I own a triplex in Omaha and I am listing each apartment across multiple platforms as short-term rentals. Right now they are on Air Bnb and Homeaway, which I find to sync up nicely, but it doesn't look like this is the case when listing on Booking or Flip Key. I want to have as much exposure as possible by having it on more platforms, but I'm a little worried about double bookings. Is there a way to Sync up all the calendars to a master Google calendar or something similar? Or do I have to use a property management software like Guesty or Host Away if I want to list on all these platforms without manually updating for every booking?

It is pretty much industry standard for all P2P websites to use a feature called iCal, even ours. 

Look for the instructions on setting up iCal for your listing and you should be good to go. If you need help, let me know. 

Best of luck, Mike

Thanks Mike! I'll get that set up asap

I'm not a STR host yet but something we're looking at. I haven't used this myself but another host had recommended I check out AirGMS https://www.airgms.com/ which has your multi-calendar support (think it uses iCal on the back end like @Michael Kugler  said), plus automated messaging and supports multiple accounts among other things.  Could be worth a look.

@Cody Purcell , that is way more than he was asking for. If I understood correctly - he just simply wants to put a reservation on the system and have it update all of his platforms at once which is pretty normal. Plus, iCal is free.

With iCal it is pretty quick and easy to setup. 

It works off of a master/slave feed - meaning that pretty much any source can be the master. i.e. VRBO, AirBNB, Vacation.Rentals and so on.

Copy the URL for the feed

and then paste it into the reader. In this case this is from our site. Then click Import Calendar and it is done.

The grey boxes are existing bookings and not available for inquiry (searches) and the green are still available with pricing. 

Again, this is pretty standard across the industry.

@Cody Purcell Thank you. I was only able to take a quick glance but from what I can tell that looks very similar to other property management software like Smart BnB or Guesty...have you found any advantages with AirGMS over the others? With Smart BnB it will cost $26 for all three listings, and AirGMS would be $20 per listing, so $60 in total per month. I would expect it to have quite a bit better functionality to justify the extra cost

@Michael Kugler that looks perfect for what I'm looking for. I'm looking into a property mgmt software as a long-term solution, but its good to know I can sync up all my calendars for free in the meantime. Does it create a separate calendar for each property (or apartment in my case) or do they all show up on the same calendar in different tiers?

@Logan Fast Okay, you are kind of mixing things up - so let's keep it simple.

Hold your hand straight out with fingers extended. 

Your outstretched fingers are the "tools" (AirBNB, VRBO, Vacation.Rentals and so on)

The palm of your hand "feeds" the fingers

If you are going to do this you are going to need a "feeder". You do that by getting a reservation company to handle your properties. I use AvailabilityOnline.com for my 12 condos. Webervations is another as well as OwnerRez. There are tons of them out there and they all do the same thing. Customer name - address - email - phone - dates - rate - etc. 

Once you have the feeder setup and running, simply supply the feed to the tools and everything else will take care of itself. This way you are only concerned with feeding one system.

Now - alternatively you could simply make VRBO be the "feeder" ( I would HIGHLY recommend against this - but it is your call )

In that scenario, there is zero cost involved because you have already paid the fees to them. 

Have a good one

@Michael Kugler that makes sense. My question had more to do with whether or not you would have to update a separate "feeder" for each property, or if they are all on the same. From what you are saying it seems like they are all on the same feeder calendar. I'm sure it will make more sense too once I actually get in there and start playing around with it.

They are all on the same. Depending on the time of resync will determine the amount of time it will update. Ours is on a every 3 hours cycle. The others may be quicker or slower. IOW, there is no platform out there that just continually pings. The only way to get up to the second results is to manually sync - but then that takes time and hassle. Normally, the aurosync is more than sufficient.

@Michael Kugler good to know. Thanks for the help, I really appreciate it.