Short term rental market research is the first thing I do now, before anything else. When someone asks me whether a certain neighborhood or a specific property is actually worth taking on, I used to answer mostly on instinct, whatever an agent said, whatever the general buzz about an area was. That is not a great way to decide, and it is not how I look at a new market anymore.
The mistake I see hosts make constantly
Looking at city-level numbers and treating them like they apply to one specific street. They rarely do. A city average can look great while the exact neighborhood in question is either far above it or quietly underperforming it, and you will not know which one until guests start booking, or not booking, on an already committed property.
What I Actually Check: My Short Term Rental Market Research Process
Three things, every time: occupancy rate for the specific neighborhood, average daily rate for comparable properties nearby, and how much that swings by season. I use AirDNA to pull all three before getting attached to anything, not after. It takes real numbers out of an agent’s mouth or a listing description and puts them in front of me directly, and it has talked me out of a property more than once, which is exactly what it is for.
Neighborhood beats city average every time
This is the part I wish more hosts checked before committing to anything. Two properties ten minutes apart can perform completely differently depending on walkability, parking, noise, and what is actually within driving distance. A citywide report smooths all of that out into one tidy number that will not tell you anything useful about that specific block. Pull the data at the smallest area you can get it for, not the biggest.
The other half of the decision is not data at all
Numbers get you most of the way there, but not all the way. I also think about what the property is actually like in person if I can see it, what the HOA or local short-term rental rules actually allow before getting attached to anything, and how far it is from properties I already manage. A property with slightly weaker numbers that is five minutes from the others is often the better move than one with better numbers that adds an hour to every turnover.
What I would tell anyone about to take one on
Pull real numbers before you get emotionally attached to a property, not after. It is a lot easier to walk away from something on paper than it is once you have already pictured yourself running it. None of this guarantees a good year, but it replaces guessing with something closer to knowing, and that alone saves people from several slow, avoidable months.
More on what I actually use to run 15 properties, including this one, is on my Tools I Actually Use page. Once the numbers check out, pricing is the next piece; see how I actually decide when to hold or cut rates.
Short term rental market research is not something I do once and forget about. Markets shift, and a neighborhood that worked two years ago is not guaranteed to work the same way next year. I revisit the numbers every time I am about to take on something new, and I would rather spend an afternoon pulling data than commit to a property I have not actually vetted. If you want to see the exact tool I use to pull that data, I lay it out on my Tools page.