Destinations are subject to varied demand. Business travellers and tourists alike will vary their travel according to trends, events, seasons and more. What’s more, the more reactive and flexible nature of short-term rental supply makes them even more prone to fluctuations in supply and demand. So, through the work of DMOs to attract visitors to their destinations, it is crucial that they have their finger on the pulse of capacity, demand, traveller origin and types to inform their actions. Transparent data provides that visibility, and here we demonstrate one aspect of our data insight – demand growth. Below we discuss the top short-term rental destinations in the United States, Europe and Latin America.
This is also key for investment, and for short-term rental property management companies to understand. Check out your destination’s growth below.
- Top demand destinations in the US
- Top demand destinations in Latin America
- Top demand destinations in Europe
These sections are previews of demand reports we have conducted. Below you will see the top 25 markets in each destination, while the reports reveal the top 50. You can review the full reports by clicking for the US, Latin America and Europe respectively.
Methodology
To consider demand, we have used the metric of booked nights. In each case, we have compared the number of nights booked in the first quarter this year against a benchmark. For the US and Latin America we have compared against Q1 of last year (2022), while for Europe we looked at Q1 this year against that of 2019.
This comparison gave us an absolute difference (how many nights were booked above or below the benchmark quarter), and a percentage difference (the % change in nights booked from the benchmark quarter). Relative (percentage) difference shows growth in terms of the starting point of the destination, and therefore tends to be a better indication in terms of contextual growth.
In Latin America we considered national markets, while for the US and Europe we are looking at ‘city’ markets. We removed any city-level markets with fewer than 100 short-term rentals, so as to only consider those relevant to the wider professional market. We then ranked remaining markets in each case by % growth in demand for the following sections. Note that the full reports linked above also give rankings in absolute growth, which can be important to contrast with supply changes.
Top short-term rental demand destinations in the US
For the first quarter of 2023, the city with the most increased demand over 2022 is Broken Bow in Oklahoma. Broken Bow has recorded a 263% growth in booked nights compared with 2022. El Paso, Texas has also recorded over 200% growth in demand (228%). In fact, the lowest of our top markets, Phoenix, AZ, has still grown 77% in demand in the last year.
An impressive majority of these top demand markets call Florida home: 12 of the 25 shown here are Floridian cities. Of the rest of the markets, Texas and Tennessee make the top 25 3 times each, Oklahoma and Montana twice. Each of the Carolinas and Arizona also have a market feature.
Top short-term rental demand destinations in Latin America
As above, in this section we consider the percentage change in booked nights over 2022. The difference here is that we are focussing on Latin America: and Latin American countries, rather than cities.
Fundamentally, all of the top 25 Latin American countries have experience positive growth over 2022. This is especially impressive as a continent where demand picked up early and strong following the pandemic. Barbados, ‘bottom’ of the top 25, still managed to attract 40% more booked nights than in Q1 2022. At the other end of the rankings, both the Dominican Republic and Venezuela have grown 160%. Interestingly, only 8 of the top 25 (plus the Dominican Republic and Haiti) are independent island destinations. Moreover, none feature in the top 13, leaving the bulk of demand growth to contiguous, continental nations.
Top short-term rental demand destinations in Europe
As mentioned above, in our final analysis, we consider the same percentage growth figures for markets with over 100 short-term rentals in Europe, this time against 2019. As such, we’d expect to see more drastic growth in these markets, and we aren’t disappointed.
5 of the top 25 markets are German, including Damp, which boasts the highest growth at a huge 485%. This is where context comes into play – absolute growth will be much lower than its lower counterparts, and supply may well have experienced a big delta. However, even the German market at the bottom of the group has experienced 103% growth over Q1 of 2019. Poland brings 3 markets to the table and our other top performing nation is Kazakhstan – ruled into our European data sets. Most featured countries are less established STR markets, while the greater supply nations of France, Italy show only 1 market a piece, and no cities from the UK, Spain and Portugal make the top 25. But what about the top 50?
Summary
Rankings can be recognition but also illuminating. Some context to your own market’s performance, or understanding of another’s can bring operational inspiration. Imagine you ran a campaign to attract Spanish travellers and saw a 15% bump in their visits. Now factor in that your neighbouring destinations registered 21% and 17% increases. That insight probably changes your view on the success of the campaign and your next steps.
Search the full reports for your market, or get in touch to learn more about data in your destination, including supply, pricing, revenue, competitive landscape and guests.
Europe report https://share.hsforms.com/1-zoQnCWgR4ejzeKXb41YgA3m62p
US https://share.hsforms.com/17xANhVsiReq3ZAKmemh9LQ3m62p
Latin America https://share.hsforms.com/1OL2Vr5gPT22EjBqJHXdpAA3m62p