Customer story · Madrid, SpainHow a Madrid rental company took back control of its business
Place4You moved to Elev8 right before their busiest season, without losing bookings, and now runs guests, calendars and rates on their own terms.
At a glance
apartments in Madrid
typical guest stay
to get onboarded
guest replies, with AI covering overnight questions
Before Elev8: a system that took courses to learn, then an external management company.
The challenge
Place4You is run by three partners who manage Madrid apartments for landlords and look after guests around the clock. Their time should go to guests and to winning new properties, not to fighting their software.
Their first system took a training course just to get started, and even then left questions. Different parts needed their own learning, and nothing felt intuitive. For a partner like Sergio, who runs the whole business rather than one narrow role, that doesn’t work.
So they handed day-to-day management to an external company, expecting to focus purely on growth. It didn’t turn out that way. Billing issues piled up, decisions were made without their consent, and the move itself disrupted bookings for six weeks. They were losing control of their own guests.
Sergio wanted the business back in their hands: a system simple enough to run themselves, with full control and the freedom to run Place4You their way.
With Elev8, we have complete control of our business. And it’s very intuitive and easy to use.
Why Elev8
Place4You met Elev8 at the Scale event while looking for a new system. They compared it with the alternatives and chose Elev8 for two reasons: it’s intuitive enough to learn without a course, and it puts them back in control. Seeing Elev8’s AI guest messaging live sealed it.
As Elev8’s first customer in Spain, they had doubts at first. Conversations with the Elev8 team before signing gave them the confidence to go ahead, with a dedicated key account manager from day one.
Switching mid-season
Place4You joined Elev8 on 13 June 2026, right before their busiest months. After six weeks of disruption last time, they expected the worst. This time, Elev8 handled the data move and connected their channels and PriceLabs, and everything was done in about a week.
Not everything was perfect. One listing came across from Airbnb three times and broke sync. Elev8’s support team and Place4You found the duplicates, cleared them and re-imported on a single call.
We were worried about the same thing happening again. Not at all. In about a week, everything was done.
Solving problems together
Every new setup has a few teething issues, and Place4You’s came in August, their busiest month. When pricing and availability settings didn’t line up as expected across channels, Sergio and Elev8’s support team worked through them side by side, using real data instead of guesswork.
Once Place4You started sending requests through the support portal, things got easier. Today, Sergio says, communication with the team runs smoothly.
Running Madrid from anywhere
The biggest change doesn’t show up on a calendar. With reservations, channels, rates and guest messages all in Elev8, Place4You no longer depends on where its partners are sitting. Sergio now spends part of the year in Southeast Asia and runs the business from there, while guests in Madrid still get answers around the clock: AI handles the routine questions overnight, and the team steps in when it really matters.
For Sergio, that’s what taking back control really means. The business runs wherever he does.
Results
Switched in about a week, without the booking disruption of their previous move.
Full control back of guests, calendars and rates for the three partners.
Run from anywhere: with everything in one system, Sergio manages Madrid apartments from Southeast Asia.
Overnight questions answered by AI, like directions, so the team steps in only for real issues like a lost key.
More time for the partners, and fewer support calls because the system is easy to learn.
Elev8 is the smoothest I’ve found in the market, the most intuitive, and at the same time it has everything you need.
What’s next
Place4You plans to keep growing across Spain. As Elev8’s first customer there, they help shape what the team builds for the Spanish market, including keeping up with changing regulations.