- Joe O'Connor
- 14 minutes ago
- 11 min read
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Before sketching out your own real estate website, it’s helpful to see how others pulled it off. Some things, after all, are too good to keep to yourself. For Mackenzie and Joe Precht, that was their mountain retreat—and they used Wix to share it with the world.
Back in 2022, the couple founded Kindling Home, a collection of vacation properties in western North Carolina. It all began with a simple wish to help guests reconnect with each other—and with nature.
At first, they listed their rentals on booking sites like Airbnb and Vrbo. But it didn’t take long to see they were missing out—losing potential business by having to pass on additional fees and not having a place to build their own brand.
That's when they decided to create a Wix real estate website.
Fast-forward a year after they launched their site, and the results speak for themselves: 60% of Kindling Home’s bookings now come straight through their site, far above the industry’s 34% average. Turns out, having a space to call their own online was exactly the spark Mackenzie and Joe needed.
TL;DR: creating a real estate website that makes visitors stay awhile
After falling in love with their new mountain home in North Carolina, Mackenzie and Joe Precht invested in a rental property to share the magic of the area with others. One rental turned into a small portfolio, and soon they were juggling multiple listings on third-party booking sites, like Airbnb. That’s when they realized it was time to take the reins. So, they built their own real estate website on Wix, helping them shave costs, expand their business and build a strong brand.
Here are some of their story’s best bits:
Mackenzie and Joe Precht, founders of Kindling Home, wanted to move beyond third-party booking platforms to manage their own bookings and build their brand, so they created a Wix real estate website that lets guests book their North Carolina properties directly through them.
With Wix’s design tools, Mackenzie could create a professional website quickly while growing their property portfolio. She researched other real estate websites for inspiration and started her design from a blank canvas.
The Kindling Home’s website features include picture galleries for the properties, an email subscription box to capture leads, a contact form and a homepage integration with Instagram.
The Kindling Home website provides plenty of lessons in how to make a real estate website: avoid overcomplicating the layout, share your personal story, invest in professional photography, capture your offline vibe and optimize for mobile.
Check out these Wix real estate website templates for inspiration or a solid headstart.
Meet Mackenzie and Joe Precht, the creators behind this Wix website
Mackenzie and Joe Precht always dreamed of investing in real estate, but were never sure what form it would take. After relocating from Florida to western North Carolina, they fell in love with the mountainous area and decided to not only make it their forever home but to also share it with others.
In 2022, they combined their real estate dream with their passion for hospitality and launched their first rental property. As they added more properties to their portfolio, it became clear that managing rentals through third-party sites just wasn’t cutting it. They wanted to get closer to their customers and take more control of their business. And so, in 2024, they decided to build a Wix real estate website.
“Having our own website allowed our properties to be a part of a brand as opposed to these independent entities, and it also gave us control over bookings,” Mackenzie explains. “By having guests book directly through us, we're able to give them a pretty significant discount because we’re avoiding a lot of fees. It’s a benefit to us too because, as these platforms change their terms, we have some stability in our business.”
It’s a timely point too, as Airbnb’s newest payout and fee policy updates shift more financial responsibility and uncertainty onto hosts, highlighting the value of having that independence.
McKenzie chose Wix because it integrated easily with her existing property management software and, as one of the best real estate website builders, offered user-friendly design tools and an intuitive customer relationship management (CRM) system.
Related reading: What is a real estate website?
How Kindling Home built its real estate website with Wix
Building the Kindling Home website didn’t happen overnight. Mackenzie and Joe took it step by step, making sure every color, photo and layout choice felt just right. Here, we share their process.
Taking inspiration from industry peers
Instead of using a real estate website template, MacKenzie figured she’d start from scratch, but not before checking out what makes a good website in her industry.
“Even very profound artists copy other people's art first, so that they can then design their own style," she says.
A few specific sites caught their eye, including The Cliffs at Hocking Hills, Bolt Farm Tree House and Joshua’s Treehouses, which Mackenzie loved for their "very authentic and personal, but also professional look.”
Their layouts were particularly helpful in guiding the design of the Kindling Home website. “We took our favorite parts of the structure and then applied our own branding, color schemes and aesthetics, so that it felt very unique,” she says.
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Thinking less is more
It may be tempting to add tons of features and pages, warns Mackenzie, but it’s best to focus on your website's core purpose. For this reason, she stuck to a minimalist approach when designing her own site.
"I think less is more," she says. "You can get lost in having 12 tabs of things. It’s important to ask yourself, ‘What's the information that you actually want people to have and to be able to function on your website?’"
Throughout the design process, she and Joe regularly reviewed their site and ruthlessly questioned the purpose of every element. "We've gone through different iterations of pages, often saying: ‘We don't need this. Let's just hide that for the time being to try to make it a simpler process,’" says Mackenzie.
Making it personal
The couple knew that if they wanted guests to book with confidence, they had to show them who they were renting from.
Mackenzie recalls her own hesitation when browsing rental properties online. “I've gone to look at a vacation rental...and it's like, do I trust this place to put in my information?”
She chose to put their founder story and faces front and center on the website. “Putting ourselves on the page was very intentional, so that it didn't feel like a spam website or some place where people are reluctant to enter any financial information. You could actually see the people behind the account and behind the homes.”
Bringing the offline experience online
Since the mountain setting is such a big part of what makes Kindling Home properties special, Mackenzie and Joe wanted the website to capture that same environment.
"All of our homes are designed with natural color palettes where it's very much connected to the outdoors and the space that you're in,” says Mackenzie.
Instead of the loud and energizing designs found on some real estate sites, Kindling Home opted for comforting green tones, subtle fonts and a calm aesthetic to match their “renewing and relaxing” properties.
Making booking simple
While building their site, Mackenzie and Joe quickly realized the importance of making calls-to-action super clear and easy to find. "One thing that we've learned as the website has gone on is creating multiple places you can click," Mackenzie shares. "So on every page, you can see the ‘Book now’ link.”
They took this a step further on the booking page. Whether a visitor clicks on a picture, the property name or the ‘Book now’ button, they're sent straight to Kindling Home’s Hostaway booking page.
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Investing in professional photography
Professionally shot photos were a must for the site. “For real estate businesses, particularly short-term rentals, you invest so much time in purchasing, designing and furnishing the property. You should put the same investment in your website’s photography," Mackenzie says.
From the About section to the property pages, every image on their Wix real estate website looks professional and high-quality.
"I think having professional photography is how we best capture the homes and the design, and it definitely gives the professional quality to the property itself," Mackenzie adds. “It's an investment worth making, for sure.”
Putting mobile first
The majority of visitors to the Kindling Home website come through Instagram, where the couple has amassed more than 168,000 followers. “It means everyone's accessing our website on their phone,” says Mackenzie. “So, the layout on the mobile side of things is so important to us.”
That meant keeping an eye on the mobile experience every time they made an update to their website—no matter how small. Mackenzie shares a recent example: "We just added a new email link box on the Invest page... and I forgot to check the mobile side.” While the desktop version looked great, on mobile, the box was distorted, making it impossible for users to enter their email. It was a quick fix for Mackenzie, but also a useful reminder to keep mobile top of mind.
The homepage pulls in their Instagram posts so visitors can see their latest updates right away and jump seamlessly between the site and Instagram while browsing on mobile.
Making your analytics count
If you want to run a successful business, you need to know what your audience responds to—and website analytics give you a clear window into that world.
"Analytics have been so helpful," says Mackenzie. “By tracking our website metrics, we can see exactly which social media posts are actually driving people to our website and bookings, and we can closely correlate those analytics on Instagram to our website."
The data isn’t just for measuring social media success; it’s a powerful tool for growing your business. "As we take on more properties, we're taking on investors, and so being able to present those analytics in a really accessible way is so helpful for us," Mackenzie explains.
Get inspired:
Explore Kindling Home’s Wix real estate website
In all its glory, the Kindling Home website feels like stepping into a calm mountain retreat. It’s clean and well-structured, with a warm personal touch from its founders.
Stunning photos make the properties stand out, giving visitors a true sense of each space and style. Navigation is a breeze, and the Instagram feed on the homepage keeps things lively.
Expect to see an online store added sometime soon. “Hopefully in the future, we'll be able to build out a storefront on Wix as well, so that as people book, they can order branded merchandise for when they arrive,” says Mackenzie.
What we can learn from Kindling Home’s website
Here are website building lessons from Mackenzie and Joe’s journey you can use when thinking about how to make a website.
Pro tip | What Mackenzie says | Real-life example |
Build from inspiration | “Even very profound artists copy other people's art first… then design their own style.” | A small vacation rental business checks out popular mountain cabin websites for ideas, then puts its own spin on things with unique branding and local photos. |
Keep it simple | “I think less is more… what’s the information you actually want people to have?” | An apartment rental site keeps things simple by offering just three navigation options—“Listings,” “About,” and “Book Now”—making it super easy for visitors to find what they need. |
Make it personal | “Putting ourselves on the page was very intentional… so it didn't feel like a spam website.” | A beachfront B&B wins hearts by sharing owner photos and a heartfelt story about their family’s history. |
Reflect the offline experience | “All of our homes are designed with natural color palettes… connected to the outdoors.” | A ski lodge website brings the alpine vibe online with snowy white accents and warm wood tones, giving visitors a taste of the cozy in-person experience. |
Streamline booking | “Anything you click will take you to our Hostaway booking page.” | A boutique inn makes booking a breeze by ensuring every property image, title and ‘Book Now’ button takes guests straight to the reservation form—no distractions, no drop-offs. |
Invest in visuals | “Having professional photography is how we best capture the homes and the design.” | A lakefront cabin business gets a pro photographer to capture those golden-hour sunsets and inviting interiors that practically sell the place themselves. |
Prioritize mobile | “By tracking our website metrics, we can see exactly which social media posts drive bookings.” | A luxury villa dives into their website analytics, discovers Instagram Reels is their traffic goldmine and shifts their marketing focus to where it really counts. |
Track analytics | “By tracking our website metrics, we can see exactly which social media posts drive bookings.” | A luxury villa dives into their website analytics, discovers Instagram Reels is their traffic goldmine and shifts their marketing focus to where it really counts. |
Why real estate businesses choose Wix
Real estate companies like Kindling Home want to be in charge of their business—to avoid add-on fees and over-relying on third-parties that can change their policies on a whim. Plus, they want to be a fully independent brand, not just a listing.
Wix gives them a platform to do that. Whether you’re using one of its 2,000+ free website templates, the AI website builder or starting from scratch, you’ve got all the design tools that make the creation process easy. You’ve even got built-in solutions and the Wix App market to help you sell or rent your properties without hassle.
As Mackenzie puts it:
“Having our own website allowed our properties to be part of a brand… and gave us control over bookings. Now, direct bookings account for about 60% of our business. Building a site with Wix was obviously a good decision.”
Building a Wix real estate website FAQ
Is Wix good for real estate agents?
In short, yes. Wix offers a flexible platform packed with tools for real estate professionals. For starters, Wix’s AI website builder lets you create a site in minutes by inputting basic preferences. Wix also offers real estate templates designed to present listings, video headers, community tour videos and banner videos that keep visitors interested.
The platform has built-in real estate marketing tools, such as real estate marketing automation and CRM capabilities. And because Wix already includes so many of these features, you won’t have to dig through endless plugins just to get things working for your real estate business.
But don’t take our word for it, check out what real users say in their Wix reviews.
Should I use a Wix real estate template or start from scratch?
Whether you use a Wix real estate website template or start from scratch depends on the design you’re looking for, your web design experience and the time you have available.
Wix offers a variety of customizable real estate website templates. Simply select one that speaks to your real estate brand and start customizing it. Alternatively, you can start from scratch to create an aesthetically pleasing and user-friendly experience that encourages visitors to explore your properties.
Related: Should I use a template to build a website?
What are the must-have pages for a real estate website?
A real estate website should include a homepage, a listings page where you can search properties, individual property detail pages, an About page and a Contact page. You can also add supporting pages, like testimonials and a blog for content marketing if you want, or specialized pages such as guides and home valuation tools. The type of real estate business you have and the number of properties listed will ultimately determine the pages you choose.
What are the advantages of building a Wix real estate website?
Building a Wix real estate website helps you cut out your reliance on third-party platforms, deal directly with your customers and build your real estate brand. It additionally allows you to control your online presence, showcase properties professionally and provide up-to-date info to a wider audience.