Startup claims it can help you earn up to 40% more from your housing rental by pricing it like a hotel

If you’ve ever tried to book a hotel room during a conference, concert, or other major event, you’ve probably been subjected to “dynamic pricing” — rates rise as demand dictates. The reverse is true as well: as the off-season approaches and things cool down, hotels will drop rates to the exact point that’ll encourage new bookings. It’s usually done automatically via online software, and now there’s a company that wants to bring that same system to homeowners who rent out their homes via websites like Airbnb.

Currently live in 60+ markets and 6,000 zip codes with nationwide availability coming shortly, PriceMethod claims it can generate up to 40% more revenue for home rentals. While the automatic pricing tool that helps hosts charge the right price for each night is the first offering from PriceMethod, other listing management tools are in the works. PriceMethod Co-Founder and CEO Andrew Kitchell told Road Warrior Voices:

“As peer-to-peer accommodations have gained popularity, more individuals have started building interesting businesses on top of Airbnb, HomeAway, Booking.com, etc. We think of these individuals as ‘peer-to-peer entrepreneurs’, and our goal is to build tools that help power these small and medium-sized businesses.”

One of the primary goals of PriceMethod is to enable hosts to manage their peer-to-peer listings as effectively as a hotel.

While there are other programs that offer similar functionality (PriceLabs and Smart Hosting for example), there are a few areas where PriceMethod really stands out. It works with Airbnb, Homeaway, and VRBO, whereas others are single-channel pricing tools only. It also shows big events within the pricing calendar, so hosts can easily see what’s driving demand spikes.

The platform allows hosts to price a single day, a singe event, or their entire calendar, all with one click, and the focus is clearly on the science of effective pricing.

Kitchell says:

"We are the only team in the space that has PhD data-scientists building machine learning models to offer accurate pricing. We've spent literally 80% of our company's funding on data science and machine learning."

Although Airbnb and similar peer-to-peer rental sites have run afoul of local authorities, most notably in San Francisco and New York, Kitchell points to the more measured. welcoming approach cities like Portland and Nashville have adopted.

"We believe that innovation trumps regulation. The growth of peer-to-peer accommodations is a massive innovation in the travel space, having unlocked the creativity of individual hosts and owners world-wide. In the short term, regulation will impact PriceMethod, as it will impact Airbnb, HomeAway, Booking.com, travelers, and local hosts & owners. In the long term, we believe that many cities will welcome peer-to-peer platforms, as these platform increase options for tourists and business travelers, and can contribute significantly to local economies."

With the potential to increase their take an extra 40%, we're sure hosts will welcome PriceMethod too, since they might just end up having to pay their renters to leave.