There are many reasons why travelers are booking a vacation rental over a hotel. Vacation rentals are more intimate, cheaper (with bigger groups), full of amenities hotel rooms don’t have (like kitchens and private backyards), and there’s a lot more privacy and space. Since vacation rentals have become a hot commodity post Covid-19, it’s fairly impossible to get a discount. But there’s an easy way to realistically get a discount on bookings on VRBO and Airbnb every time you book – and we’re talking 20 percent. It’s the greatest secret in getting a vacation rental discount without looking hard, and here’s how to get the Airbnb discount, as well as VRBO and other vacation rentals.
VRBO is a vacation rental booking site, like Airbnb, and both have millions of listing across the world. Like hotels and airfare, rates for vacation rentals have gone up, so they’re not as cheap as they were pre Covid-19, but there’s a cool little hack to get 20% off bookings every time you book. The only catch? The rental has to be a new listing.
Both VRBO and Airbnb gives its property owners to offer 20% off new listing discounts to renters. This is advantageous for both the property owner and the renter. A new listing discount helps the property owner get bookings and reviews earlier by improving visibility and trust with travelers. For renters, the new listing discount is 20% off your nightly rate, and it doesn’t include fees.
For both VRBO and Airbnb, a listing is eligible for the discount for the first 90 days it’s live or until the listing gets three bookings, whichever comes first.
For VRBO in particular, badges highlight that the listing is new and offers a special discount, and participating listings are eligible to be featured on the first page of search results. Travelers see the listing’s discounted rate when searching. It’s a really easy way to get a vacation rental discount as long as you’re open to staying in a new property.
Now, if you’re looking to realistically get 20% discount on a new Airbnb or Vrbo listing, here’s how it works.
I’m using VRBO as the example here below.
- Search the destination where you want to book a vacation rental. A list of properties will pop up.
2. Now, you can do this before, or you can do this after your search, but go in to “Filters” and scroll all the way down. You’ll see the tab for “New listing discount.”
3. Click the “New listing discount” filter.
4. Once you click the New listing discount tab, hit done, and the site will find all the new listings in the area that you search that are eligible for the new listing discount. As you can see below, Tree Top Hideaway came up in the Catskill Mountains where I searched.
5. When you click on the property, you’ll see it’s eligible as a property for the new listing discount at 20 percent off.
6. When you select the dates and request to book, you’ll be taken to the booking page. Here, you can see that the 20 percent off was honored, and it’s already taken out the total rate of the booking.
Depending on how much the rental is, you can save a lot of money, even hundreds of dollars — but you have to be quick. The ‘new listing discount’ is only honored for the first 3 bookings, or the first 90 days the listing is live. Considering that many people are booking vacation rentals now, especially over the summer months, you can expect bookings to go fast, and the 20% discount will not last. This really is how to get an Airbnb discount, and other vacation rentals.
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Jimmy Im has traveled to 113 countries, stayed in over 600 hotels and has flown a million airmiles. He lives in New York City.