Co-hosts: how do you build monthly owner statements?

Question

For those of you co-hosting or managing a handful of STRs for other owners, I'd love to hear how you handle monthly owner statements.

A few things I'm curious about:

• Do you start from the platform payout report, your PMS, or the bank deposits?
• How do you handle stays that cross month-end, and refunds or adjustments that land after the statement goes out?
• If you use the split payout, how do you show your fee and any extra charges (cleaning, supplies) so the owner can tie it to their deposit?
• Roughly how long does it take you per owner each month?

Do you start from the platform payout report, your PMS, or the bank deposits?

How do you handle stays that cross month-end, and refunds or adjustments that land after the statement goes out?

If you use the split payout, how do you show your fee and any extra charges (cleaning, supplies) so the owner can tie it to their deposit?

Roughly how long does it take you per owner each month?

Spreadsheet setups, software, whatever works. What's the part that still eats the most time?

Andrew Steffens · Answer

Im a property manager, and offer both limited and full service options in Florida, so not quite a co-host. We use Streamline as our PMS and we provide the generated PMS monthly statement (after we check each one manually, unfortunately.). To answer your questions:

• We use PMS generated payout statement only.
• For stays that cross months we pay in the month the money was received. So if a stay was Oct 25-Nov 15 and we received the payout Oct 26 we would pay the owner in full in Oct. However, if the stay was Oct 30-Nov 15 and we did not receive the funds until November 2nd, we would pay them out in November. Also Airbnb breaks up payments on longer stays (i.e. over a month), so we give the owner the chunks as they come in from Airbnb, in the month they come in.
• The statement we send starts with top line revenue, then backs out management fee, then has a supplemental income section (i.e. pet fees), then has an owner charges portions where things like maintenance and replacement items go.
• The PMS generates the reports in less than 5 mins when prompted for over 50 properties but we spend 5-10 minutes average (some take less than a minute some take some time for investigating potential issues). Probably about 4 hours average for 50 or so properties.

We use PMS generated payout statement only.

For stays that cross months we pay in the month the money was received. So if a stay was Oct 25-Nov 15 and we received the payout Oct 26 we would pay the owner in full in Oct. However, if the stay was Oct 30-Nov 15 and we did not receive the funds until November 2nd, we would pay them out in November. Also Airbnb breaks up payments on longer stays (i.e. over a month), so we give the owner the chunks as they come in from Airbnb, in the month they come in.

The statement we send starts with top line revenue, then backs out management fee, then has a supplemental income section (i.e. pet fees), then has an owner charges portions where things like maintenance and replacement items go.

The PMS generates the reports in less than 5 mins when prompted for over 50 properties but we spend 5-10 minutes average (some take less than a minute some take some time for investigating potential issues). Probably about 4 hours average for 50 or so properties.

So to answer your question the manual checking of the statements is what takes the longest. On average we only catch 1-2 mistakes on the statements but that is enough not to have complete faith in any software and have to have a manual check in place.

Divin Kanyama · Answer

@Zac Thompson I’d build the statement from PMS or reservation data, then reconcile platform payouts to bank deposits. Pick a consistent month-end approach—cash received or revenue by stay dates—and explain any timing differences.

For split payouts, show booking revenue, your fee and calculation basis, cleaning and supplies, and who received each amount. Keep owner-paid expenses separate to avoid double charging. Label late refunds as prior-period adjustments linked to the original booking, unless a corrected statement is needed.

For a small portfolio, I’d start with a reusable spreadsheet and reservation IDs linking each transaction. Track prep time separately from resolving unmatched payouts and missing receipts—that’ll give you a realistic per-owner estimate and show where automation could help.

John Racine · Answer

Zac, split payout changes the question quite a bit. I co-host, so I work inside the owner's own Airbnb account, and Airbnb's split payout sends the owner's share and my fee straight to each of us. My fee never passes through the owner's deposit, and the owner can see every reservation's payout in their own account. That means I'm not rebuilding their revenue every month. Airbnb already did that, in a place they control.

For the numbers, we work from our PMS and the platform's payout reports, and we use cash accounting. Revenue and expenses land in the month they actually hit, not by stay dates. That takes care of your month-end question too. On long stays, Airbnb pays out every 30 days, so the revenue simply shows up in the month each payment hits.

What I do send is a bill for everything outside the split. I pay the cleaner directly and the owner reimburses me. Consumables like toilet paper, soap and detergent are billed separately, and so is a monthly technology fee. So the owner's paperwork comes down to two things: their Airbnb payout history, and my invoice with dated line items.

One reason I like it this way beyond the time it saves: when the co-host collects all the payouts and sends the owner their share, it can start to look like a property management arrangement, and some states, Florida included, require a license for that. With split payout, the money never runs through me. Anyone setting up co-hosting should look at that before choosing a payout setup.

For my current portfolio, the whole process takes about an hour a month.

Lee Futcher · Answer

Hi Zac,

Fair question. Honestly, I don't build statements myself, so the managers here know that pain better than I do.

Your guess sounds right though. A payout that's short by an amount that matches nothing is the one people end up digging for. If your tool can show the likely reason right next to it, like a resolution payment or a split refund, that's the feature I'd want first.

Cheers,Lee

John Racine · Answer

@Zac Thompson , I've been fortunate I have had no questions as statements go out. I attribute that to the constant communication I keep with my owners so nothing seems to come as a surprise to them. Which I love!

Zac Thompson · Answer

Thanks all, this is really useful. @John Racine, an hour a month is a great benchmark. When an owner does have a question, is it usually about the payout history or about your invoice? @Divin Kanyama, agreed on picking one month-end basis and sticking with it, and on tying late refunds back to the original booking. @Lee Futcher, honest answer: it's too early to say from real files. My guess is a payout that's short by an amount that doesn't match any single fee or refund on the reservation. What's the one that eats the most of your time?

Lee Futcher · Answer

Hi Zac,

That makes a lot of sense, and I respect you doing the homework before you build. Most tools get built the other way around.

Since you're building it, the flags are where I'd spend the effort. The statement itself is a solved problem. What managers pay for is not having to look at the 90 percent that's fine. If your tool can explain in one plain sentence why something was flagged, like "payout is $42 less than the reservation, likely a resolution payment," that's when it starts saving real time.

John's point about split payout is worth designing around too, since it changes who even needs a statement.

What's the hardest mismatch to explain automatically so far?

Cheers,Lee

Matthew Tregoning · Answer

For the tool you’re building, I’d want a re-import check: uploading the same payout file twice shouldn’t duplicate reservations or charges. Then show a short “what changed since last import” list. That’s the kind of small detail I’d test before trusting the monthly workflow.

Zac Thompson · Answer

Thanks Matthew, both of those are on point. Re-uploading the same file now adds nothing, and a corrected amount updates the existing line instead of adding a second one. Each import also lists what was added, changed or unchanged. If you ever want to try it on a real month, DM me.

Zac Thompson · Answer

Thanks Daniel, Andrew and Lee. Andrew, the point that checking takes longer than building the statement is useful, and so is paying stays in the month the money arrives.

Lee, fair question. I'm not managing owners myself. I'm building a tool for the statement step, so I'm trying to learn how people actually do it before I assume anything. Your flag list matches what I've been hearing.

Daniel, when a payout doesn't match, what's usually behind it, a fee change, a resolution payment, or something else?

Co-hosts: how do you build monthly owner statements?

Co-hosts: how do you build monthly owner statements?

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