Article for owners
Airbnb co-host or full management: which suits you?
Airbnb lets you invite a co-host to help run your listing. For some owners that's all they need. This guide covers what a co-host can do, how they're paid, and how that compares with handing your home to a full management company.
What an Airbnb co-host is
A co-host is someone you invite onto your Airbnb listing to help you run it: a friend, a neighbour or a local professional. You stay the listing owner. The account, the listing and its reviews are yours, and you decide what each co-host can see and do.
You can invite up to 10 co-hosts to each listing.
What a co-host can do
Airbnb has three levels of access, and you choose one for each co-host.
Airbnb's co-host access levels
- Full access
- Messages guests, runs the calendar, the listing and its prices, accepts or declines booking requests, handles cancellations and changes, writes guest reviews and can see payouts.
- Calendar and messaging
- Messages guests and can see the calendar, but can't change it or accept booking requests.
- Calendar only
- Can see the calendar, but can't change it.
Whatever the level, only you as the listing owner can set up or change a co-host's pay, and a co-host can't see your payout or tax details.
How a co-host is paid
Airbnb can split each booking's payout between you and your co-host. You choose how the co-host's share is worked out:
- The cleaning fee
- The cleaning fee plus a percentage of each booking
- A percentage of each booking
- A fixed amount per booking
You propose the split and the co-host has 14 days to confirm it. It then applies to bookings that start after they confirm. Their share comes out of your earnings after Airbnb's host service fee: the co-host is paid first, and you get the rest.
The split only covers stays booked on Airbnb. And your tax document from Airbnb still shows the full booking amount, so tell your accountant what you paid your co-host.
How much does a co-host charge?
Airbnb doesn't set a rate. You and the co-host agree a price, often a percentage or a fixed amount per booking. What the price covers varies as much as the price, so ask whether it includes cleaning, linen, restocking and repairs, and who pays for each.
Airbnb's Co-Host Network
In the UK and some other countries, Airbnb helps you find a local co-host through its Co-Host Network. You search by your home's location, read profiles and guest ratings, and message as many co-hosts as you like before inviting one.
To join, a co-host must
- Have hosted at least 10 stays, or 3 stays adding up to 100 nights or more, in the past 12 months
- Have an average guest rating of 4.8 or more
- Cancel fewer than 3% of bookings
- Have their identity verified
Airbnb is open about what those checks don't cover. The ratings shown are guests' reviews of listings, which may not reflect the co-host's own work, and the co-host must hold any permits, licences and insurance they need, so check those yourself.
When a co-host suits you
A co-host can be enough if
- You already host on Airbnb, enjoy it, and want help with the parts you can't do
- You live near the home, or have one trusted person who does
- You're happy taking bookings from Airbnb alone
- You want to stay the host, with your own account and your name on it
Where co-hosting runs out
A co-host works inside your Airbnb listing. That keeps things simple, but it also sets the limits.
- Airbnb only splits payouts for stays booked on Airbnb, so bookings from Booking.com, Vrbo, Expedia, Google or a corporate portal aren't covered
- A co-host may be one person working alone, so ask who covers their holidays and sick days
- You still own the listing, so safety certificates, insurance and the rules for your area stay with you unless you agree otherwise
- Every arrangement is different, so cleaning, linen and repairs need agreeing one by one
What full management does instead
With full management, a company runs the whole let for you, on every booking site, and answers for all of it. Here's how the two compare.
With an Airbnb co-host
- Booking sites
- Your Airbnb listing
- Who runs it
- The people you invite, at the access level you choose
- Cleaning and linen
- Agreed between you
- Certificates and local rules
- Yours to keep up, unless you agree otherwise
- How you're paid
- Airbnb splits each payout: the co-host's share first, then yours
- Cost
- Whatever you agree, per booking
With full management from HOMEHOSTS
- Booking sites
- Airbnb, Booking.com, Vrbo, Expedia and Google, plus corporate booking portals a single landlord can't join
- Who runs it
- Our team, with guests answered early till late, seven days a week
- Cleaning and linen
- Our vetted local cleaners after every stay, checked and photographed, with linen hired from a professional linen company
- Certificates and local rules
- We track your certificates and arrange renewals, and check your area's rules before you sign
- How you're paid
- One statement for every booking site, itemising every booking, cost and our fee, paid by the 15th of the following month
- Cost
- From 15% of booking income, and at least £100 a month
Every guest is ID-checked and every booking has damage protection in place before the guest arrives. You see every booking in your online owner account, and you can block dates whenever you want to use the home yourself.
Already on Airbnb? If your listing is a strong one, we keep it and its reviews, and we take over the bookings already in your calendar.
How our management works
What we do for owners, from photography and pricing to guests, cleaning and your monthly statement.
Like a letting agent, but for short lets
HOMEHOSTS isn't guaranteed rent or rent-to-rent. We manage your home for you, and our fee is a share of what it earns, so we do well only when it's well booked.
The honest downsides of full management
- There's a fee, and it's at least £100 even in a quiet month
- Your first agreement runs for 3 months or more, and after that you give 3 months' notice to end it
- You hand over the day-to-day, so you're less hands-on than with a co-host
Run the numbers yourself
Our holiday let calculator takes your own nightly rate, occupancy, cleaning and bills, less the booking sites' fees, and shows your profit and the occupancy you need to break even.
The bottom line
If you enjoy hosting, live close by and only want Airbnb, a good co-host can be enough. If you'd rather your home was on every major booking site, run by a team, with guests checked and the cleaning, linen, certificates and statements taken care of, full management does far more for you.
Ask for a free valuation: we'll show you what your home could earn with full management, set against a standard rental (AST), with no obligation.
Find out what your property could earn
Send us the postcode and a few details. We’ll call you with figures we can stand behind, and no pressure either way.