This article is reprinted by permission from NerdWallet. Despite what some travelers might think, booking a hotel in advance usually isn’t a good idea. The savings aren’t huge, but booking at the last minute knocks about 13% off the price of a hotel room, on average. But what about short-term vacation rentals like Airbnb?
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NerdWallet looked at real-world booking data for hundreds of Airbnb properties, comparing cleaning fees, long-term discounts and the cost when booking in advance versus short term. This data provides a snapshot of when it was collected in June 2022 and suggests that Airbnbs — unlike hotels — are usually cheaper when booked in advance.The best time to book an Airbnb We looked at Airbnb rentals in 10 cities across the United States, comparing prices across three booking time frames:
Three days in advance.
Four weeks in advance.
Forty-seven weeks in advance (almost one year).
We found that booking four weeks in advance yielded the lowest median price.
For this analysis, we only included properties with availability across all time frames. This means the same properties were lowering their prices about a month out compared to last-minute bookings or those made well in advance. The savings weren’t huge, but they were consistent. Further, we found that most (84%) of these properties used “dynamic” pricing, with rates varying by demand.
This means that most hosts adjust prices based on availability and other trends. As a guest, this means that you should never consider the “price” of a property to be static. It’s liable to rise and fall over time, just like an airplane ticket. Plus: 12 ways to adjust your vacation for inflationSo, is booking an Airbnb last minute cheaper? We recommend a middle path: Booking neither many months in advance nor a few days before check-in, but somewhere in between. This offers the lowest typical rates, according to our data. Keep in mind that this rule of thumb won’t apply in every situation. We took this snapshot during summer 2022, when travel demand was particularly frenzied. This may have driven up the prices for late bookings as renters found themselves in a kind of “seller’s market.” Based on the laws of supply and demand, travelers should expect to see more last-minute deals during low travel seasons and fewer during peak seasons. Many other factors affect dynamic pricing. According to vacation rental software company iGMS, hosts consider many variables when setting prices, including:
Seasonality.
Supply and demand.
Day of the week.
Amenities.
Number and quality of reviews.
So the booking time frame is one factor to consider, but it shouldn’t make or break a travel budget. Also see: Here’s the No. 1 complaint against U …