Airbnb and Vrbo fee calculator
What do Airbnb and Vrbo cost you, and would a direct site pay for itself?
Four numbers and one choice: what you pay the platforms in OTA fees, and whether a site of your own pays back. The answer can be no, and when it is, we say so.
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01How many listings?How big is the property?
HomeRunner is $0 a month at that size. Flat, never a percentage of your bookings.
02How many bookings a month come through Airbnb and Vrbo?
About $0 a year in Airbnb and Vrbo host fees.
Set from your listing count, one Airbnb or Vrbo booking per listing a month. Change it if yours differs.
Default is Airbnb’s single host fee, 15.5%, which Airbnb says is mandatory for hosts on property management software. Drag it down if most of your volume is Vrbo or you are still on the old split fee.
03Average booking value
$0 a year goes through Airbnb and Vrbo.
04How many of those guests would book on your site instead?
0 bookings a month move to your site.
Returning guests move. Randoms mostly don’t. Half is the middle of what managers tell us.
Out of every 100 guests who book on your site, how many come back within a year?
About 0 extra stays a year, worth about $0.
5 of 100 is the hotel benchmark (Bookboost, 2.2 million guests, 2024 to 2026): guests who booked direct came back at 5.1%, guests from the platforms at 1.3%. Each extra stay counts at your booking value, less card processing. A guest from Airbnb rarely comes back to you; a direct guest can.
05Do you need a site built?
Subscription only installs into the site you already run. The pre-built site is a one-time $2,000 from Hudson Creative Studio. Bespoke is quoted per project after a scoping call, from $5,500.
Worth it
Typical numbers for 15 listings
$0
kept a year, after HomeRunner and card fees
Where this year’s $0 in Airbnb and Vrbo fees goes
- Still paid to Airbnb and Vrbo
- Card processing on direct
- HomeRunner
- Kept
- Short
Fees today
$0
a year to the platforms
Break-even
0
direct bookings a month
Payback
Month 1
covers the subscription
Counts your HomeRunner tier and card processing at 2.9% + 30¢ on each direct booking, nothing else unless you switch on returning guests. No commission. Assumes today’s rate card and the same bookings every month for three years, with no growth. Your PMS and hosting are the same either way.
At three operators on HomeRunner, subscription fees ran under 2% to 4% of direct bookings, and Airbnb’s host fee measured 14.9% to 18.1% of booking value. See the case studies.
Own it or rent it
The same direct bookings for a year, priced on the builders that take a share.
HomeRunner is a flat subscription on your own website. The hosted builders bundle the site into the subscription and take a percentage of what you book through it; stop paying and the site goes with it.
HomeRunnerFlat, never a percentage. Your site, your domain.
Hostaway Booking Website Pro$49 a month plus 0.5% of direct bookings, on top of Hostaway. US guests pay a further 1.8%.
Guesty Advanced Website$49 a month plus 0.5% of direct volume, on top of Guesty and the gateway fee.
Hostfully Growth1% gateway plus 0.85% direct booking fee. Both waived on Pro, from $25 a property.
CraftedStays HostFlat per listing up to 20, no commission. The site lives on their platform.
Percentage rows use $0 a year booked through your site at your numbers. Hostaway and Guesty figures exclude their PMS subscriptions, which you pay either way.
What you own
The number leaves out the part that compounds.
Fees saved is the easy math. Owning the site is what changes the business.
Your domain, your site, your content
HomeRunner runs on your website. Cancel it and the website is still there; only the booking engine stops.
Your guest list
Names, emails and phone numbers land in your PMS, not in a platform inbox you can only message through.
Your prices and policies
Rates, minimum stays, cancellation terms and house rules are yours to set, with no platform rule in between.
No single point of failure
One guest complaint cannot take your own site offline. A platform listing can be suspended on one.
Search and AI visibility
Every page, review and guide builds on your domain and stays with it. That equity is yours, not a listing’s.
The repeat economics
A guest who booked you direct comes back direct. Switch on returning guests above to see what that is worth at your numbers.
See HomeRunner on your own site.
A short demo with your listings and your numbers, or start on the rate card and go live when you are ready. No fees until you are live.
Sources, read 11 October 2026
www.airbnb.com/help/article/1857 (read 2026-10-11: single fee “Most hosts pay 15.5%”; “mandatory for most hosts, including … hosts who use property management software”) · homerunner.io/#pricing (rate card: $45 up to 5 listings, $95 up to 15, $175 up to 25, $295 up to 50, $425 up to 100; Hospitality $295 up to 10 listings + 100 rooms, $495 up to 25 + 250; “A flat monthly fee, never a percentage of your bookings”; “No fees until you’re live”) · homerunner.io/experts/ (Hudson Creative Studio minimum budget $5,500) · stripe.com/pricing (2.9% + 30¢ per successful card charge, used as the processing assumption) · www.hostaway.com/features/direct-booking/ (read 2026-10-10: Booking Website Pro “$49/month, plus a 0.5% reservation fee”; “charges a 1.8% fee directly to guests (US only)”) · help.guesty.com/hc/en-gb/articles/9365607381149 (read 2026-10-10: Advanced Website “$49 + 0.5% (per website), direct gross booking volume per month”) · www.hostfully.com/pricing/property-management-software/ (read 2026-10-10: Growth plan “1% payment gateway fee … 0.85% direct booking fee”; Pro from $25 a property) · craftedstays.co/pricing (read 2026-10-10: Host plan “$89.99/mo for your first two properties, plus $8/mo for each additional property”, up to 20) · insights.ehotelier.com/suppliers/2026/09/09/direct-booking-guests-return-at-4x-the-rate-of-ota-guests-what-the-data-shows/ (read 2026-10-11: “A guest who books direct returns at 5.1%, while a guest who books through an OTA returns at just 1.3%”; Bookboost analysis of 2.2 million guests at European hotel groups, 2024 to 2026; hotel data, not vacation rental) · homerunner.io/terms-of-service/ (“Customer retains ownership of all property data, guest information, and content”) · homerunner.io/case-studies/ (read 2026-10-11 20:30 CT: “booked direct per $1 of subscription”; “channel cost, vs 18.1% on Airbnb”; “direct revenue in year one”; “host fee averaged 16% of booking value at the three operators with payout records”)