Data is important when it comes to real estate investing, especially when investing in Airbnb and short term rental properties. Clients often ask us for the previous short term rental income on a subject Gulf Shores investment property, and rightfully so, they want to ensure that they are making a wise investment, and that the property has performed well in the past. It's historically been pretty difficult to get accurate Gulf Shores rental data from the local property management companies for a number of reasons:

1. Most of the big local rental companies do not utilize the major booking platforms like Airbnb, VRBO, etc. They rely solely on direct bookings through their respective websites. With over 150 million users on Airbnb alone, that's a lot of tourist traffic to miss out on. Due to the lack of advertising on today's most relevant booking platforms, their rental income numbers are typically significantly lower than they would be if the property had been posted on all the most up to date platforms.

2. Many of the local companies do not keep records on occupancy rate, or month over month data. It's very typical for them to only supply us with vague annual numbers, with no insight into seasonality or overall occupancy rate.

3. Most listings will not have monthly expense data to supplement the income numbers that are being shared. If you need a sample proforma to help with analyzing these Gulf Shores rental numbers, just shoot us an email! info@theshorttermshop.com

The above short term rental income data is a scrape from all properties listed on Airbnb and VRBO in 2019. Not sold on Gulf Shores? Check out our Panama City Beach rental data HERE

It's also always a great idea to drill down and look at the listings of your potential neighbors on Airbnb!

Short term rental income data provided by our friends at Airdna!