Fees

Fees may prevent some travelers from booking your vacation rental. In fact, properties that only charge one fee experience a 30% higher conversion than properties with three fees.*  

Fees alone don’t prevent bookings. The total cost of fees compared to the nightly rate also matters to travelers. Properties with fees lower than, or equal to, the nightly rate see 50% higher conversions than properties with fees higher than their nightly rate.*  

To drive bookings, a good strategy is to charge minimal fees and keep them lower than your nightly rate. Read further to learn more about fees and fee-reduction strategies that can drive bookings. 

What are fees for vacation rentals?

Vacation rental fees are any extra charges beyond your nightly base rate and are often used to compensate vacation rental owners or property managers for additional services or amenities. You can choose two types of fees to charge for on our platform: standard fees and custom fees. 

Standard fees are the most common types of fees owners and property managers use and include extra guest fees, cleaning fees, and pet fees. Custom fees are any additional fees beyond standard fees.

How travelers view vacation rental fees

When you charge a fee on our platform, the fee is added to the total price at checkout. That means travelers don’t see any fees until they’re about to pay for their booking. From the traveler’s point of view, imagine the frustration of trying to calculate a stay at a vacation rental, only to have that total significantly increase at checkout due to fees.

When travelers experience this frustration, either from several fees or high fees that add up to more than the property’s nightly rate, they might abandon the booking process and look elsewhere.  

Be strategic when charging fees

We understand that some fees may be necessary for your business to compensate for extra services. To keep travelers ready to book, here are some ways to be strategic about vacation rental fees:

• Keep separate fees to a minimum. Because seeing a long list of fees in your final price quote can scare travelers off, avoid listing more than two to three fees.
• Roll standard fees into your base rate. Consider including fees in your advertised nightly base rate (as long as it doesn’t drive up your price outside of the range of your competition).
• Don’t charge any fees. Fees aren’t required. If you don’t want to charge fees, leave all fields for fees blank within your dashboard.

*January 2020 Vrbo Fees Analysis

Adjust fees

From your dashboard, visit your “Rates calendar", and select the “Rates Settings” icon, then select “Fees” from the dropdown menu.

Ready to restructure your fees to drive bookings? Here’s how to do it in the owner dashboard. 

1. Visit your “Rates calendar", and select the “Rates Settings” icon, then select “Fees” from the dropdown menu.
2. To update your standard fees, go to the “Standard fees” section, select your fee type from the drop-down menu, and enter a dollar amount into the “Amount” field. You have the option to make each fee taxable or not.
3. To update your custom fees, go to the “Custom fees” section and select the “Fee name” from the drop-down menu. Then select the “fee type” from the drop-down menu and enter a dollar amount into the “Amount” field. Select the “Taxable” checkbox if this fee should be included when calculating sales tax. To remove a custom fee, simply select the trash can icon to remove it.
4. To save your updated fees, select the “Save” button at the bottom of the page.

If you use software to manage your listings you should be able to review your fees and make updates within your software. The types of available fees and instructions for updating fees will vary by software. Contact your software provider if you need help making changes.

Adjust fees

From your dashboard, visit your “Rates calendar", and select the “Rates Settings” icon, then select “Fees” from the dropdown menu.