How to maximize your Airbnb Occupancy Rate

It’s simple math – your Airbnb Occupancy Rate matters

The more people that rent your Airbnb listing, the more money you’ll make. You obviously can’t add any more days to the year, so increasing the number of guests that stay with you each week is critical. Having a strategy to increase your short term rentals is imperative to having a successful Airbnb vacation rental business. It’s all about supply and demand, so dust off your Econ 101 notebook from college and get ready to do research. Keep reading below to understand your options when it comes to increasing the Airbnb occupancy rate for your business.

Step one: Check your current occupancy rate

Before you decide on a strategy, you’ll want to know where you’re starting from. Thankfully, Hosty’s Airbnb Property Management Software is here to help you see all of your listings together in an easy to use format. Our Airbnb Multi-calendar feature can help you understand your average occupancy rate for each one of your listings. This feature also helps you notice any seasonal gaps or patterns that emerge. These are important to note as they can help you devise a strategy to get as many bookings as possible. The important part of this step is simply being aware of what your occupancy rate looks like. Now that you have your average rate figured you can learn how to maximize it.

Tip: Don’t think that having a super high rental rate is always a good thing. Having a high rate of rentals far in advance may actually be bad. Typically, guests don’t book Airbnb rentals until 30 days before their stay. If your rental is booked for months out, you may be charging too little for it.

Step two: How to maximize your Airbnb Occupancy Rate

Where to start:

A great place to start when you’re maximizing your occupancy rate is to check what your competition is doing. Researching prices from nearby Airbnb properties and hotels make it possible to understand how they increase and decrease prices to get the most people to stay with them. If there are few Airbnbs in your area, the easiest approach may be to just choose a price that feels right and see how the market reacts. The only takeaway here is to be aware of your booking rate at various prices and tweak them until you’ve settled on a price spread that maximizes your revenue while keeping your guests happy.

Smart pricing:

It may be easier to set a price for your rental and forget it, but this is not a good strategy. In order to achieve a maxim Airbnb occupancy rate, you need to take special Airbnb pricing considerations into account. Basically, don’t forget to look at the calendar. Make sure your rental rates correspond with holidays, events and popular or unpopular times of the year in your location. Keep a list of popular days available so you can always price accordingly.

Weekend vs. Weekday:

If your rental is slow Monday-Thursday, another helpful strategy is lowering your prices to encourage weekday stays. Lowering your weekday prices can potentially encourage weekend travelers to add an extra day to their trip. It could also increase the frequency of Airbnb business travelers. The caveat to this is your rental location. If your Airbnb is by the beach you’ll want your weekend price to be higher, if you live in the center of Manhattan, you may be appealing to business travelers, and your weekday price may be higher. Just think about who your home appeals to and price the week accordingly.

The bottom line for when you’re trying to increase your Airbnb occupancy rate is to keep a pulse on your market and be responsive to its needs. The extra work will pay off in higher revenues and extra bookings.

Good luck on achieving your best Airbnb occupancy rate!