The popularity of Airbnb is not to be denied, but will it stay as the only major short-term rental company in the United States?

What about VRBO, Flipkey, HomeAway, Tripping.com, etc.? They may be more geared towards vacation homes but they are all still short term rental companies.

@Leigh Ann Smith I do not, my rates are set in Evolve and then an API feeds them directly to the AirBNB, VRBO, etc. That being said, AirBNB and VRBO then add their fees to that when a customer books however. And the way AirBNB does it is a little weird also, I have had to have it explained to me a few times and it still doesn't make much sense but they are only 5% of my bookings so haven't investigated it that much yet. :) Hope that helps! ~Jon

@Mike Reynolds, ask away on tiny house rentals. We started about a year ago with 1 house, and we added another in September. The cost of the houses was reasonable, but it was expensive putting in the road, water, electric, and septic system. That's the main reason we hope we can keep multiple houses rented out. We actually have a 3rd space ready to go, but it's on the back burner while we focus on one of our other ventures (an event venue) and we're also waiting until we have enough demand to sustain a 3rd house. For 2017, we're netting about $1,350 per month on a 90K investment. It's not a passive investment, though. I've got a great cleaning lady, but I'm doing all of the laundry as well as communicating with guests, managing the calendar, etc. We're just south of Houston, so stop by some time if you are in town.

@Nick Winikoff Understood and an interesting topic for discussion. IMHO and limited marketplace exposure Airbnb's market strategy appears different than the other Expedia / TripAdvisor companies, and they appeal to a different crowd. I see millennials and younger generations booking via AIrbnb and a more mature crowd booking through the Homeaway (I get nothing from anyone else and refuse to use Booking.com any more). It is becoming somewhat of a crowded space, yet still growing - for now. As with all business, it begs the question: "At what point will it saturate and margins begin to suffer?" Airbnb scares me though (love/hate relationship) as I believe they are wiggling their way closer to the guest and working hard to keep Hosts (their customers) at arms length. However, I also believe there are opportunities for "boutique" booking sites (possibly Vuepeer - it would be interesting to understand how you differentiate yourself)and solutions like Evolve as @Jon Crosby described, however they too are getting closer to the guest and from what I understand have acquired properties of their own. As for "mainstream" it's all about funding, marketing and "scalability"; Airbnb has all three.

@Nick Winikoff @Jeff Graves AirBNB is only 5% of my bookings and I utilize Evolve to feed all the major sites and handle all payment and booking details so that is another layer to think about. Have you reached out to look at partnerships with companies like Evolve @Nick Winikoff ? I think a bigger question will be how local, state and even federal laws will drive the STR business in the future. Those companies that pay attention to STR advocacy will likely become the favorites for those who are directly impacted by any lobbying efforts provided by those companies for their local regions. Just more food for thought. :) Thanks for the topic!

Thanks, @Jeff Graves! It might be worth it for me to try a year of VRBO and see how it goes. Our 2 tiny houses were booked pretty heavily Feb - April, but it's slowed up a lot for May. Fortunately I have a traveling nurse who has reserved one of the houses for 2 weeks of the month for the next few months (at a significant discount, but 2 weeks is great anyway). Good point about the canned responses. I do that with AirBnB already. VRBO guests probably have the same kinds of questions. I have the templates on my phone, so I can respond fairly easily. I like the idea of direct access to the guest. I like to send my guests a link to a video showing how to drive in since it's a bit complicated, but I can't send it through AirBnB.

@Leigh Ann Smith yeah the annual fee at vrbo is a much better deal than 3% for each guest booking. Vrbo more inquiries that don't book? That may have been the case PRIOR to vrbo providing the Instant Booking feature, similar to Airbnb. I do get some inquiries that don't book, but even if I was booking 50% of those inquires...I'll take that because I'm getting more leads from vrbo than airbnb. Frankly my responses to inquiries don't take that much time. Most are canned responses with a personal twist. I just copy and paste from a previous email I've sent. Now, I'll be honest...I do promote my vrbo link, not airbnb's. For the most part I prefer vrbo's platform, and access to guests contact information...(not some dynamic email address airbnb generated). I hope that helps. Jeff

As Jon mentioned HomeAway (which owns vrbo) are owned by Expedia which also owns search engines Hotels.com, Hotwire.com, trivago, Venere.com, Travelocity, Orbitz. As a vrbo host our STR can be seen across multiple platforms. Personally, we get more leads from vrbo and longer stays from the guests than with Airbnb...that's just our personal experience, but we'll continue to use both platforms.

Will companies with the Airbnb model move into the mainstream?Will companies with the Airbnb model move into the mainstream?

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Will companies with the Airbnb model move into the mainstream?

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