Realtor · Marietta GA · Member since 2026 · 8 posts · 2 votes
We own two short-term rentals and I am working on building our own direct-booking website.
It started as a way to avoid paying platform fees, but Airbnb is adding new rules on November 20 that limit our ability to have guests sign a separate rental agreement and to collect information like a driver's license. That makes having our own booking process even more important.
For those of you who already take direct bookings:
1. Which platform or booking software do you recommend, and why?
2. What would you do differently if you were starting over?
3. Is anyone else affected by Airbnb's new rules, and how are you handling guest agreements and ID verification?
Thanks in advance. Happy to share what we learn as we build it.
Hi Maria, the November 20 change is coming up a lot with owners here on the Florida coast too. What I'm seeing is people keeping the Airbnb side simple and moving the rental agreement and ID check into their own direct booking flow for repeat and referral guests. Hospitable, OwnerRez and Lodgify are the names I hear most for direct booking sites, so it might be worth demoing a couple and seeing which one feels easiest to run day to day. Would love to hear what you land on.
I'll leave the software question to the hosts here, but I can speak to your second question from the guest side. My wife and I have spent the past four years living mostly in short-term and monthly rentals, so we've looked at a lot of listings and booking pages.
For a guest, three things make a direct booking feel safe. Real photos and reviews they can check somewhere else, a clear total price with the cleaning fee and taxes shown before checkout, and a cancellation policy written in plain language. When any of those is missing, most people go back to the big platforms where they feel protected.
If I were starting over as a host, I'd also keep the rental agreement and ID step short and explain in one line why you ask for it. Most guests are happy to do it when it feels like a normal part of booking rather than an extra hurdle at the end.