Fees: It's More Than A "Fee"ling

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A complete revenue management strategy considers and optimizes all sources of income. As the short-term rental industry has grown, so has the variety of different revenue sources - one of the largest being additional fees. Cleaning, administrative or processing fees can now play a central and sometimes controversial role in the profitability of a listing.

In our industry, fees walk the fine line between needing to cover operational costs and being a mini-pocket of revenue that helps increase margins. The dual-purpose of fees means they can get quite confusing, especially when trying to match what the competition is doing, or managing guests' perceptions.

In order to get a better, unbiased understanding of how fees are being b2b email listb2b email list used in the short-term rental market, we took a look at what the data is telling us.

Before we dive in, however, let’s clarify a couple of points. To ensure we’re measuring fees proportionally across different types of listings, the main metric we’re going to use is “% of total guest cost (excluding taxes) that come from fees.”