In recent years, the vacation rental business has been booming. More and more owners are embarking on the adventure and are making their property furnished tourist accommodation. Anne-Claire Souty, director of our concierge YourHostHelper in Royan, takes stock and explains the reasons for such success.
This is the new Eldorado for owners: seasonal rentals continue to attract and each year, the most touristy towns welcome more and more furnished tourist accommodation. These accommodations are not rented by the year, but by the week, or even by the month: this is called seasonal rentals.
Seasonal rental, a system that benefits everyone
Intended for short-term rental, they have all the aspects of a normal accommodation, except for a different functioning. Over a month, they bring much more to their owner than would a dwelling rented for the year, with a long-term rental lease. “There are many advantages to seasonal rentals that year-round rentals do not have,” describes Anne-Claire Souty, director of the YourHostHelper agency in Royan. Taxation is more attractive, income is higher and housing deteriorates less quickly, minimizing maintenance costs. It is something not insignificant”.
For tenants too, seasonal rentals are a very interesting alternative to more traditional means of accommodation. Often less expensive than hotels, tourist accommodation also allows you to benefit from complete accommodation and to be dependent on no external factor. "It's a more economical means of accommodation," says Anne-Claire Souty of the agency Airbnb concierge service in Royan under the YourHostHelper brand, and which allows families and groups of friends to rent more spacious, friendly and practical accommodation to meet and spend holidays together. This tourism, which is more focused on discovery, is constantly developing, adds Anne-Claire Souty. The French want accommodation in which they will be able to be independent and isolate themselves, in rural areas and in the countryside, in the open air. »
Vacation Rental Traveler Trends for 2023
Several recent studies have identified tourism trends for the coming year. A first study conducted by the travel agency Tourlane suggests that in 2023, 68% of holidaymakers prefer to go to a tourist location located in nature. "The goal for tourists is to spend more time outdoors," says Anne-Claire Souty of the AirBNB concierge service in Royan. Most tourists also want to practice local tourism and take more time to discover their magnificent country. Family holidays are also among the most popular types of vacation, which was no longer the case a few years ago.
The advent of the Internet and new means of communication also justifies such an increase. Indeed, according to the Likibu.com site, around 30% of stays are booked at the last minute. This can be explained by several reasons: travelers generally wait until the last moment hoping to obtain a promotional offer, which is unfortunately incompatible with a summer of 2023 which will break records. Might as well book as soon as possible to avoid problems. As Anne-Claire Souty, director of the AirBNB agency in Royan, explains, “the current economic situation makes it difficult to have visibility in terms of availability, budget and therefore travel. We have a lot of last minute bookings with us, it happens often. »
Direct bookings with hosts also broke the ceiling in 2022. In fact, 70% of travelers booked their holidays directly with their future host. A spectacular increase given that this same rate was 30% in 2017, according to a study by the Coach Omnium site carried out in June 2022. Finally, according to the travel agency Tourlane, 38% of French people book by opting for booking conditions flexible, to compensate for any unforeseen events. “Travellers choose vacation rentals for different reasons,” argues Anne-Claire Souty. Most want access to a kitchen, others want more space and/or privacy. But these are not things you find in a hotel.
Vacation rental platforms hit the jackpot
The big winners of the explosion of this new form of tourism and seasonal rentals are obviously the sites that offer these accommodations. You must have heard of them: AirBNB, Abritel, Booking, Expedia… These platforms experienced phenomenal growth in the 2010s, which allowed them to become essential. These sites showed owners that their real estate could be rented out, entirely or not, to other individuals for short periods. Vacation homes have become much more accessible to tourists wanting to go on vacation but not to a hotel, helping to create a whole new market.
AirBNB, which has become the world number 1 in the field, displays impressive figures on its site: more than 6,6 million online ads in more than 100 cities around the world, for a total presence in more than 000 countries. In total, AirBNB hosts (over 220 million on the site) have earned a staggering total of $4 trillion. Hotel chains themselves are getting into the vacation rental space, like Marriott, which launched Homes & Villas by Marriott International in 180, and which had around 2019 properties when it went live. Today, the program includes more than 2 households worldwide.
On the Booking side, the website announced in 2022 that for the first time, a third of its turnover (31%) came from seasonal rental income. The rental platform is taking advantage of a very strong post-Covid recovery to increase its rental offers (gîtes, rentals, apartments) in its catalog and attract more and more travellers. The results don't lie and the success is there. Optimism is even in order, the CEO of Booking, Glenn Fogel, does not hesitate to say that “the vacation rental market will literally explode by 2030, with a probable quadrupling”.
The war of seasonal rental sites
Competition is now fierce between the various rental platforms which have understood how juicy the market is and each brags about the number of ads on their respective sites: Vrbo (subsidiary of Expedia) claims nearly 3 million advertisements, Airbnb claims 5,6 million and, recently, Booking announced, worldwide, that it had grouped together 6,4 million advertisements. The three main players in the sector are waging a war without mercy and as in any war, all shots are allowed. For their part, competitors of Booking dispute the figure of 6,4 million advertisements by asserting that they do not only include holiday rentals, but also guest houses, lodges, etc.
Seasonal rentals therefore remain at the heart of the challenges of the very large online travel platforms (and Google too, etc.). It must be said that this market is one of the most dynamic and attractive segments. The recovery initiated since the end of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis is enabling the entire sector to move forward and even exceed expectations. Online seasonal rentals still have many good years ahead of them and, as Anne-Claire Souty, from our Airbnb Royan Concierge, “it is difficult to know where the seasonal rental will stop, but it is even more so to know if it will stop one day. “Given the recent tourism figures for the year 2022 and unless there is a new cataclysm or very restrictive regulations, the fall in the seasonal rental business is not expected for tomorrow.
