How do you set the best price for your Airbnb? Should you do it yourself or should you invest in an Airbnb pricing tool?
When it comes to your short-term rental business, pricing is one of the most important decisions you’ll make. In fact, according to Hermann Simon, a 5% increase in price can boost your profits by 50%.
But, there’s a catch.
When you increase your price, you’re going to lose some bookings. You have to make sure your expected increase in profits accounts for the loss in bookings. After all, you wouldn’t want to charge such a high price that no one books.
For many hosts, setting prices can be very difficult and time-consuming. It requires a lot of math and data to calculate the best price. Fortunately, there are several automated pricing tools that help hosts set ideal Airbnb prices.
In this article, we’ll compare two popular choices: Wheelhouse and Beyond.
Why Manual Price Setting Isn’t Ideal
In any industry, prices fluctuate depending on market conditions. This is especially true for short-term rentals because of seasonality and other factors.
Problem 1: Calculating the Price
As a host, you’re going to have to know how profitable your business is. This means determining your costs, predicting demand, and identifying what price to set.
Calculating these numbers is not only difficult but also extremely time-consuming. It can be confusing knowing what numbers to use. A small miscalculation can lead to a bad price that will hurt you in the long-run.
Problem 2: Charging the Same Price
If you charge the same price every day, you’ll be leaving a lot of money on the table.
Maybe you were fully booked, but your guests were all willing to pay a higher price. Or maybe your price was too high and only a few people booked.
Problem 3: Running Multiple Properties
For hosts with a single Airbnb, they may want to manually calculate their pricing. But what if you have multiple properties? Determining pricing for each property can take hours of unnecessary work every day.
What Makes a Good Airbnb Pricing Tool
There are a lot of Airbnb tools out there. How do you know which one to use?
A good Airbnb pricing tool considers factors such as:
- Seasonality
- Flight demand
- Competitor prices and occupancy
- Hotel prices and availability
- Your amenities and listing quality
These automated pricing tools update your pricing every 24 hours, so you’ll always have the right price.
Wheelhouse vs. Beyond
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Why Choose Wheelhouse
Wheelhouse is known for its emphasis on personalization. From the very start, you’re asked if you want a “conservative”, “recommended”, or “aggressive” approach to pricing. Their algorithm not only takes into account local market conditions but also your rental goals.
Current users typically see their revenues increase by 10% to 40%. But with Wheelhouse, you don’t have to pay anything if you don’t make any more money using it.
Another benefit of Wheelhouse is that its pricing recommendations are highly transparent. They provide detailed insights for every recommendation, so you know why prices are changing.
Wheelhouse pricing is highly customizable, as there are 10+ pricing adjustments you can make. You can adjust for seasonality, last-minute reservations, weekend bookings, and so much more.
Many users often rave about how user-friendly the platform is. Wheelhouse provides numerous charts to show how you’re performing over different criteria. These graphics make understanding your listing effortless.
You can connect listings from Airbnb, VRBO, HomeAway, and Trip Advisor.
If you have multiple listings, Wheelhouse makes it super easy to search for a particular property. You can filter listings by status, channel, market, bedrooms, and pricing.
But, a downside of Wheelhouse is that it’s only available in around 577 cities, with most based in the US.
If you’re interested in trying out Wheelhouse, GPFYP readers get their first 10 bookings free if you sign up now.
Related Post: My detailed review of Wheelhouse
Why Choose Beyond
Beyond has something unique: the Health Score. This score tells you how well your listing is doing by looking at how fast you’re getting bookings.
If your Airbnb listing is booking up too quickly, then your prices are probably too low. But, if you’re not getting enough bookings fast enough, then your prices are probably too high.
Beyond takes all this into account when giving pricing recommendations.
Like Wheelhouse, Beyond also breaks down its pricing recommendations, so you know why prices go up or down on certain days.
Beyond allows you to customize your pricing. You can set minimum and maximum prices and customize minimum stay prices and last minute discounts. This can all be done on a seasonal basis as well.
By default, Beyond has 25% and 10% discounts for reservations booked 3 days and 7 days before the stay, respectively. You can adjust these as needed. You don’t have to worry about setting too high of a discount because your price will never go below your minimum.
Unlike most other competitors, Beyond is one of the only solutions built by a team that has pricing experience. Their CEO comes from hotel revenue management, so this may indicate a stronger team background.
Compared to Wheelhouse, Beyond is more global. It’s available in over 7,500 cities.
Related post: Read my detailed review of Beyond
Conclusion: Wheelhouse vs. Beyond
At the end of the day, what the better pricing tool is will depend on your needs and hosting style. Wheelhouse is better at providing you with personalized insights and customizable control. Beyond leverages its unique Health Score to provide recommendations.
Both Wheelhouse and Beyond charge 1% of your total revenues, with Wheelhouse offering a 0.25% discount if you have 10+ properties.
