Airbnb rentals are allegedly on the decline. Just how much is unclear — a viral Twitter thread this week showed nearly 50% in some cities — but investors don’t seem to be worried.
Nick Gerli, CEO of Reventure Consulting, pulled data from AllTheRooms, a short-term rental tracking site. It found that in cities like Austin and Phoenix, bookings were down nearly 50% in May 2023 from the same month in 2022 in terms of revenue per available listing (RevPAL}
The Airbnb collapse is real.
Revenues are down nearly 50% in cities like Phoenix and Austin.
Watch out for a wave of forced selling from Airbnb owners later this year in the areas hit hardest by the revenue collapse. pic.twitter.com/xjGkj7bFC5
— Nick Gerli (@nickgerli1) June 27, 2023
Airbnb pushed back, arguing that demand for short-term rentals has remained strong.
“The data is not consistent with our own data,” Airbnb spokesperson Sam Randall said. “As we said during our first-quarter earnings, more guests are traveling on Airbnb than ever before, with nights and experiences booked growing 19% in the first quarter of 2023 compared to a year ago.”
AirDNA, another outlet that tracks short term rentals, shows a decline of just single digits, according to according to a tweet by the site’s chief economist Jamie Lane.
Lane prefers the metric RevPAR, or revenue per available room, because it leaves out the dates when listings aren’t available to be booked. He expects RevPar to fall about 1% in the first half of 2023.
“We expect something similar in the back half, about 1%-2%, driven primarily by a decline in occupancy and slightly offset by higher rates,” Lane said.
Stock impact
Airbnb shares fell a modest 2% Thursday, the day after Gerli’s viral thread, but are up 2.5% to $128.19 on Friday afternoon.
So why aren’t investors worried? For one, Airbnb has previously issued guidance that gives shareholders a baseline of how the company will perform. The company 20% revenue growth in the first quarter and guided for 12% to 16% revenue growth in the second quarter.
The company also provides forward-looking booking reports, since many summer bookings come in during the first quarter. Gross bookings actually increased 19% that quarter to $20.4 billion, which is a bullish sign for the rest of the year.
Ultimately, RevPAL may be down significantly, but the underlying revenue numbers seem strong enough for investors, at least for now.
Contact Andrew Kessel at andrew.kessel@proactiveinvestors.com
Follow him on Twitter @andrew_kessel