Airbnb vs. VRBO Fees and What They Mean for Maine Property Owners

📊 How Airbnb Fees Work for Property Owners

Airbnb uses what it calls a split-fee model as its default pricing structure, and understanding how it works is essential for any Maine property owner thinking about listing their home. Under this model, hosts pay a service fee of approximately 3% on every booking. That fee is automatically deducted from your payout before the money ever hits your bank account. Meanwhile, guests pay a separate service fee that typically ranges from 13% to 16% of the booking subtotal, which covers Airbnb’s platform costs, customer support infrastructure, and payment processing.

For a concrete example, imagine you own a two-bedroom cottage near Old Orchard Beach and you set your nightly rate at $225 during peak summer. A guest books a five-night stay, creating a $1,125 subtotal. Under the split-fee model, you’d pay roughly $34 in host fees, bringing your payout down to about $1,091. The guest, on the other hand, would see the $1,125 nightly total plus a service fee of around $150 to $180 on top of that.

There’s also a second option called simplified pricing, sometimes referred to as the host-only fee model. Under this structure, you as the host absorb the entire service fee, which typically runs around 14% to 16%. The advantage here is that guests see a single, clean price with no surprise add-ons at checkout. This can boost your conversion rate because guests are more likely to complete a booking when the price they see is the price they pay. Many professional hosts and Everrow Property Management companies prefer the simplified model because it tends to generate more bookings and higher search placement within Airbnb’s algorithm.

💰 How VRBO Fees Work for Property Owners

VRBO takes a different approach to its fee structure, and the differences matter when you’re calculating your bottom line. The standard VRBO model charges hosts a commission of approximately 5% per booking. This is higher than Airbnb’s default 3% host fee, but the guest-facing fee is generally lower, which can influence booking behavior depending on your market.

VRBO also offers an annual subscription option for hosts who prefer predictable costs. Instead of paying a per-booking percentage, you pay a flat annual fee (historically around $499) and then keep 100% of your booking revenue minus payment processing fees of about 3%. For high-volume properties in popular Maine destinations, this subscription model can save you thousands per year compared to the percentage-based approach.

One thing that makes VRBO particularly interesting for Maine property owners is its audience composition. VRBO has historically attracted more family-oriented and group travelers who are looking for entire homes rather than shared spaces or single rooms. If you own a three-bedroom beach house in Old Orchard Beach, a lakefront property, or a ski condo at Sugarloaf or Sunday River, VRBO’s user base aligns well with the kind of guest who wants your type of property. These guests also tend to book longer stays and plan further in advance, which translates into more predictable revenue and fewer last-minute gaps in your calendar.

It’s also worth noting that VRBO is owned by Expedia Group, which means your listing can get additional exposure across the broader Expedia travel network. This matters for Maine properties because many out-of-state visitors plan their trips through travel aggregator sites, and having your property surface across multiple platforms without additional effort is a real advantage.

🏠 Side-by-Side Fee Comparison

When you line up the numbers, the Airbnb vs. VRBO fee comparison for hosts comes down to more than just the headline percentages. Here’s how the math plays out in a real-world Maine scenario.

Take a property that generates $60,000 in gross bookings per year. On Airbnb’s split-fee model at 3%, you’d pay roughly $1,800 in annual host fees. On VRBO’s standard 5% commission, you’d pay $3,000. That’s a $1,200 difference that favors Airbnb on the surface.

But the story doesn’t end there. Because VRBO charges guests a lower fee, your property may appear more competitively priced to guests comparing options across platforms. A listing that shows up at $225 per night on VRBO might show up at $225 plus $35 in guest fees on Airbnb, making the VRBO listing look cheaper from the guest’s perspective, even though your payout is slightly lower. This can affect your occupancy rate, and a few extra bookings per year easily close that $1,200 gap.

If you switch to Airbnb’s simplified pricing model to level the playing field on guest-facing prices, your host fee jumps to around 14-16%, which means you’d pay $8,400 to $9,600 on that same $60,000 in bookings. That’s significantly more than VRBO’s 5% or the annual subscription option.

The bottom line is that the “cheapest” platform depends entirely on your pricing strategy, your occupancy rate, and how price-sensitive your target guests are. Many of the most successful Maine property owners don’t choose one platform over the other. Instead, they list on both and let a professional manager optimize pricing independently for each channel. You can see our managed properties for examples of how dual-platform listing works in practice.

Fee Category	Airbnb (Split Fee)	Airbnb (Simplified)	VRBO
Host Fee	~3%	14–16%	5% per booking
Guest Fee	13–16%	None	6–12%
Annual Subscription Option	No	No	~$499/year
Cost on $60K Gross Revenue	~$1,800	~$8,400–9,600	~$3,000 (or $499 flat)

📋 Which Platform Puts More Money in Your Pocket?

The honest answer is that it depends on your specific property, location, and management approach. A waterfront condo in Portland’s Old Port that attracts weekend travelers and food tourists may perform better on Airbnb, where the platform’s brand is stronger with younger, urban-minded guests. A four-bedroom farmhouse on 10 acres near Bethel, positioned as a family retreat close to Sunday River, might see higher booking values and longer stays through VRBO.

What the data consistently shows, however, is that owners who list on both platforms earn more than those who choose just one. The incremental bookings from a second platform almost always outweigh the additional management complexity, especially when that complexity is handled by someone else.

The challenge with dual-platform listing is operational. You need to sync calendars in real time to avoid double-bookings, adjust pricing independently for each platform’s audience and fee structure, manage separate inboxes and guest communications, maintain consistent review scores across both platforms, and comply with each platform’s evolving policies and requirements. This is where professional management earns its fee. A good property manager handles all of this seamlessly, so you benefit from maximum exposure without the operational headache.

🔑 How a Property Manager Can Help You Navigate Platform Fees

A professional property management company doesn’t just list your property and wait for bookings to roll in. The best managers actively optimize your presence across every platform, and that includes fee strategy.

At Everrow Property, we manage short-term rentals across Portland, Old Orchard Beach, Sugarloaf, Sunday River, and other Maine markets. Our approach to platform fees is part of a broader revenue optimization strategy that includes dynamic pricing, listing optimization, professional photography, and guest experience management.

Here’s what that looks like in practice. We analyze each property’s performance data across platforms monthly, looking at conversion rates, average booking values, guest demographics, and net revenue after fees. Based on that analysis, we make platform-specific adjustments. If Airbnb’s simplified pricing model is generating more bookings for a particular property, we shift to it. If VRBO’s subscription model makes sense for a high-volume listing, we recommend that approach.

We also handle the day-to-day operational complexity of multi-platform management: real-time calendar syncing, separate communication workflows for each platform, platform-specific listing optimization, and compliance with each site’s evolving rules and requirements.

The result is that our property owners earn more in net revenue than they would managing either platform on their own, even after accounting for our management fee. For many owners, the increase in revenue more than covers the cost of professional management, meaning they earn more and do less.

If you’re curious about what your specific property could earn under professional management, have questions about platform fees, or want to understand how multi-platform listing could work for your Maine rental, check our frequently asked questions or reach out to talk with a local expert.

📌 Helpful Resources

• full-service vacation rental management
• see what your Maine property could earn
• browse our managed vacation rentals in Maine
• common questions about property management fees