AirDNA Review — Short-Term Rental Data
Location is everything when investing money in real estate and running a successful short-term rental business. We need accurate and up-to-date data and reports to identify the right city, neighborhood, and property and then set and change the rental prices continuously.
AirDNA has the most comprehensive data and analytics regarding the short-term rental market, at least data available to us, the general public. Their mission revolves around enabling hosts, investors, and businesses to excel in the vacation rental sector with the most precise tools. They keep tabs on the daily operations of over 10 million properties listed on platforms such as Airbnb and VRBO across 120,000 worldwide markets. Their data collection extends to a portfolio of 1 million properties through their partnerships. AirDNA was founded in 2015 and headquartered in Denver, Colorado.
How does AirDNA Work?
The way AirDNA works, you have to purchase access to a neighborhood, city, state, country, or entire globe. Once you have paid access to that location, you can drill down using different filters and generate different reports.
AirDNA Pricing
Pricing for AirDNA is custom based on the location, market size, and monthly vs. annual options. The costs below are as of July 2023.
- The cost for neighborhood subscriptions fluctuates between $9.95 and $39.95 every month.
- Most cities have monthly subscriptions falling between $19.95 and $99.95, albeit smaller cities and towns could be less expensive.
- The monthly rate for U.S. states is $300 or $500, based on the specific state.
- Monthly subscriptions for countries are priced at $300, $500, or $800, with a preponderance of countries falling into the $300 or $500 categories.
- A global subscription is priced at $599 for an annual commitment, while it goes up to $999 for a month-to-month arrangement.
Market Minder
AirDNA calls its suite of products Market Minder. Under Market Minder, they have several features and sub-features
- Research: overview, occupancy, rate, revenue
- Price: smart rates, pacing, seasonality
- Invest: Rentalizer, top properties, market comparison
1. Research
The research section of AirDNA gives overall data about a specific location (ex. city, zip code, state). In the examples in this article, I’m looking at data from Houston, Texas. It has three main sections:
- Overview page: Provides an overview of the market
- Occupancy page: occupancy rate of properties in that location with a number of filters to look at the most relevant data
- Rates page: daily rates based on properties on the market and filters
- Revenue page: revenue made by properties in a specific location and filters
1.1 Overview
Market Grade: gives the location you are looking at a grade by looking at rental demand, revenue growth, seasonality, regulation, and overall inevitability in that area.
Average Daily Rate: average booked nightly rate plus cleaning fees for all booked days over the past 12 months.
Occupancy Rate: the number of booked days divided by the total number of available days for rent over the last year. Properties with no reservations are excluded. It basically represents the median occupancy rate over the past year.
Revenue: Median monthly revenue (nightly rate plus cleaning fees) earned over the last 12 months, not including taxes, service fees, or additional guest fees. Keep in mind those additional guest fees can add up especially if you charge different prices per number of guests.
Active rentals: at least one reserved or available day in the last month
Rental Type: how the rentals in the market you are researching are divided between entire home, shared home, and shared rooms.
Rental Channel: Listing distribution between Airbnb and VRBO. It's not clear which other platforms VRBO gets its data from. For example, Google Vacation Rentals, Trip Advisor, Trivago, and a few others might not be represented in this data.
Rental Size: by number of bedrooms and possible guests
Rental Growth: growth in the number of new rental listings in the market
Top Property Managers: largest property managers in that location based on last month’s data
Amenities: offered most by the rental properties in that location
Airbnb Ratings: the aggregated rating of Airbnb listings in the location
Rental Activity: Segments active properties by the days they were available for rent and rented over the past year. AirDNA classifies full-time rentals as available for at least 181 days in the past year.
Rental Settings: Most common rental settings in properties in that area.
1.2 Occupancy
This section allows you to research occupancy rates in that location and use a healthy number of options.
1.3 Rate
This section provides more granular data on the rental prices in a location with the same set of filters.
1.4 Revenue
This section provides more granular data on monthly revenue in a location with the same set of filters
2. Price
The features in this section are particularly helpful for customizing the listing price. They are best used with a 3rd party pricing management tool like Wheelhouse or Pricelabs.
2.1 Smart Rates
This tool is made for Airbnb hosts who have one or more properties. It lets you link your Airbnb properties and shows you the best prices to charge per night for the upcoming weeks.
Changing your nightly price is very important. When it’s a slow time, dropping your price can bring in guests who wouldn’t book at your regular price. This way, you can still make money from Airbnb, even when not many people are renting. When it’s busy, you can raise your price without worrying about not having guests, so you make the most money from Airbnb.
2.2 Pacing
The pacing sub-section under the “Price” section, gives data on analyzing the price at a local area with additional filters for type of home, number of bedrooms, and number of guests it accommodates.
Future Demand Analysis: As the name implies, it shows a chart of future demand analysis including the number of booked listings and median booked price. This suggested price doesn’t include the cleaning fee.
Rate Analysis: provides data about available rate, booked rate, and booked year for the previous year.
Booking: A forward view of the number of booked listings by day based on when the property was booked. Shows when listings are being booked and how far out they are being booked for.
2.3 Seasonality
As the name implies, this part helps with identifying any seasonality patterns for the particular location you are researching. You can see the data below of Washington DC taken in July 2023.
3. Invest Features
Under the Invest group of features, AirDNA provides data to help with real estate investments.
- Rentaizer: Rent data on an address you enter
- Top Properties: Top properties in an area and how much they make
- Market Comparison: Compare a few parts of the markets (ex. zip codes or cities) with each other
3.1 Rentalizer
Under the Invest group of features, AirDNA provides data to help with real estate investments.
- Potential Revenue: see what any address could earn as a short-term rental, average daily rate, and occupancy rate
- Seasonal Revenue Forecast: Different locations have different seasonal pricing and it is nice to see a time-chart of that.
- Top-Performing Properties in the market that compare to the property you’re considering investment in
- Market Comparison: compare multiple markets (ex. zip codes or cities) among the markets that you have access to
To test the featyre I used a houst address on Zillow that was for sale at the time of writing this article.
I put the address in AirDNA and I got the following reports. You have to have access to the market to get the full data.
3.2 Top Properties
The Top Properties section shows the top properties in a specific location. In the screenshot below I’m filtering for “Entire Home”, “2 bedroom”, and accommodating “2 to 6 guests”. That's similar to the property we manage which is also listed in the list of top properties.
The revenue estimate that it shares is fairly accurate. I was a bit confused by the number of reviews shown in yellow oval shapes. They feel too low to be having the estimated revenue. AirDNA calculates this data from the last 12-month performance based on actual availability. Presumably, some of these top properties were available only a few days at above-average prices. Then AirDNA extrapolates based on that and estimates how much revenue the listing would generate in a year if it was available all year round. I’m assuming that.
3.3 Market Comparison
Market comparison helps you compare potential revenue from different markets that you have access to.
The chart below compares a few different zip codes inside Washington DC
The chart below compares Houston with Washington DC
Summary
AirDNA, headquartered in Denver, Colorado, provides comprehensive data and analytics for the short-term rental market, tracking more than 10 million properties listed on platforms such as Airbnb and VRBO across 120,000 global markets. The platform’s mission is to empower hosts, investors, and businesses in the vacation rental sector with precise tools, offering daily insights into property operations and additional data from their portfolio of 1 million properties gained through partnerships.
Access to AirDNA’s data, which is tailored to specific locations, is purchased and then drilled down using various filters to generate different reports. The pricing for AirDNA is based on location, market size, and subscription length, with options ranging from neighborhood subscriptions to global access.
The platform’s suite of products is known as Market Minder, offering features and sub-features in three categories: Research, Price, and Invest.
The Research section provides a wide range of data, including overall data about a specific location, occupancy rates, daily rates based on properties on the market, and revenue made by properties.
The Price section helps hosts customize their listing prices, offering tools to adjust prices according to demand dynamically.
The Invest category is targeted at real estate investors, providing data on potential revenue, top-performing properties, and comparisons of different markets.
