Airbnb cancellation rate is 36%

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Ryan MoyerBusiness Member
Property Manager · Orlando Kissimmee Davenport Salt Lake City, Park City · Member since 2019 · 996 posts · 1k+ votes
3d

Sadly, this is by design.

When you log on to Airbnb as a guest Airbnb plasters you with ads to "book with $0 deposit".

Alongside that, Airbnb has all but eliminated cancelation policies that are reasonable for large homes.

Airbnb is essentially urging guests to book properties, hold the calendar hostage, and then decide later if they actually want to visit and just cancel last minute if they decide not to or can't find people to go with them.

For casual hosts Airbnb is fine, I guess. Anyone serious about STR that is not spending every ounce of their energy to reduce reliance on Airbnb and move more heavily into direct bookings is out of their mind.

The platform is a huge bane on the traditional vacation rental industry, as they continue to try to turn 5+ bedroom houses into hotel inventory and force them to abide by hotel rules despite them having no hotel competition.

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  • Andrew SteffensBusiness Member
    Tampa, FL · Member since 2022 · 3k+ posts · 3k+ votes
    3d

    What is your current cancellation term on Airbnb? We have different ones on different units. For example our small units that always book ultra last minute anyways are flexible and our Gulf front penthouse is strict.

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    • Collin HaysBusiness Member
      OP
      Property Manager · Gatlinburg, TN · Member since 2020 · 3k+ posts · 4k+ votes
      3d

      That's actually a good idea, Andrew. We have a uniform policy for all of our rentals, but perhaps we have more strict guidelines for certain properties. What is your criteria for more strict guidelines?

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    • Ryan MoyerBusiness Member
      Property Manager · Orlando Kissimmee Davenport Salt Lake City, Park City · Member since 2019 · 996 posts · 1k+ votes
      2d

      Strict doesn't exist anymore. Only on legacy listings and they will remove it from those eventually as well.

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  • Ryan MoyerBusiness Member
    Property Manager · Orlando Kissimmee Davenport Salt Lake City, Park City · Member since 2019 · 996 posts · 1k+ votes
    3d

    Sadly, this is by design.

    When you log on to Airbnb as a guest Airbnb plasters you with ads to "book with $0 deposit".

    Alongside that, Airbnb has all but eliminated cancelation policies that are reasonable for large homes.

    Airbnb is essentially urging guests to book properties, hold the calendar hostage, and then decide later if they actually want to visit and just cancel last minute if they decide not to or can't find people to go with them.

    For casual hosts Airbnb is fine, I guess. Anyone serious about STR that is not spending every ounce of their energy to reduce reliance on Airbnb and move more heavily into direct bookings is out of their mind.

    The platform is a huge bane on the traditional vacation rental industry, as they continue to try to turn 5+ bedroom houses into hotel inventory and force them to abide by hotel rules despite them having no hotel competition.

    Cosmic Vacations4.9174 Reviews
    WebsiteView Page
    5Reply
    • Jon Martin
      Member since 2022 · 1k+ posts · 1k+ votes
      2d

      All of That, and/or guests book to see if there is a better offer as the time nears. Strict/Firm (or whatever it’s called) or bust.moderate is still too lenient because at 5 days before they still have a lot of options.

      The large homes book further in advance, although the flip side of that is they are much harder to follow last minite as well for those same exact reasons.

      1Reply
  • Jon Martin
    Member since 2022 · 1k+ posts · 1k+ votes
    2d

    I think that still leaves us with firm, where they still get charged full price if it’s less than 28 days out?

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  • Divin KanyamaBusiness Member
    Accountant · Seattle, WA · Member since 2025 · 535 posts · 227 votes
    2d

    That gap is large enough that I would look beyond the written cancellation policy, @Collin Hays. Equal terms do not necessarily mean equal guest behavior: the platforms may attract different trip purposes, booking windows, lengths of stay, price sensitivity, or levels of commitment.

    I would compare cancellations by booking lead time, season, stay length, nightly rate, discount used, refundable window, and days before arrival. Also separate guest-initiated cancellations from host or payment-related failures, and compare completed stays rather than reservation counts alone. A 36% rate may be concentrated in one segment—for example, long-lead bookings that guests treat as placeholders.

    Before changing terms across the board, test one targeted adjustment on Airbnb, such as a shorter refundable window, a modest nonrefundable discount option, or clearer pre-booking messaging. Then measure net revenue, occupancy, and rebooking—not just the cancellation percentage. The channel with fewer cancellations is not automatically more profitable once fees, rates, and replacement bookings are considered.

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  • John RacinePro Member
    Rental Property Investor · Casselberry, FL · Member since 2008 · 78 posts · 47 votes
    1d

    @Collin Hays that's a big gap. Divin's point about breaking it down by lead time is where I'd start too, but I'd add stay length to that list.

    Most of my calendar is 30+ day stays, with short stays only filling gaps between them. I have never had a 30-day stay cancel. Stays of 28+ nights fall under Airbnb's long-term cancellation policy, and the penalty can be steep, so it discourages cancellations. If most of your volume is weekend and holiday trips, you're fully exposed to the placeholder booking Ryan described.

    Another thing I do with my properties and the ones I co-host is use the non-refundable rate within Airbnb. It gives the guest about a 10% discount, but the booking becomes non-refundable. It's given us an incremental revenue bump that we like.

    The other thing I'd look at is where the rest of your volume comes from. Booking.com has been one of my strongest channels, and it doesn't get mentioned much in these conversations.

    If Airbnb keeps loosening cancellations, I'd rather have more of my bookings coming from somewhere else. Of course, with all of their new changes coming down the pike, I'd like a few more incredibly active and viable channels too, LOL.

    Out of curiosity, have you split tested or experimented with different cancellation policies?

    Disclosure: I co-host STRs for other owners.

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  • Don KonipolBusiness Member
    Investor · The Woodlands TX / Avon, CT · Member since 2009 · 6k+ posts · 10k+ votes
    1d

    Airbnb profit maximization strategy and the hosts profit maximization strategy are often at odds with each other. Guess who prevails?

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  • Nick Pavlakis
    Investor · Seattle · Member since 2018 · 13 posts · 2 votes
    1h

    How many of those cancelled nights eventually rebook, and at what rate? I'd track the dollars still lost after replacement bookings, including any payout you kept from the cancellation. That would tell you which properties need a policy change before tightening terms across the whole portfolio.

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  • Daniel Jung
    Member since 2026 · 49 posts · 17 votes
    52m

    The number I would want next to the cancellation rate is when the cancellations happen. A booking that cancels two months out is mostly an inconvenience. One that cancels inside the final two weeks is lost revenue, because those nights rarely refill at full price. That timing changes the response. For far-out bookings, a short friendly message before the free cancellation window closes seems to shake loose the guests who were holding the calendar as a backup plan, while they can still release it cleanly. For the rest, I have stopped treating cancellations purely as a policy problem. Some of it is just the cost of the channel, and I would rather price for it and keep a list of past guests who can be told when dates open up than tighten terms and lose bookings I would have kept.

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