Linda Smith

Tel 301.229.4300

Martha Stewart, eat your heart out. When it comes to turning a house into a home on Jamaica, no one has a leg up on Linda Smith. This grande dame of villa rentals does not merely take a cursory glance at a property and add it to her roster. She checks in. For two days or two weeks. Whatever it takes to identify a villa's shortcoming. Then, she'll make suggestions to the owners on what must be done, from cosmetic touch-ups to major overhauls. If they agree, she'll personally train the staff - from butler to gardener - on what they should be doing every hour of the day, from 6:30 A.M. to bedtime. Next she'll supervise her hired painters, carpenters, plumbers, electricians, masons, landscapers, and seamstresses until their work is done to perfection. Then Smith adds the finishing touches, like new lamp shades, linens, and even pets for guests who are leaving their pooch at home.

After everything is in its proper place, Smith styles and supervises all photography for each home's brochure and writes the copy while she's on location. Not until the last click of the shutter is a "deluxe" Villas by Linda Smith home born.

"It's thrilling to start with a tired, inactive house and turn on the lights, emotionally and physically." says Smith, who represents [40] luxury villas outside Montego Bay. Among her impressive collection is Highland House, the Oscar Hammerstein estate, a 27-acre property that sports six bedrooms with their own porch or deck, a sundeck with pool, and the services of a cook, butler, laundress, two chambermaids, and gardeners. It rents for $6,500 a week for up to twelve guests (high season).

Smith oversees and rents these properties by phone and fax from her office outside Washington, D.C., and makes two long trips to Jamaica each year. Forget about travelling light. She typically hauls along 11 footlockers and cartons laden with linens, dishes, fans, pool floats, and candlesticks for her surrogate homes. "I never go to Jamaica without 100 towels," she says.

Smith got into the business as a homeowner, renovating her own villa, Tranquillity, in 1988. Then she built her second Jamaican home, Serenity, from scratch in three months. Friends noticed that Smith's homes were doing a brisk rental business and asked her advice. At first, she made recommendations to them for free, then a stranger asked for help and she started charging a modest fee.

Smith vows to limit her villa cache. "I prefer to limit my portfolio and know each house intimately." Nor does she intend to expand her business to other islands. "Anyone with enough money can make a beautiful house," she says. "Unique to Jamaica, however, are the Jamaican staffs in each home. They are literally the heart of the villa. The owners couldn't run the house without them."

Nor, perhaps, without Smith.

For rental information contact Villas by Linda Smith, 8029 Riverside Drive, Cabin John, Maryland 20818;
(301) 229-4300

-Sharon Jaffe Dan
Caribbean Travel & Life