VARE Properties: Building infrastructure for 200+ luxury homes with Guesty

Rafi Bastramjian and Michael Mazmanian founded VARE Properties in 2018 with a single vacation rental in La Quinta. It started as a personal investment. Then neighbors and fellow homeowners noticed the founders’ hands-on “owner mentality” and asked for the same treatment, and it turned into a boutique management firm.

Today, VARE manages 65 premium and luxury homes across the Coachella Valley, including Indio, Palm Desert, and Palm Springs. As the portfolio grew, the founders saw that keeping their service standard would take more than a tool for daily management. They needed a foundation built to scale.

The challenge of manual coordination at scale

Before Guesty, VARE ran on Streamline. It supported their early growth, but as the portfolio expanded, manual coordination became the bottleneck. The team juggled several disconnected platforms and kept switching between systems to verify information, sync calendars, and follow up on guest requests.

The team had to cross-check every reservation to ensure data moved correctly between tools. Time spent troubleshooting software and double-checking details pulled the team away from the people they’re there to serve: homeowners and guests.

“At 10 or 20 properties, manual work may be manageable, but at 65 properties, every additional step gets multiplied across the entire portfolio,” says Bastramjian. “We reached a point where the administrative workload threatened to increase at the same rate as our growth, which isn’t a sustainable way to scale.”

Why VARE chose Guesty as infrastructure for growth

VARE treated the move to Guesty as a long-term investment, not a software swap. They needed a platform that could run today’s operations and scale to 100 or 200 properties without a matching rise in headcount.

Three things drove the decision: automation, centralized operations, and an open integration ecosystem. The open API mattered most to Bastramjian. It let VARE keep its specialized third-party tools while routing all critical data into a single source of truth. The Unified Inbox and automated workflows also gave the team a clear way out of repetitive manual work.

“We’re not looking at Guesty as a replacement PMS; we’re looking at it as infrastructure for the next stage of VARE,” Bastramjian explains.

“What stood out was that it felt like a platform built for where we want to be in the future, not just where we are today.”

Rafi Bastramjian, Founder

The impact VARE expects from a connected platform

VARE is finishing onboarding and has set clear targets to measure success:

• 30% less administrative work: Automate reservation changes, guest follow-ups, and system cross-checks to free up team hours every week.
• 30% faster issue resolution: Keep guest messages and property data in one place, so requests like maintenance or pool heating get resolved in a single workflow.
• More properties per team member: Grow to 100 properties and beyond without adding administrative headcount.
• Lower operating cost per property: Cut the overhead behind every listing through greater efficiency.

How VARE runs day to day on Guesty

Every guest conversation runs through the Unified Inbox, with reservation details right next to the message. Staff can handle a high volume of messages without losing the personal touch.

Automated workflows trigger cleanings and inspections from check-in and checkout events. When a guest changes dates, field vendors get the update in real time. No phone calls, no chasing emails, no manual rescheduling.

Looking ahead to 200+ homes

Over the next five years, VARE plans to grow to more than 200 professionally managed homes. The goal is to become the most trusted name in Coachella Valley short-term rentals, with strong returns for owners and a smooth stay for guests. Bastramjian sees the right mix of technology and human service as the only way to reach that scale without losing the boutique quality that defines the brand.

“We never want automation to replace hospitality; we want it to give our team more time to actually provide hospitality. Five years from now, success means having a much larger portfolio supported by systems that keep our hands-on approach intact.”

Rafi Bastramjian, Founder