Have you ever wondered why some properties consistently have higher occupancy rates, ADR, and yearly revenue than others in the same market? We have.

In one of our markets, we started to manage a property very similar to a property we were already managing. Both properties were in similar locations, had similar amenities, and had similar descriptions, yet one was generating 50% higher revenue than the other. What was the secret sauce? Was it just luck?

Now that we had both properties in our hands we could dig deep to see the differences and what kept one property with a much higher page rank the other other.

The new property we started to manage had a previous co-host wasn’t bad and perhaps made a few mistakes, but nothing major. And yet the revenue difference in 2024 was significant. Our existing property had an annual revenue of 85K and this new property had an yearly revenue of 55K. AirDna reported an average revenue for this type of property at 60K.

So, this second property was slightly below average, but a whopping 30K lower than our existing high-performing property.

So what are differences? First a little bit about this market.

Constrained Market

Some of the properties we manage are in markets that are constrained, where, due to licensing restrictions during the busy season, occupancy is at 80 or 90 percent and low season is still in the 50 percent occupancy.

In contrast, other properties are located in markets with little to no entry restrictions, resulting in a really high saturation of empty places in the low season and downward price pressure during the high seasons.

These two properties are in a market similar to Tampa, FL, with little barrier to entry. When we first started to manage a property in Tampa, FL, the area had just shy of 1K STRs. Fast forward 5 years, and there are now over 6K STRs. That is an increase of 500%. Nights booked has also gone up in the past 5 years, but nowhere near 500%.

The other item we can tell by this graph is that there are owners dropping out…..the high was 7.2K properties about a year ago and the number of STRs seem to be slowly decreasing. We can only assume that some of these STRs are turning back to LTRs.

Statistics

One of the first analyses we did was a deep dive in various stats. For this we used Rank Breeze . Rank Breeze is excellent for monitoring Airbnb page rank and various statistics. While some of these statistics are accessible within Airbnb, others are not.

Views

Views are the number of times the property appeared for a guest or potential guest. The high-performing property is getting a LOT more views than similar properties. In some months as many as 10X more views.

The low-performing property had literally the same stats as average. Some months a little higher and some months a little lower.

This makes sense since we know the high-performing property has a higher page rank and will get more page views.

Click-Thru Rate

The click-through is the rate when guest or potential guest clicks on your property. This rate was also higher in the high-performing property, but it did have a few months where it was just about average.

The low-performing property also had slightly higher click-through rates than similar listings, but just a bit higher.

Occupancy Rate

The occupancy rate is a key statistic. This is the percentage of days that the property was rented. We consider anything above 80 a good occupancy.

The occupancy rate of the high-performing property was awesome. Even during the low season, occupancy remained strong. In months such as Oct, which is the low season, the average occupancy was 20%, while our high-performing property had an occupancy in the 70s. In fact, occupancy was impressive even after the hurricanes at the end of 2024.

During the high season, the property was fully booked at 100%. We checked, and the longest booking was 7 days so this wasn’t a fluke.

The low-performing had occupancy rates just a tad higher than similar listings.

Avg Daily Rates - ADR

The average daily rate, or ADR, is another key statistic as it has a direct impact on revenue. This one surprised us. During the low season, the high-performing property had a slightly LOWER average daily rate than similar properties.

During the HIGH season, it had a HIGHER average daily rate than similar properties. In fact, in months such as February, the ADR was close to 100/night higher than similar properties. These were the months with 100% occupancy.

The low-performing property had a lower ADR than similar properties in both the high and low season. Hint - they were NOT using a good dynamic pricing engine.

WhishList

The Wishlist number is the number of times a guest or potential guest adds the property to their wishlist. Usually, when a guest is looking for a place to stay, they will add a handful of properties to their wishlist and then select one.

The number of Wishlists of the high-performing property was significantly higher than that of similar properties. In some months, it was four times that of similar properties. In January, nearly 100 potential guests added the high-performing property to their wishlists, while similar listings had only 15.

The low-performing property was just average. Some months a tad higher and some months a tad lower.

So yes, we analyzed, sliced, and diced a LOT of statistics for both properties.

Reviews

We also analyzed the reviews. In fact, we consolidated the reviews for both properties and used AI for some insights.

The reviews for the low-performing property were 'decent,’ with an average score of 4.7. In contrast, the high-performing property received a score of 4.98 and had significantly more reviews than the low-performing property.

The reviews of the high-performing property were also much longer. Guests were delighted with their stay and many (8% of the reviews) mentioned that they were coming back. In the low-performing property, not a SINGLE review mentioned that they were coming back, and very few reviews mentioned that they highly recommend.

The Secret Sauce

After analyzing all the numerical data and raw review information, here are the top five ingredients contributing to a high-performing property.

1. Reviews

Reviews are undoubtedly the most important ingredient. This makes sense, as the algorithm aims to prioritize STRs that guests will appreciate and want to return to. We believe that Airbnb is using AI to assess guests' happiness after their stay. In fact, we have observed a couple of cases where a review is rated 5 out of 5 in all categories, but the written review is mediocre. In one instance, the reviewer mentioned that the property was smaller than expected, and in another, they expressed a desire to be closer to the city center. In both cases, we noticed our page rank dropped after receiving this 5 out of 5 review.

Here is this precise scenario. The red dotted line is the 5/5 review, but with the ‘property was smaller than expected and far from the city center’. This lowered our page rank.

All 5/5 reviews are NOT the same. A long glowing review is worth a LOT more than a short review. In addition, quantity matters. Our properties that are near the top have more reviews.

Educate your guests on the importance of reviews.

2. Dynamic Pricing Engine

The second most important ingredient is a well-tuned dynamic pricing engine. Notice the term "well-tuned." We use WheelHouse (click for $20 off your first month) at most of our properties, but we have also used PriceLabs, which has worked very well too.

Each market has slightly different tuning requirements. The nice thing about a dynamic pricing engine is that it will adjust the nightly rate automatically based on:

• Market Demand & Seasonality

• Competitor Pricing

• Local Events & Holidays

• Booking Trends

• Length of Stay

• Occupancy Levels

• Lead Time (How Far in Advance the Booking Is)

• Reviews & Ratings

• External Factors (such as weather or events)

If you are not using a dynamic pricing engine, try it. Tuning a pricing engine is more of an art than science, but it is not rocket science.

3. Wishlists

Having your property whitelisted is also an important factor. In all of our well-performing properties, we have a higher wishlist number than the average. For some of these properties, the rate is MUCH higher. We know that Airbnb’s algorithm will rank your property higher if it is whitelisted more.

We now actually ask guests who enjoyed their stay to also add our properties to their wish list. Many guests have responded that they have wishlisted our property.

4. Main photo

The photos in your listing are super important. We could write a whole blog on just photos and best practices: Tips on ordering, angles, lighting, etc. Unless you are really good with your iPhone, have a professional take photos of your listing.

But the most important item is to have a good and catchy first photo. This is one of the items that will cause someone to click on your listing vs another.

You can just experiment with your main photo to see if one gives you a higher click thru rate.

A while back when trying to get a property to perform better in the low season we happen to get a good photo of our dog sitting by the fireplace. The photo was a little guffy, but our dog appeared to be showing the place so we thought it was neat.

We added this as the main photo, and our click-through rate began to rise. Within four weeks, our page rank was near the top and remained there. For this property, this was the key ingredient.

So remember to experiment with your main photo.

5. The Guest Experience

This should actually be the first item. In the STR world you are in the hospitality business. If your STR is simply a place to sleep, it will be a mediocre experience for the guests. In cities like Tampa, FL, the vast majority of the properties that are no longer an STR are the ones giving guests a mediocre experience.

By digging deep into the reviews and the conversations with guests at both the high and low performing properties, we were able to identify key elements that contributed to an awesome guest experience.

Here are the ingredients to a great guest experience.

Communication

The first item was communication with guests. The high-performing property had message workflows that were always executed on time and automatically, and all communication was clear. The low-performing property had room for improvement. Some of the messages were too long and not to the point.

Ensure you know when to communicate what. The messages should be clutter-free and to the point. We have a blog about this.

The Kitchen

The second item is the kitchen. Guests who stay in STRs often enjoy cooking at home.

All of our properties, including this high-performing one, typically feature a well-equipped kitchen. We provide items such as a coffee grinder, rice cooker, air fryer, waffle maker, and more. When we stay in our own properties, these are the kitchen items we appreciate having. The low-performing property was initially set up by a large STR for-profit company. Someone with a checklist purchased the bare minimum. One of the reviews captured this sentiment well, stating, “the kitchen was soul-less."

Items to Delight

This is a category we created after conducting our research. Both properties are near the beach, but one was designed to delight guests, while the other had just the bare minimum.

As an example, the lower-performing property had a pool heater, but it was set to no higher than 80 degrees, leading to frequent guest complaints about the water being too cold.

In contrast, the high-performing property maintained its pool at 86 degrees, using both solar and electric heaters. Guests could request either a higher or lower temperature. When the sun was shining, this didn't add much to costs, and we had no issues cranking the solar heater up to the 90s.

Another example was beach supplies. The low-performing property, equipped by an hourly employee with a check-list, had a couple surf boards, sand toys, and two beach chairs.

The high-performing property, equipped by my wife and son, featured eight beach chairs, two umbrellas, a cart to haul the stuff, 4 small foldable tables, surf boards, floating toys, among other things. You get the picture. Any guest planning on spending a day at the beach would be delighted with all the supplies.

There are other small differences in the decor and backyard. The low-performing property was a little bland. The backyard was functional, but boring. The high-performing property had little solar lights and string lights that made the backyard look amazing at night.

By analyzing the back-and-forth communication, we also discovered several other small items that contributed to a great guest experience. Other items include having a QR code on the wall for both the Wi-Fi connection and the guest guidebook. A guidebook with many recommendations for things to do, restaurants, and info about the area. As one review summarized, “This property was very well designed”.

The other item to note is that the low performing property was NOT run in a way to delight guests. While reviewing historical communication with guests, we saw the co-host charging $20 for two broken plates, an extra $50 for a late checkout, very strict rules on having the grandparents over for dinner (in their 90s), etc. Guests do not like to feel nickel and dimed. We can dedicate an entire blog to tips and tricks for delighting guests, as well as the top 10 things to avoid.

In Conclusion

The high-performing property clearly costs more to equip and run. We tried to estimate how much more was spent:

• Beach & pool supplied - $500

• Backyard - $300

• Kitchen - $1000

• Pool solar heater - $6000

• Misc - $2000

In total, we estimate an additional 10K was spent on the high-performing property setup. The extra setup time is difficult to quantify. However, we know that this additional setup time and the extra 10K are enabling this property to generate an yearly revenue of 85K compared to the low-performing property's 55K. Clearly, it paid off more than enough.

The fundamental difference was not only in how the property was setup/stocked, but how it was run. The low-performance previous style of management seemed to be trying to nickel and dime guests and save every penny it could. "Penny wise, pound foolish."

The million-dollar question now is: will it be possible to turn around the low-performing property? Can the 55K/year property become an 80K or 85K/year property and if so, how long would it take? Will a new listing be needed?

Thanks for reading!!

P.S. Wondering if cohosting is right for your property? Let’s talk it through — reach us at info@AdventuresInAirbnbs.com

• Wifi information

• Address

• Door code

• Garbage collection

• Your contact info

• etc

Don’t include items such as:

• Restaurant recommendations

• Nearby attractions

• House rules

• TV Channel Guide

• etc

  The above items are for your guidebook.

This message should have bullet points and never ever have long run-on sentences here.

When traveling, we often stay in Airbnb, and we have seen so many convoluted check-in messages or messages with missing key details.

You must use paragraphs and bullet points in your check-in email.

In one of the local real estate meetups, I met a couple with a lakefront duplex in a popular summer destination. Both sides of the duplex were in Airbnb and they were thinking of converting a 3rd place they owned into an Airbnb, but only when the wife retired. As we were talking, they mentioned how, on average, every guest generated 4-5 questions, and almost everyone had questions when they checked in. The questions were always similar.

If you get the same question 2 or 3 times, this means your instructions need to include something else. Fix it. The check-in message should be tweaked until it is close to perfect.

Finally, one of the most overlooked items in your check-in message is how to contact you and that you want your guests to have a 5/5 experience. In your Check-In message, you do want to stress for your guests to contact you if anything is keeping them from giving you a 5/5 rating. We stress to use the app, but for high priority items we give them a phone number to call. This phone number rings our 4 cells at the same time with a distinct ring.

In addition, this check-in message should stress that you are open to any and all feedback.

All hosts know that anything less than a 5 is a failure, but your guests may not know this. The newsgroups are full of hosts who are frustrated with their guests saying everything was awesome, and they rate it 4 out of 5.

Your goal is to have an average higher than 4.9. Sooner or later, you will have someone who will leave less than 5, but as long as most reviews are 5/5, you are ok.

In the hosting world, sooner or later you will have to handle fires such as the cleaning crew forgetting this turnover and guests arriving with a completely uncleaned house, power outage, the dishwasher broke, the washing machine breaking and water pouring down in the living room, HVAC stopped working and thermostat hit 101 degrees, smart lock stopped working, dozens of roaches in the garage, the dreaded double booking, etc. These are all real emergencies that we have had to deal with. If guests can quickly contact you for these emergencies, and they are handled appropriately, you can still recover and have a good review.

Here is our exact welcome message and key pints. We have a single template with tags for all of our properties.

Read more

We send this message 6 hours after the check-out time.

Why 6 hours? Usually, within 6 hours, the cleaning team has had a chance to inspect the property, and you will be notified if there are any issues. Don’t send this message as is if the guest did not follow instructions or left the property a mess.

In this message, thank guests for staying at your property and stress the importance of receiving a 5/5 review. Let them know to send you private feedback on anything that broke, needs attention, or could be improved. Let them know you will be rating them a 5/5 and would love a 5/5 review.

That’s right, softly ask them for a 5/5 review.

Here is our exact after-checkout message and a deep dive:

Hi [$GUEST_FIRST_NAME$],

Thank you for choosing to stay at our place and for taking such great care of it! This is one of our favorite vacation spots as well—our home away from home.

As a small business, we’re dedicated to providing excellent service and creating a welcoming experience for our guests. If you have any suggestions on how we can improve, we’d love to hear your private feedback. Your input helps us continue to make our home even better for future stays.

We look forward to giving you a 5-star review as soon as possible and hope you’ll consider rating us 5 stars as well. We truly hope you enjoyed your stay and would love to host you again!

Thank you!!

Your Name
Your Email
——-

The [xxxx] are parameters from our workflow engine in Hostfully . If you are using native Airbnb or another property management system, your parameters will look different.

A couple of key components of this message:

• By mentioning that you will rate them 5/5, you are pushing them to also rate you. We are constantly reading various community posts that many guests do not rate. This will definitely increase the percentage of guests who write reviews.

  We have also had cases where we messed up, or the guest expectations did not match our property, and the guests point blank have told us we can’t give a 5/5, so we won't rate.

  If you do manage to get this feedback loop working well, your property will remain at the top with many 5/5 reviews.

• Do rate your guests 5/5 if you say you will. Many hosts don’t bother rating their guests, but doing so doesn’t take long. We do have another post coming up on rating your guests.

• Make sure your message signature includes your name, email and direct booking web site if you have one. If you have your direct booking site, guests that want to return will appreciate it. Repeat guests love saving the 10-13% guest fee that Airbnb charges by booking directly. Around 10-20% of our guests are now repeat guests….this percentage has grown yearly. The other item you can do is a discount coupon. Everyone loves coupons……more on this on a different blog.

• Take the private feedback seriously. You are not obliged to do any of it, but guests will often have great ideas that may not cost that much to implement.
  
  As an example, here is a small 1 bedroom suite that we completely gutted and remodeled. We thought we were perfect in our remodel, but in two years, here are the items we have done based on feedback. We keep a running list in Microsoft OneNote, but you can use your favorite online note-taking tool. Make sure it is easy to add as you may be in the supermarket line and get a feedback worth jotting down. Here are our improvements in 2 years based on guests feedback:

  • Under counter lights in the kitchen (less than $100 from Amazon)

  • A cheese grader to the kitchen

  • A light switch right by the door

  • A label to the fireplace thermostat so easy to see how to operate

  • A sign with the name of the place (to not be confused with the main house)

  • Ice trays

  • More scissors (do guests eat scissors?)

  • Installed Cabinet door knobs

  • Better grill utensils

  • Insulated toilet water line to stop sweating/leaking when sauna is used

  • Cut lawn with a better path to the firepit

• The last point on this message is if you do have a property that may not always be considered a 5/5, perhaps stress that anything any review less than a 5 is considered a failure. There are still many guests who do not bother to leave a review or think that a 4/5 is a good score. This is where we need to educate the guests and politely beg for a review.

Remember, this post-checkout message is just one piece of a formula for a great guest communication experience. And the guest communication experience is just one portion of the whole guest experience.

Thanks for reading!

P.S. Wondering if cohosting is right for your property? Let’s talk it through — reach us at info@AdventuresInAirbnbs.com

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Over 10 years ago, I recalled waking up, going to the basement, and instead of feeling the carpet under my feet, felt 1 " of water. Yes, our basement was flooded. During heavy rainfall at night, a temporary power outage killed our sump pump. We did not have a backup sump pump, a battery backup system, or a water alarm. The cleanup took weeks and ruined some furniture. Luckily, it was just water.

Now, imagine if this were a septic system. Instead of just water, the basement would be filled with crap…. literally crap. Yeah you can guess what usually goes down the toilet. The basement would be a total health hazard in a matter of hours, perhaps minutes. I can not even imagine what it would take to clean up.

If your STR has a septic system, you want to do everything you can to monitor it and ensure it is running optimally.  

One item you must know about your septic system is whether it is gravity-fed, a pump, or a hybrid. In our case, we have a hybrid. The main floor and 2nd floor are gravity-fed to the holding tank. There is no pump. The basement and a small 1 bedroom ADU feed into to a 50-gallon holding tank in the basement. The 50-gallon tank then has a grinder pump for the septic tank.

Here are the 9 items we do in regards to our septic system in our STR that enables us to sleep soundly at night.

Awareness

• We also have a sign in the kitchen sink stating we have a septic system and do not throw food waste and grease in the drain

• We have English and Spanish signs in all the bathrooms asking guests not to throw anything in the toilet, such as dental floss and feminine products.  We use these stickers: https://amzn.to/3tVVc6O

• Include this verbiage in the welcome email and house guide.

• Make sure to inform guests in the check-in email, house guide, and ask guests to inform everyone in their group. Over-communicate this.

  

Monitoring

• The 50-gallon holding tank only fits a single pump. We have a 'pump spy' gadget that monitors how often the pump runs, run-time, and motor current, and includes a high water float alarm. For $160, this is a must-have. https://amzn.to/3tw5fPP

  

• We have a separate float and siren, so if the water level is high, the alarm will be heard both inside the house and outside.

  

• We added two YoLink water sensors near the pump and the drain. If you don't have these devices, we highly recommend them. These devices are an inexpensive way to monitor for water leaks under the sinks, near the water heater, near the washing machines, etc. https://amzn.to/478aa7r

Maintenance

• We hope 90 percent of our guests will read and abide by the house rules. But this means 10 percent will ignore it. So, we clean the septic filter once a year.

• The external septic pump only needs to be pumped every 3-4 years. However, based on research, we decided to pump every 2 years.

• In case of emergencies, we have the personal cell number of a plumber who lives nearby. This has been a life safer as our pump has filed on one occasion and clogged on a second occasion.

Future enhancements

The new pump has a lifetime of at least ten years. It typically runs only 2-3 times a day. The item that worries us a bit is a power outage. We have no battery backup on the pump. We hope to add a battery backup to the house furnace and the septic pump sometime in the future. We also plan to replace the grinder pump proactively with the biggest pump we can purchase.

Thanks for reading!

P.S. Wondering if cohosting is right for your property? Let’s talk it through — reach us at info@AdventuresInAirbnbs.com

YouTube is filled with small clips from news articles from large parties in Airbnbs, such as these:

Reddit and other forums are also full of similar examples. One of my favorites was a post from a couple of years ago during the pandemic.

The host lived on the other side of the country and the neighbors emailed him to ask if they were setting up for a graduation or birthday party.

“After calling back, they mentioned how a large truck had backed up on the driveway. After a minute, two young guys opened the back and began unloading a lot of stuff quickly: chairs, tables, more chairs, and cases and cases of alcohol. They even had beer kegs. I did not know all that stuff could fit in the backyard. ”

And you can guess what was about to happen. Parteeeee.

Airbnb doesn’t allow parties and tries to crack down on them but they still happen.

Even if a guest is verified, there is no guarantee that a fake ID was not used. In fact, the Internet has plenty of information on how to book an Airbnb anonymously for your next Parrrrrrty! Some comments even suggested how to pick the perfect place. The comments do mention skipping if the listing mentions multiple cameras or the owner lives nearby.

Let’s make sure your Airbnb is NOT this perfect place.

So what can you do?

There is plenty you can do to drastically decrease your changes of having having your place trashed.

Here are our tips.

Location

You can not change the location of your Airbnb, but there are certain locations that are much more prone to a party than others. If your Airbnb is in the middle of nowhere, in the woods off a long dirt road, the chances of your place being the perfect party spot are very very low.

A condo on the second floor, with cameras on the entrance, elevator, and hallway, is also not a very good location for a party.

Likewise, if your place is in a big city and has a very nice backyard with an extra-long pool, it could be a target.

So, our first tip is simply to be aware of whether your place could potentially fit the criteria for a good party house.

Cameras

Cameras are a must if you have an Airbnb. Only have the cameras outside, per Airbnb policy and also per being a good host etiquette. Make sure that not only you have a Ring doorbell camera but also cameras that capture your driveway and sides of the house.

In some of our properties, a Ring doorbell and a camera over the driveway are good enough. In other properties, we have cameras on the sides, too. The goal is to capture all of the front areas so you can see anyone and everything going into your property.

In regards to pool areas, we do not have or recommend cameras in pool areas. Guests do expect a bit of privacy in the pool.

You can use another brand of cameras; we recommend Ring as they are easy to set up, can work wired or with solar, and seem very reliable.

There is no need to hide your cameras. In fact, you want to make them visible, as they are also a deterrent. Make sure your listing is very very clear that you have multiple cameras outside. Be specific on the location.

Minimum Stay

This one is our most important tip. If you have a property that could be a good fit for a party, do not allow less than a 3-night stay.

We have properties that allow a minimum of two-night stays, but the ones with a pool and large backyards, and in a big city, we require a minimum of three nights.

We never allow a single-night stay. Guests staying for a single night will see your Airbnb much more like a hotel and will probably not treat it as nice.

We had one property that we tried allowing a single night to fill in gaps. These were the guests that we had small issues with: dragged mud into the condo, left without locking the door, didn’t follow any of the checkout instructions, etc.

One of the TikToks we saw a while back was about throwing the perfect party in an Airbnb. One of the items it mentioned was booking for only one night so you can have extra funds for alcohol.

Airbnb does not share party-related statistics, but we wonder how many parties are thrown in a booking that is 3 days or longer? We can guess very few.

Instant Booking

Instant booking can help you climb the Airbnb rankings. However, two settings are also necessary to protect your property.

• Only allow instant booking for guests with verified IDs. If you do not have this option, you might as well rent to an anonymous guest named John Doe.

• Only allow instant bookings for well-reviewed guests, which means guests with at least one positive review.

In our opinion, the above two options are a must with instant bookings.

If the potential guest does not have a verified ID, we simply ask them to verify with Airbnb. We never had a guest say no.

If the potential guest has NO past history and is a new account, then you will want to ask them a couple of questions - why are they visiting? and kindly remind them of the house rules. This is where you need to use your instincts.

Trust Your Instincts

Luckily we have never had to deal with a bad party. We have had guests who broke the rules and had a kid’s birthday party. This created a tremendous amount of garbage that could fill 3 garbage bins, but no real damage to the property was done.

We also had guests who decided to sing Karaoke late at night after a night out in the town. They did not trash the house but pissed off our neighbors and they called the cops. This was before we had an active noise monitor.

Our closest incident was on a new listing—it was the third or fourth booking. While setting up the pricing rules and minimum stay, we made a mistake and allowed a two-night booking. In addition, instant booking was enabled with no ID required and no well-established guest required.

The booking came in from a recently created account (1 month ago), no id verification, and 8 guests (our max occupancy in this property). The image on the profile looked like a very young kid with no about us and nothing else. There was no message on why they booked.

In addition, they were from the same state. All the potential warning bells were there.

• New account with no reviews

• Account not verified

• Max occupancy

• Instant booking used

• Guest was from nearby

• Guest did not communicate much

Now, it is possible they were going there for a Bible study club or perhaps a Robotics competition, so we messaged and texted the guest, asking a few questions about why they booked our place. After not receiving a reply for over 24 hours, we canceled the booking.

It is possible we totally overreacted, but all the signs of a potential issue were there.

Trust your instincts.

Noise and Crow Detector

One of our properties is very close to our neighbors. In addition, our neighbors did not exactly throw a welcome reception when we told them we were going to rent the house via Airbnb. One of the items that made them feel just a little more comfortable was that we would be monitoring the property with ring cameras and a noise/crowd monitor. The noise decibel monitor was going to be both inside the house and outside the house.

The gadget we installed inside and outside the house is a noise and crow detector. This is a really neat device as it simply measures the decibel level at all times and does not record any voice just the ‘loudness level’. We can specify the threshold. If it goes over for more than 5 minutes, it can automatically notify the guest. It does this twice, then notifies you via email, or text or app pop-up.

In addition, it can detect the number of individuals inside the house. So, for a maximum of 8, we set the limit to 10 or 11.

This is a great way of being proactively notified if the noise level is high OR the number of people inside the house increases past your limit. Unlike a Ring camera, which is passive—you need to look at the video—this is active and near real-time.

For $180/year per property, this is a no-brainer is certain properties.

You can get one sensor for free and you can save an additional $15 by using This Link

The only issue we have had with this is that the outside unit is battery-operated, and often, the battery only lasts 3-4 months. We now swap this on a regular basis.

If you set up one of these devices, be sure to also mention it in the description. This is another good deterrent.

Additional Verification

Third-party systems provide additional verification and checks on potential guests. We will soon write about one of them that we are testing.

Final Thoughts

There are many parties and out-of-control crows in Airbnbs every night. However, the number is relatively small compared to the ‘good guests’.

In addition, following these tips can drastically decrease the chances of your Airbnb being one of them. These tips are very easy to implement. Make sure YOUR Airbnb is not a good candidate for an out-of-control party.

Thanks for reading!!

P.S. Wondering if cohosting is right for your property? Let’s talk it through — reach us at info@AdventuresInAirbnbs.com

The Airbnb Listing is Live and costs $0 to be added to the Drawing.

Are you a fan of “UP” ? Ever dreamed of staying in Carl’s home?

Carl Fredricksen epitomizes the power of determination and the beauty of unexpected friendships. Despite facing numerous obstacles, including a persistent antagonist and the challenges of old age, Carl remains steadfast in his pursuit of fulfilling Ellie's dream. His character arc serves as a poignant reminder of the human capacity for resilience and the transformative nature of love. Through Carl's journey, audiences are invited to reflect on their own aspirations and the significance of forging meaningful connections. Ultimately, Carl Fredricksen emerges not only as a beloved animated character but also as a symbol of hope, courage, and the enduring power of dreams.

Airbnb recreated the house as part of launching its Icon experiences and is offering a night's stay in the house for free. Of course, it is a drawing, and we are not sure how many entries per night. In the app, you can select one night and up to four guests.

Participating in the drawing for a free night's stay in Carl's home is as easy as a click and answering why you?

Don't miss out on this unique opportunity, the entry is absolutely free. Here is the link.

Select any date except for Jul 6-7 because that is the date we selected. :-)

Good luck

P.S. Wondering if cohosting is right for your property? Let’s talk it through — reach us at info@AdventuresInAirbnbs.com

Lately, we have seen a number of posts regarding the number of bookings slowing down or, in some cases, completely stopping.

This can happen slowly over a few months or very suddenly, with one month having 80% occupancy and the following month having close to 0% occupancy.

Many articles refer to this as the ‘Airbnb bust’. Our view is not that this is an Airbnb bust, but simply supply and demand finally leveling off. This occurs at different rates in different markets.

The Cliff Vs Slow Ramp Down

In some markets, acquiring an STR license is complicated, so supply is going up slowly. In other markets, such as many cities in Florida, the regulation is very light, with no cap restrictions. We have seen an explosive growth in supply in these markets—new Airbnb listings.

Demand IS still increasing, but the supply is increasing FASTER.

Supply grew about 16% in the last year. Again this is NOT spread evenly.

Demand is still growing at a steady pace, but a bit slower. Airbnb Q4 2023 saw a 12% increase in bookings compared to a year ago. This is a healthy growth. But supply in some areas outgrew this by, let’s just say, a TON in some areas.

In a few places where we have our properties, if we search the area in the mid or slow season, it is now NOT uncommon to see 1000+ listings.

If you are not on page 1 or 2, then suddenly, your new reservations can stop.

There is one big reason why this decrease may not be gradual. Airbnb has a sophisticated algorithm to determine where you are placed in a potential guest search. No one knows exactly how this algorithm works, but its key ingredients are well-documented in various posts, YouTube videos, etc.

The algorithm has two goals: maximize revenue for Airbnb and create happy guests that come back.

Have you ever wondered why you can not sort the search results by total price? Or why are taxes NOT clearly visible on the main page? This is definitely related to the maximization of revenue for Airbnb criteria.

To create happy guests who will return to Airbnb, the algorithm will order the properties it thinks are most likely to be a good match for the potential guests.

This means that if your listing drops slightly in a market with a lot of supply, you can suddenly appear on page 3 or 4 and get 0 new bookings.

Below are two items that can cause your listing to drop off. I’m sure there are others, but these two are easy to observe and measure.

1. When a guest cancels a booking. Your listing will drop off for a day to a couple of weeks.

2. If you get a 3-star or lower review AND the review contains certain keywords your listing will drop. We are not 100% sure what keywords seem to trigger this, but from our own experience, words and phrases indicating need maintenance or inaccuracy seem to cause this.

How bad is this drop-off? On the well-performing properties, it's just a couple of days. Your listing may have two or three days being buried, then bounce right back. How do we know this? We monitor it closely.

Here is one of our properties that is almost in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd placement every day of every month. A canceled booking can drag it down to as low as 20th place, but only for a day or two.

The various colored lines indicate our placement or ranking when someone searches for an Airbnb with a capacity for 10, 9, 7… people in this location. It is a big house so the placement when searching for 2 or 3 or even 4 people is not relevant.

Climbing the Rankings

Luckily there are many things we CAN do to increase the ranking in Airbnb. In addition, if the number of new bookings is still really low, you can increase your exposure by listing in additional channels such as Vrbo, Booking.com, Google, and your own direct booking site. There are many other niche channels that can be really good for certain markets.

Good reviews help a lot, so you should elegantly beg your guests to write a good review and rate you 5 stars. We will write an article on various strategies for this in the future.

Yes, you do need a property management system to easily list in multiple channels, synchronize the calendars, have the same set of email notifications, etc. We will be writing an article shortly on our favorite property management system, Hostfully. We would not be where we are today without Hostfully.

BTW, if you do sign up for Hostfully, please use our Hostfully Affiliate Link:

Back to climbing the Airbnb rankings. First - review these Top 10 tips

For an existing listing, we would recommend:

1. Update the listing description. Make sure it is a good story and describes your place well.

2. Review the photos. Often, a listing that has been around for a while now has outdated photos or shows old furniture. Always remember you want a light background and an almost overexposed photo.

3. Try new main photos. This is an art and not a science, but your main photo can really drive new bookings. Experiment a little bit. We have one property where not only do we allow dogs, but we use one of our photos with our dog. The bookings went thru the roof.

4. Track your progress. There are a couple of tools for this, but we really like Rank Breeze.

   You can also do this manually. Simply open a new browser in private or incognito mode and search your market. Then, count where your property appears. This is how we started back when we had one or two properties.

Tracking your progress the easy way

Rank Breeze is really straightforward to set up and use. They have a 7-day free trial. If you do use them, please use our Rank Breeze Affiliate link

We use them for:

• Keep track of our competition

• Keep track of our Airbnb ranking

• Determining which changes work and which changes do not.

• Examining keywords to add to our listing

They have other cool features but we mainly use the above 4 items.

Let’s look at these in more detail one at a time.

After signing up, add your listing. This is easy, and they have tutorials available.

Keeping track of your competition

Spend some time looking for 4-5 well-performing Airbnbs in your market. Add them with a single click, and you can now track their performance and daily rate compared to your property.

Keep Track of your Airbnb Ranking

This is the number one item we use. Once a week, we check all of our properties and see their exact ranking. Our goal is to stay in the top 7. When someone searches in an area our property is in, our property shows up in the top 7 positions, so a potential guest will see the photo and our property title. There are MANY potential guests who do not scroll past page 1.

Determining which changes work and which changes do not.

This is an important item. You can make changes that could cause your placement to go down. For example, you might think of an awesome new main image. However, after changing it, your click-through rates go down, which would cause your ranking to also start to decrease.

We advise making one change at a time and tracking what change you made in Rank Breeze. Here is a good example. We made the first change and appeared to have a downward trend. Three days later, we reversed the change and made a different change. Then, our ranking began rising and was now in the 5-10 range. This is still okay, as it is on the first page. Have patience.

Remember to NOT make too many changes at once. This is like steering a ship. Once your ship, your Airbnb, is going in the right direction, let it keep heading there. The red vertical lines are changes that we track.

Please use our Rank Breeze Affiliate link if you want to try them.

Final thoughts

There was a time when any Airbnb property was profitable in certain cities. When the occupancy rate is 80% or 90%, you will rent any place, with any description, with any photos, and with a less-than-stellar property management methodology.

During the hockey stick Airbnb boom, new property management companies came out of nowhere and claimed your success was due to their secret sauce. Large property management companies such as Vacasa grew extremely fast and acquired others. Vacasa, as an example, sometimes had guest experiences that mimicked their stock price

The owners of these poor-performing properties are part of the Airbnb bust, and they are getting fewer bookings now. Some are barely hanging in there. However, supply and demand are now beginning to equalize in some cities.

For the first time in a while, we see markets such as this where the supply is finally leveling off. Many poor-quality Airbnbs are transitioning to Long-Term Rentals, or the property is being sold. The top-quality Airbnbs will remain profitable, although with some downward pressure on a daily rate.

For example, there are over 5K Airbnbs in Tampa, FL. Although the number of Airbnbs has grown only 6% in the past year, it has decreased in the last few months.

Looking at occupancy we can see a big difference between 2021 and now in 2023/2024. We have a lot more empty Airbnbs now in 2024.

In the long run, this is a good thing. The really poor experiences some guests have had, such as staying in a place with broken windows, an AC that broke during their whole stay, misleading photos, or waiting 2 hours for a physical key, or a kitchen with barely anything, will soon be a thing of the past. The well-equipped Airbnbs, where guests have a very good ‘Experience’ will stay remain. The poor ones will be weeded out.

Is your Airbnb one of the ones that is well-performing? Is your listing top-notch? Do you know your ranking?

Thanks for reading!

P.S. Wondering if cohosting is right for your property? Let’s talk it through — reach us at info@AdventuresInAirbnbs.com

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The Algorithm

Airbnb’s ranking algorithm is a little bit of a black box as they do not publish how their algorithm works, but many individuals have analyzed how properties are ranked. There is a fair amount of knowledge on the ingredients that affect your placement. In addition, we can have an educated guess that the algorithm goal is two fold: higher guest satisfaction & higher profit.

Higher potential guest satisfaction means properties that better match the guest requirements have good reviews and good feedback, and are placed higher where it thinks the guest will like your property.

Higher profit means that two houses, all being equal, the one with the higher nightly rate will be placed higher.

Airbnb Statistics in 2024

• Every second, there are 6 guests check-in in

• As of February 2024, there are 7.7 active listings

• Europe has twice as many listings as North America (stats from 2021)

• In 2023 Airbnb had a revenue of 9.7 Billion!

• Yet Airbnb only has 20sh% of the vacation rental business

• Airbnb listings are growing, but revenue per host or per listing is dropping

The last statistic is one to always keep in mind. There is more competition on a daily basis, especially in markets with little to no regulation.

Our top 10 tips

These tips are from various sources - YouTube videos, books, online postings, and most importantly, our own experiences with 8 properties.

Tip 1 - Your first 30 days

Your first 30 days are critical. The Airbnb algorithm will prioritize your listing and will place it in high rankings. It will compare how your listing does with other highly rated properties. If your property does well, with happy guests and more revenue for Airbnb, your property will stay there. This means absolutely not launching your property if the listing is NOT fully complete with professional photos, good description, and is connected to a pricing engine, etc. Do not make your property live until every single little thing is setup. Also, do not start with a low pricing. Part of the algorithm is to maximize profits…..9 billion does NOT come from placing lower-priced properties on top :-)

Tip 2 - Your photos

Your photos, and especially your main photos, are critical. Unless your are a very good photographer, hire someone professional. Professional-looking photos can dramatically improve your short-term rental business. Make sure these photos are:

• High res—Yes, in this day and age, some photographers still use equipment that is now considered subpar in terms of resolution.

• Horizontal photos - All photos should be taken horizontally

• Exposure - These photos should almost be overexposed…..you want your place to glow!

• Angle - The good & eye-catching photos are often taken in an angle.

• Decor - Make sure the decor is well placed, or perhaps even move them around for that great shot.

• Surrounding areas - If you property is in a neat area include some of those photos. If it is near a neat walking path, include the photo of the walking path.

• Collage - We are trying collage photos as our main photo in a couple properties. It is still too early to tell if they help. Some people claim it helps.

Tip 3 - Your Listing Description

Your description is also very, very important. You do not need to be an English major to write a good description. Use a tool such as Grammarly to write in proper sentences. Your description should NOT be short. Describe each room and what it has. Look at your competitors' writing and improve on it.

In addition to describing everything, create a narrative about your property and its location. This is also key. The narrative should draw the reader into your Airbnb and its location.

It is ok to make a longer than usual description, but do NOT make a short description.

One of the ingredients in the Airbnb algorithm is time on page. They measure how long potential guests look at your listing. If you have a long and engaging description, the potential guest will spend more time in your listing.

If English is not your strong suit, go on Fiverr and hire someone to help you write a good description.

Tip 4 - Your Title

An often overlooked ingredient of a good listing is the title. Spend a lot of time brainstorming your title. Does your property have a good name? Are there features that make it stand out?

For example, in one of our properties, we have a wood-burning sauna. The word sauna is part of the title. In our property in Kissimmee/Orlando, we have many themed rooms with Disney characters, so the word Disney is part of the title.

If you are in a very competitive market, think creatively. If your market is NOT very competitive, then ‘My Airbnb’ will do :-)

Tip 5 - Key Words

Incorporating relevant keywords in your title and description can enhance your listing’s visibility. These keywords enhance the search engine optimization (SEO) of your listing, making it more discoverable to potential guests. Imagine yourself as a guest searching for an experience similar to what you offer. Think about what your target audience might search for—terms like “cozy,” “ocean view,” “pet-friendly,” or “nearby attractions.” These keywords not only attract the right guests but also improve your search ranking.

Each area will have a different set of relevant keywords.

If you are stuck, Fiver offers cheap deals to get help with Keywords. Services like RankBreeze can also help.

Tip 6 - Your Response time

Another key metric is your response time. Once your property has been live for a while, it won’t matter if you take 6 hours or 12 hours to reply to one question as long as your average is good. However, in the first few months after listing, you want to make sure you reply to questions and messages as soon as possible.

Potential guests will see “Host usually replies within xx hours.” If you are very high, a potential guest may pass you on.

With today’s smartphones, this should not be very difficult unless you live in a faraway time zone from your property.

Tip 7 - Self-check-in

Self-check-in allows guests to arrive at their accommodation anytime. Delays can occur for various reasons, including flights, traffic, etc.

A percentage of guests filter and exclude properties that do not support self-check-in. This is often the case when travelers arrive from International flights.

The self-check-in does NOT need to be a smart lock; it could be an old-fashioned lockbox with a physical key inside. Most of the properties we have stayed in Europe have a lockbox with a physical key inside. But the smart lock has many advantages:

• More secure as each guest gets their code, which expires when their stay ends.

• There is no physical key to lose

• You have a log of each and every time the door is opened and by whom

A recent statistic mentioned that on the top 3 pages, 75 percent of the properties support self-check-in.

Having a listing in a competitive area almost requires having self-check-in.

Tip 8 - The ‘extras’

There are many travelers who keep coming back to the same destinations over and over again. We are one of those people. If you can get amenities and little extras to delight your guests, there is a good chance that next time, they will book your place again and not take a chance on a new place.

For example, one of our places is a small rehabbed studio apartment. It is small, great for two people, and in a good location. It is very cozy, very well decorated, and has a sauna inside the unit. We provide towels, sauna towels, and eucalyptus drops for the sauna. This is the unit where we see guests coming back over and over again. We have guests that must have returned at least four times already. We plan on writing an article on this remodel.

Another example was a small place we stayed in Washington DC. The place was small but in a great location, near everything and well decorated, and we really liked the free water and little snacks. When we are back in DC, we probably will just book with them again instead of taking a chance in a new Airbnb.

Tip 9 - Allow Pets

Properties that allow pets have higher occupancy and higher ADR. If you are trying to decide whether to allow pets or not, decide before you go live with your listing. Remember, those first 30 days are supercritical.

Not all properties are suitable for pets. But if your property has good hardwood floors and resistant furniture, it may be a good idea to allow pets.

We don’t allow pets in some of our properties due to carpet, pool, and close-by neighbors. But for others where that is a good fit, we do so. In fact, in one of our properties that is very season, while thinking about how to increase bookings in the low season, we changed the main photo to include our dog. This definitely increased our bookings in the low season. Our dog is helping advertise our condo.

Tip 10 - Don’t have Crazy Rules

Don’t have crazy rules or crazy fines, as this can be a real turnoff for potential guests. It is okay to state no smoking and a $250 fine for smoking. But don’t have items such as a $1000 fine for touching the pool heater, $500 per extra guest not approved, or $500 for bringing in pets.

These are all real examples of items we have seen in listings.

One more recent example was a post in the newsgroups asking for help as their house had very few bookings and had been a total loss to date. The house was in the same community as our house in Kissimmee/Orlando so we decided to help. There were many items wrong with the listing, but the major one was having a list of 3-4 fines for things that perhaps a bad guest would do once in a blue moon. This includes the $1000 fine for messing with the pool heater. In a competitive market such as Orlando, anyone who read that would pass on the property.

We hope you enjoyed our top 10 tips. With a suitable property priced right in an area with decent demand and following these tips, you should be able to make it to the top page of Airbnb.

Thanks for reading!!

P.S. Wondering if cohosting is right for your property? Let’s talk it through — reach us at info@AdventuresInAirbnbs.com

• Streamlining your short-term rental business with smart automation tips

• Proven strategies to boost revenue and maximize occupancy

• Effective ways to elevate guest experiences and earn 5-star reviews

• Budget-friendly design ideas to make your space unforgettable

• Tips for handling guest communication and setting clear expectations

• Advice on optimizing your listing for better visibility

• Essential tools and software for self-managing like a pro

• Lessons learned from real experiences to help you avoid common pitfalls

Join us as we uncover everything you need to thrive as an Airbnb host!

Our story - how we started

Our story began over 10 years ago when we purchased an older 4-plex with a friend/acquaintance. We were the passive partners. We invested a bit more funds and had no control over the management of the 4-plex, but in turn, we learned quite a lot about real estate, appreciation, permits (or lack of permits), property management, fires, and more. Looking back, this could have been a disaster, but it turned out well primarily due to appreciation.   

When we were beginning to consider how to ‘exit’ our partnership, we received a call from our ‘friend’ who said he was thinking of selling the quadplex as he needed the cash for something else. Perfect. In fact, he already had the listing up, and this was more of a courtesy call since we were the passive investors. 

After three months, the property sold for a good price, and we now had extra funds to invest. 

We had to decide between investing in another multifamily home or something else. 

We had read several books on real estate investing, appreciation, multi-family investing, and AirBnB/STRs. STRs seemed very interesting to us as we loved to travel, and both of our jobs allowed for a certain amount of work remotely. In addition, we had a few vacation spots that we kept returning to repeatedly. 

As if the stars aligned, a property appeared on Minnesota’s north shore that met all the criteria: A-frame cabin, 4 bedrooms, 3 bedrooms, large deck with a view of Lake Superior, close to Ski resort, lake view, room for expansion, and fiber internet (a must-have). A couple of months later, we closed on the property. The house did need a bit of cosmetic work and one major item—a new septic system within 12 months. 

How hard could this STR business be?

This was the start of our Adventures, which eventually led to Airbnbs in various cities in the US and one in Mexico.

We hope to share many of the tips and tricks and dos and don’ts we have learned while self-managing the properties remotely.

Someone once asked how we would categorize our Airbnb business in one short sentence: A hospitality business with great automation and customer service geared towards delighting guests.

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