This forum is dedicated to connecting hosts with other hosts. Sign up to get the latest updates and news just for AirBnb hosts! Note that we are not affiliated with Airbnb - we are just passionate hosts!
Hi there,
I’m in Orlando and getting the AirBnB hosting big again. I’m thinking about renting it the upstairs of my house. I’d like to do more at the peak price times than for quantity. I remember about 5 years ago when I was a host I could actually call AirBnb and they would give insight. Could someone help me by giving a head start on how that’s done now?
Thank you
Kraig
Now they have something called smart pricing that you can enable. There are mixed reviews on how smart it is, lol.
Yep so I’ve heard. So would I have to make a listing and just play around with a calendar for that?
Yes. It’s not hard or risky to make a listing and it’s the best way to re-learn the system.
Not “smart” for me. Adds ONE dollar for peak times, including two of the biggest holiday weekends in my town. Airbnb suggested smart pricing min. is around a third of what like properties in my area charge. Pick your own range and do your homework on peak times in your area and manually adjust pricing your calendar. I just learned (the hard way) how important it is to be proactive in this regard!
Someone here (@jaquo?) said you kind of have to train it? It’s gotten much better for me sometimes raising prices more than I would think to do. But that can be counterproductive because then I don’t get booked and they lower them too much. No program can know more about your market than you do.
Hotels will be on top of their game, track their rates.
exactly. I read the bit about training SP. Maybe it still works? Not sure. I don’t know how long it takes to train it either though, mine clearly is not trained, so I just try very hard to keep my eye on pricing as much as I can.
Yep – I am trying to do my own homework right here. 
Tracking hotels totally makes sense. Is there some way to see hotel peak rates vs not? I just kinda assumed in this day and age, there might be some sort of tool that shows peak pricing times for airbnb, hotels, or what not. I almost need to do it to see if the ROI is good and also figure out if i can get my Orlando license (yeah we need one now…) prior to the busy times. Only thing Ive seen so far is Mashvisor?
Thanks again for the help!
I did a quick search within a mile. Just one hotel at $119. It;s your average Quality Inn. How do you usually compete with hotels? Same price, lower?
I don’t directly compete with them, but if you see the rate spike to $200 you know it is a busy time period. That was your question I thought.
It was. Just wondering if there’s a tool or method to know when they usually spike without ‘stalking’ their prices
There are services that will do this…for a price of course. I don’t use any of them but they are out there.