Report: How tech is driving the professionalism of short-term rentals
Worldwide: Channel manager Rentals United, has published The Global Short-Term Rental Tech Report 2020, which explores how technology is driving the professionalism of short-term rentals.
The findings are based on the largest ever survey of short-term rental technology with 959 professionals in the short-term rental industry responding over a period of eight months.
As the vacation and short-term rental industry continues to mature and competition heightens, property managers are becoming increasingly driven to improve their use of technology and are adopting more and more software solutions to help them stay ahead of the game. It is now commonplace for professional property managers to automate certain operations, distribution, marketing, revenue management, guest communication and other tasks.
From the report, we learn that the four core areas in which property managers use additional tech are channel management [57 per cent], payment providers [51 per cent], accounting tools [40 per cent] and keyless entry solutions [33 per cent]. Emerging technologies use include 3D tours [17 per cent], chatbots [13 per cent], home automation solutions [12 per cent], noise control devices [nine per cent] and voice concierge services [three per cent].
It was also found that for larger property managers with more than 100 properties, 74 per cent surveyed use an external channel manager in conjunction with their PMS, which is often built ‘in-house’.
James Burrows, CEO of Rentals United, said: “Tech innovation is enabling the short-term rental industry to grow at pace. In the future, we will see more third-party providers – many of them VC-backed – entering the space, targeting enterprise property managers and solving their needs.
“The most successful business models will work like SaaS platforms and will fuel further investment and development in the industry,” he added.
The Global Short-term Rental Tech Report 2020 gives an analysis of the landscape of current and planned technology use of the professionalised short-term rental industry. The report can be downloaded for free here.
For more information, visit the Rentals United website here.
