Airbnb co-hosting and STR management: fees, and how to choose

A co-host or a property management company takes 10% to 35% of your booking revenue, and Airbnb takes 15.5% on top. What separates a 12% deal from a 30% one is not the market, it is the list of jobs the fee covers. This guide breaks down what each service level does, what it costs in dollars, and the questions that keep you out of a bad agreement.

Airbnb formalized this market in October 2024, when it launched the Co-Host Network and hosting help stopped being a favor from a neighbor. It became a priced service. Rates, reviews, a payout split. Most of what you find on pricing is either a vendor's sales page or a Reddit thread from three years ago. Here is the version with the numbers in it.

What an Airbnb co-host actually does

A co-host is a person you add to your Airbnb account with permissions you choose, and the permissions decide everything else. They can message guests, manage the calendar, adjust pricing, handle a cancellation, reply to reviews. What they cannot do is change your payout method or delete the listing, unless you grant full access.

The work splits into two very different jobs. The fee follows the split.

A remote co-host handles the screen: messages, calendar, pricing, review replies, the occasional furious guest at 11 PM who cannot find the door code. They never set foot in the property. You keep the cleaner, the handyman and the linen.

A hands-on co-host handles the screen and the ground. Same list, plus scheduling turnovers, restocking consumables, meeting a locksmith, checking the hot tub after a bad review mentions it. This is the version most owners actually want, and it costs eight to ten points more.

Airbnb's own network sets a quality floor. The company said co-hosts on the network average a 4.86 guest rating against 4.62 for large property management companies. It also said 73% are Superhosts and 84% help manage a Guest Favorite listing. Those are Airbnb's numbers about Airbnb's own directory. Read them as a screening signal, not as proof that a co-host beats a company.

How much do Airbnb property managers charge?

There is no single answer, because the word manager covers five different jobs. Here is what each level charges in the United States in 2026.

Run your own numbers in the Airbnb co-host fee calculator. It shows the yearly fee, the Airbnb service fee on top, and what lands in your account.

Two things move that percentage far more than your market does.

The first is what the percentage applies to. Some agreements read the fee on nightly revenue. Some read it on the total the guest paid, cleaning fee included. A few read it on the payout after Airbnb has taken its cut. On $60,000 of annual bookings with a $150 cleaning fee and 60 turnovers, those three bases sit more than $1,800 apart at the same headline rate. Put the base in the contract.

The second is everything parked outside the percentage. Ask about the onboarding fee, usually $250 to $500 per listing. Ask about photography, the linen program, and whether vendor invoices carry a markup. Ask whether a monthly minimum bites in February, and what the notice period costs you if you want out in year two.

What a property management company includes that a co-host does not

A management company signs its own agreement, carries commercial insurance, employs or contracts a cleaning crew, and usually handles occupancy tax registration and remittance. Some list your property under their own Airbnb account. That detail matters more than owners expect, because the reviews then accrue to the company. Leave, and you leave without your review history.

A co-host working inside your account leaves the listing, the reviews and the Superhost progress with you. For an owner who might self-manage again one day, that difference is worth several points of fee.

Co-host, manager, or management company: which one are you hiring?

Sales calls use the three words interchangeably. They are not the same contract.

A co-host is an individual with account permissions and a payout split. Airbnb's help center describes co-host payouts as a percentage or a fixed amount per booking, set per listing, taken from the payout before it reaches you. It does not say whether the percentage reads before or after the service fee. That silence is exactly why the base belongs in writing.

A manager is a person doing the same job under a service contract, often for a handful of owners, sometimes as a sole proprietor with a cleaning crew on call.

A management company is an operation with staff, vendors, software and insurance, running anywhere from twenty units to several thousand. Vacasa, Evolve, AvantStay and Casago sit at the large end. The trade-off is consistency against attention. A company answers at 2 AM, and it will never know that your neighbor complains about the gate.

The Airbnb Co-Host Network, in numbers

Airbnb launched the Co-Host Network on October 16, 2024, with more than 10,000 co-hosts across ten countries, the United States included. Four months later its Q4 2024 shareholder letter reported nearly 100,000 listings on the network. Co-host count had reached roughly 15,000.

Airbnb has published nothing since. Any 2026 figure you see quoted for the network is unsourced until the company says otherwise, and several vendor blogs quote one anyway.

The network is a directory, not a price list. Airbnb introduces you to a vetted local host, and the rate, the scope and the exit terms stay yours to negotiate.

Short-term rental (STR) management beyond Airbnb

List on Vrbo or Booking.com as well, and the co-host permission model stops at the Airbnb account boundary. A co-host cannot see your Vrbo inbox.

STR management at that point means a property management system sitting above all three channels, with one calendar and one message thread. The fee starts buying software rather than hours. A 15% co-host and a 25% company are no longer comparable. Ask which platform they run, whether you get a login of your own, and what happens to the data the day you leave.

Multi-channel changes the tax picture too. Airbnb collects and remits occupancy tax in many jurisdictions, and Vrbo does not always match it in the same county. A manager who handles remittance is doing real work that a percentage on Airbnb-only revenue hides completely.

How to find an Airbnb property manager near me

Search demand for this intention is almost entirely local. People type "airbnb property management near me" rather than a city name, and Google answers with a map pack and Yelp. The good operators in your market are often invisible from a laptop three states away.

Four sources beat a search box.

1. The Co-Host Network filter inside your Airbnb account, which shows co-hosts working in your area with their rating and listing count.
2. Your cleaner. Cleaners work for every manager in town and know exactly which ones pay on time.
3. The local short-term rental owner association or Facebook group, where the complaints are specific and dated.
4. The listings around yours. Find three properties in your zip code that run well, open their reviews, and note which manager name keeps appearing.

Then get three quotes against the same written scope. Otherwise you are comparing three different jobs and calling it a price comparison.

Ten questions to ask before you sign

1. What exactly does the percentage apply to?
2. What is the onboarding fee, and what does it buy?
3. Who keeps the cleaning fee, and who pays the cleaner?
4. Is there a monthly minimum?
5. Do vendor invoices carry a markup, and what threshold needs my approval?
6. Whose Airbnb account holds the listing, and who keeps the reviews?
7. Who handles occupancy tax registration and remittance?
8. What is the notice period, and are there exit fees?
9. What insurance do you carry, and what does it not cover?
10. Can I see three months of a comparable property's statement, with that owner's permission?

How to become an Airbnb co-host

The path is shorter than the courses selling it suggest. You need a track record on Airbnb, a service scope you can deliver, and a rate.

Start with your own listing. Airbnb's network recruits from hosts with strong ratings, and the first thing a prospective owner checks is whether you have hosted at any scale yourself. Then pick a lane. Remote-only if you have no vehicle and no crew, hands-on if you have both.

Price the work, not the property. A $200-a-night studio and a $200-a-night cabin generate the same number of guest messages and a very different number of drives. Charge one flat percentage across both and the cabin subsidizes the studio, which you will resent by March.

Write the agreement before the first booking: scope, base of the percentage, cleaning fee handling, notice period, insurance. A co-host without a written agreement is a friend doing a favor. That is how the relationship ends.

Then standardize the guest side. Every property you take on should ship with the same digital guidebook, the same house rules and the same check-in instructions, all of which live in our free tools for hosts. Skip that and you answer the same four questions forever, across a portfolio that keeps growing. Hosts who scale past five units without a manager do it exactly this way, as we covered in managing five Airbnb apartments without a property manager.

What the deal is worth on both sides

For an owner, the honest comparison is not fee against zero. It is the fee against your own hours plus whatever revenue a professional adds. A manager who lifts occupancy six points and charges 20% can end up cheaper than a co-host at 12% who never touches the calendar.

For a co-host, the arithmetic is unforgiving at small scale. At 20% of a $3,000-a-month property, one unit pays $7,200 a year in fees. Take out software, insurance, mileage and the hours you actually spend, and a portfolio under six units is a side income rather than a business. Run both sides before you quote anyone.

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