About
Named for the spirits that protect home.
A zemi[ZEH-mee] is a sacred ancestral figure of the Taíno — the people who named Jamaica long before it was Jamaica. Carved from stone, wood, or shell, zemis sat in every household. They protected the family, welcomed guests, and watched over travelers. To stay in a Taíno home was to come under the protection of its zemi.
That’s the spirit we’re trying to bring back to Caribbean hospitality.
Why we’re building ZemiStay
On Airbnb’s split-fee model, guests commonly pay a service fee above the listing subtotal while hosts also pay a service fee from their payout. From April 2027, Jamaica plans a 15% GCT rate for specified tourism activities. Where that tax applies, it applies regardless of booking channel; booking direct does not remove it.
The hosts we know — many of them friends of family, neighbors in the parishes — have been quietly bracing for this. Most want to take more bookings direct. Most don’t have the time or technical skill to build it themselves.
ZemiStay is a direct-booking platform built specifically for hand-picked Caribbean Superhosts. Its lower distribution cost gives hosts room to dampen the tax’s effect on payouts while keeping guest prices competitive.
Why “hand-picked” matters
We’re not racing Airbnb on inventory. We never will. The point of ZemiStay is the opposite — every home on the platform belongs to a host with a proven reputation, a real history of 5-star stays, and the relationship to back it up.
The first family on ZemiStay is the Yeates family: Curtis and Andrea Yeates host three Jamaican homes (Glory and Grace in Montego Bay; Seagull in Negril) and have welcomed guests for over a decade.
Each host on ZemiStay keeps their identity and their story. We run the booking, payment, messaging, and back-office layer underneath. Our commission is single-digit. Shared discovery can introduce each host to more direct guests without erasing the host’s identity.
Who builds this
ZemiStay is operated by Nyx LLC, a Delaware-formed company. The platform is built and operated by Machel Saunders, a US-based engineer and co-host for the Yeates family’s homes. The Yeates family advises on hospitality, guest experience, and the local realities of running a vacation home in Jamaica.
We’re a small operation by design. We don’t want to be the next Airbnb. We want to be the platform that great Caribbean hosts choose when they realize there’s a way to take more bookings direct.