Airbnb Tips and Tricks: Double Airbnb Income With Occupancy. FREE! No Fancy Pricing Tools Required

Airbnb Tips and Tricks: Double Airbnb Income With Occupancy. FREE!

1. Establish trust with quickly getting many 5 Star reviews.
2. Exceeding guest expectations.
3. Setting deal-making rates

Our goal is, obviously, to make proper money with Airbnb.

But how do you make more money with Airbnb?

We focus on maximising occupancy.

How do we maximise occupancy?

We offer guests the perfect deal. A deal they cannot ignore. Even with no reviews.

You do this by finding that ideal sweet spot with competitive rates.

BTW: My opinion is that any pricing tool, or Airbnb price suggest is pretty useless.

A good and simple judge is to consider occupancy: If occupancy is low, guests are finding better deals elsewhere. If occupancy increases quickly, be careful. But don’t increase rates. Yes, And I am not mad. Or not yet.

Remember, you are trying to get many excellent reviews quickly.

Keep going.

You will be surprised.

As an example. You investigated and your ideal competitive or deal-making rates should be fair at about 1000 bucks a day. You checked and 130 000 bucks per year are conservative. Even for long term rentals. Don’t worry. In my follow up articles, I’ll dive deeper into how to estimate competitive rates.

To get to 130000 bucks per year at 1000 per day means 130 days booked. Or 36% occupancy. Not bad. Remember 36% is double what Average Joe Airbnb does. See previous articles for the research (here).

Okay. You have set your deal-making best rates.

1. You are getting regular bookings. Excellent.
2. Guests go wow.
3. Many 5 star reviews are piling up. Great.
4. Occupancy is high!

At this stage, many hosts will increase rates. But why? Why?

I am not saying you shouldn’t.

But wait…

The research I shared on 6 million bookings, indicated 80% occupancy at 250 reviews. Before we run let’s learn to walk. You want consistent high occupancy with many reviews. I would never start increasing rates just because I am getting many bookings.

Sorry. You are no rock star yet. You will be. But be patient. You’ll still make great money. While you are establishing a foundation of Trust.

Now what do you do?

You do nothing. Let them arrive. Let them go wow.

Have a good look at this table. Three columns, three rows. The first row is the rate per day. It will stay 1000 bucks per day. The second row is annual income. The third row is occupancy at 130 nights over a year is 36%. At the deal making competitive 1000 bucks per day, the many bookings, and the mountain of reviews piling up. You can exceed 36% occupancy. You may say this 1000 bucks example is way too much or way too little for me.

Yes. This is only an example and your competitive rates will differ.

Subscribe below to get next week’s update on setting competitive rates.

The bookings keep rolling in. You calculate and you forecast doing at least 51% occupancy for the year.

Have a look at this table again.

We have not changed the deal-making rates. It’s still 1000 bucks per day. See the green 185000 at 51% occupancy. The 130 000 goal is past tense. Now things are creeping to 200 000 for the year.

1. Let the momentum increase.
2. More Trust.
3. And guest reviews are selling your amazing offer.
4. Airbnb loves you for the money you make them.
5. They promote you to their first page.

But I said you can double your Airbnb income without increasing your rates.

Well yes. Look at this table.

The same 1000 bucks. No rate increases.

But due to all the good things you have done, and are still doing you have doubled your income at 71% occupancy.

It’s no coincidence, is it?

The LearnAirbnb research showed 80% occupancy is achieved consistently at about 250 reviews. Get the research paper here.

I am not telling this to impress you. No. I am not being paid to share our so-called secrets. We have done, are successful with it, and will continue to do it.

There is nothing more satisfying than seeing a unique plan works. And it’s simple.

Airbnb Tips and Tricks: Pricing Strategy Actions:

1. You must experiment for yourself, but be careful not to lose on the momentum.
2. Never get greedy. Leave that for guests. Focusing on high rates is for tail chasing Average Airbnb Joe.
3. When you get to 60 % occupancy, increase your prices slightly. This may slow bookings down, but maybe it won’t….?

Remember the 3 crucial occupancy drivers you must have in place.

But before I get there……

Next week I will start unpacking how to find and set competitive rates.

Have you subscribed yet? Subscribe below.

Any questions? Use #AskCapeHolidays in the comments. I will respond.

Now you have seen how occupancy can drive your money-making efforts.

Focus on these 3 most important the occupancy drivers

1. Set deal-making competitive rates.
2. Adjust down if no bookings. Only when you hit very many reviews at very high occupancy increase rates.
3. Continue surprising guests with remarkable experiences. Asking for and getting many high scoring reviews quickly.

Have fun

Johan Horak

Earn trust, earn trust, earn trust. Then you can worry about the rest. Seth Godin

Have fun 

Johan Horak Agency.CapeHolidays.Info

Airbnb Management Agency with offices Beautiful Cape Town