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I have been looking into listing our place on other similar sites to Airbnb, our place is in Los Angeles and we are getting good feedback and bookings but I have some two and three day spots in between visits that we would like to fill.
Does anyone list on other sites and how do you sort your calendar out to make sure you don’t get double booked? Also is it easy to co-ordinate and look after both sites?
Can anyone recommend any sites to use or any to avoid?
Like many people, I use Hideaway/VRBO to fill in, though 95% of my bookings come from AirBnB. I dropped Flip Key and Bookings quickly after starting; didn’t think their clientele fit my place. I manually update both calendars, though you can get them to interact with each others.
I’ve been hosting on Airbnb since 4 years and I’m quite happy with the services provided by Airbnb. However, I’m also renting on other vacation rental sites to maximize number of bookings and profit as it’s sometimes hard to get enough guests from Airbnb. Furthermore, I have the feeling there is less competition on the other vacation rental websites I’m using (less hosts). I’ve never experienced double bookings due to the genious Airbnb ICAL tool (you can export the Airbnb calender to other websites and the other way around - and they sync instantly once you get a booking).
The sites I’m using are:
Flipkey by Tripadvisor.
Recommended site. I’m getting a lot of guests from this site, probably because of the strong Tripadvisor brand name. Also, these guests tend to pay really well.
Roomorama.
Im using Roomorama and Wimdu to attract more European guests.
Homestay.
I recently signed up with this site. I’m not sure if I will get many guests from it, but it looks like an interesting site.
I’m also using other sites such as Hotelscombined and Holidaylettings. I’ve made a complete list of Airbnb alternatives I’m using here.
A vacation rental site I would avoid is 9flats. Their customer service sucks. I also tried to advertise on booking.com for a short period, but it was just too much work as it was impossible to integrate the booking.com calendar with Airbnb and the other vacation rental sites I’m using.
I also use Wimdu. Still 90% or so of my guests come to me through air, but I’m eager to establish my reputation on alternative sites; I don’t don’t want all of my eggs in one basket.
My Wimdu guests, so far, have been excellent; I wish I had more of them coming!
But it is super tricky keeping up with both calendars!
