Published by Henri KESSELS, November 2023
Are you used to booking your accommodation on a platform like Airbnb, Booking or Homeaway ? Great. Like many people, you may be wondering how to avoid Airbnb fees, or how to avoid Homeaway service fees and pay the best price for your rental. By booking directly with the owners, you save an average of 18% on the price of your stay. Yes, as you might expect, the platforms are not free and the rental owners pass on the amount of the commissions they charge. And if this is not the case, you will have to pay "service fees". But the platforms lock down their system and it seems very complicated to get in touch with the rental companies of tourist accommodation outside of these platforms.
As the owners of a cottage in Lamentin Guadeloupe, Jaden Kréyol has chosen to set up a website with a booking engine. This allows us to offer Internet users an experience identical to a booking platform in the sense that they have availability and prices in real time as on a platform, secure payment, but at a much more attractive price for the traveler, and identical revenue for the rental company. This is also our contribution to better purchasing power!
These big behemoths such as Airbnb, Booking or Abritel / Expedia have become essential and it is quite normal that vacation rentals like us are present there, and that you use them as a traveler. It is also normal that they are paid for the service provided, but by being a little smart, it is possible to find rental companies directly and obtain your vacation rental at the best price, and avoid paying platform commissions.
By the way, note that a good part of the commissions that we pay to Airbnb (American) ends up in the coffers of our dear friends Google and Facebook (American). Did you know that Booking alone pays 6.5 billion dollars each year in purchases of keywords for "sponsored links" campaigns, in other words advertising? You have surely noticed that, whatever you search for as accommodation in the world on your search engine, the first results are always ads from the platforms, Booking in the lead. This explains that.
So I don't know what you think about it, but I prefer to keep my money to treat myself to some good little Creole restaurants or activities during my vacation in Guadeloupe rather than paying commissions to multinationals listed on the stock exchange, don't you?
Here we explain how to do it and it's very simple!
The trick is simple to pay less. Find the name of the accommodation in the platform ad, and type it into your favorite search engine. If the owner of the accommodation has his own website, you can generally find it in the first ten results, contact him directly or book directly on his site. If he does not have a website, it may have a Google MyBusiness file that will be displayed in the right-hand part or a section of the page with the first results of Google Search and which will indicate at least its contact details. Google Maps is also a way to find rental companies that are listed there. As simple as that!
It does not work every time, but it is worth trying to save 15% on a stay of €1000 or more. Do the math, it is rather well paid per minute!
It doesn't depend on the guest but on the host. Airbnb distinguishes between two statuses for hosts: individuals and professionals. Professionals are owners who have a declared status as a furnished accommodation rental provider, professional or not, which is actually a tax regime. Or, it can be a concierge service that manages several accommodations.
For private rental providers, Airbnb charges a fee of 3% to the owner, and 15% to the tenant. When the owner has Pro status, Airbnb passes the guest service fee on to him, which then becomes an 18% commission. The traveler no longer has to pay a service fee, but you can imagine that the owners pass this commission on to their rental price. In the end, it doesn't change much for the traveler who will simply see a clearer total price displayed.
Back to the blog articles