sync	✓	✓	✓
Rate guidance by season	✓	✓	✓
Guest communication	—	✓	✓
Turnovers and upkeep	—	✓	✓
Marketing department	—	✓	✓
Direct booking site	—	✓	✓
Owner statements	—	✓	✓
Consolidated multi-home reporting	—	—	✓
One named point of contact	—	—	✓

Inclusions are what each way of working covers. Fees are agreed per home — see the note above on why no rate is published here.

Before you hand over a key

The questions owners actually ask.

If yours is not here, ask it — we would rather answer it now than have it come up later.

Do I lose control of my own home?

No. You set the ground rules — how many guests, whether pets come, which weeks you keep for yourself — and we work inside them. Blocking dates for your own use is normal and expected, not an exception we grudgingly allow.

What happens when something breaks at midnight?

The guest contacts us, not you. Small things get fixed without troubling you; anything that needs a real decision or real money comes to you with the options already priced.

Can I still use the house myself?

Yes. Owner stays are part of the calendar. The only thing we ask is enough notice to avoid turning away a booking we would then have to cancel — cancelling on a guest is what damages a listing.

Which platforms will my home be listed on?

The ones that suit the property and the market it sits in. That is a conversation about your specific home rather than a fixed list, and we will tell you which ones we think are wasted effort for it.

How do I know what I am actually earning?

A statement showing what came in, what went out, and what each deduction was for. If a line item needs explaining, the statement has failed, and we would rather rewrite it than have you chase us about it.

What does it cost?

Fees are agreed per home. The right number depends on the property, the market and the season, and we would rather quote honestly than advertise a rate we have to walk back.

All the questions

Start a conversation

Tell us about the home.

Where it is, how many it sleeps, and how much of it you want to keep doing yourself. We will tell you honestly whether we are the right fit — including when we are not.