Airbnb No Longer Wants to Be Just Airbnb: What Should Hosts Do? (Part 1)

Visit the Snowball Rentals website 👉🏻 snowballrentals.com

Things are changing! Today, let’s look at Airbnb’s brand-new Summer 2025 upgrade. This time, Airbnb does not want to be just an accommodation platform: it is expanding so you can also book services and unforgettable experiences!

We will cover this in three installments. In Part 1, we introduce the highlights of Airbnb’s new product launch.

In Part 2, we explore the underlying logic and reasons behind these major changes.

In Part 3, we discuss their potential impact and how hosts should respond.

After watching Airbnb CEO Brian’s 50-minute product launch, we have condensed the new features into three highlights! 1. One-stop local services (Airbnb Services)

You can now book more than accommodation through Airbnb: you can book professional services delivered to your home!

Hosting a dinner? Book a private chef or bartender to come to your home.

Want beautiful travel photos? Professional photographers are ready to help.

You can even book fitness instructors and manicurists—available immediately in 260 cities worldwide.

The key breakthrough: you do not need to book accommodation to book these services. You can have them come to your own home!

2. Deeply local experiences (Airbnb Experiences)

Say goodbye to checklist tourism! Airbnb partners with local experts to design unique local experiences:

For example, you can book a museum tour with a guide on Airbnb, or take a hot yoga class. There are even unique Airbnb Originals, such as:

Explore the restoration site with an architect of Notre-Dame in Paris;

Learn to make ramen with a three-Michelin-star chef in Tokyo;

Even learn a few moves from a professional Mexican wrestler and take photos together inside the wrestling cage!

These experiences are available only on Airbnb—exclusive to this platform! 3. Connect travel, services and experiences with social features

The most disruptive feature of this redesign turns Airbnb into a social platform. For example, people attending an activity or service together will automatically get a group chat and a shared photo album. You can see which cities the other participants come from and what they have done previously.

There is also a new “Connections” section on your personal profile.

Open it to keep a record of every friend you meet through services and experiences.

You can also open their profiles to see where they have traveled and which experiences they have enjoyed.

So, beyond booking a service because you need it, you might eventually book one to meet more people of the opposite sex.

Quite a development!

That sums up Airbnb’s major Summer 2025 redesign. Hosts may be wondering: what exactly is Airbnb trying to do, and what is the underlying logic behind these changes? We will explain in the next issue!

If you have questions, join our WeChat group to share experiences and support one another with others operating short-term rentals!

Snowball Rentals’ booking website, booking.stayoo.com, recently officially launched, offering a booking experience that can hold its own against Airbnb! Don’t believe it? Try it yourself. 👇🏻

If you:

Hope to increase rental income through short-term rentals;

Cannot spare a great deal of time to handle the small details;

Occasionally need to use the home yourself, making it unsuitable to empty out the furniture for a long-term rental;

Then:

Snowball Rentals’ management team is your best choice.

From pre-launch vacation-rental styling, big-data analysis and online marketing to tenant screening, dynamic pricing, customer service and sales, cleaning and repairs, Snowball Rentals provides everything as one complete service for your home.

This Week’s Booking Results

Through long-standing relationships with insurers, assignment companies and technology companies, Snowball Rentals rents homes for medium- and long-term durations at short-term rates, then gives owners a rebate of 5% in management fees to maximize their income.

April is here, cherry blossoms are beginning to bloom, and Seattle’s short-term rental slow season is finally coming to an end!

Short-term rentals in peak season; mid-term rentals in low season.

Looking back at earlier large bookings, this strategy has achieved some results, allowing us to retain confidence even in a cold winter!

Although peak season has arrived, we still cannot let our guard down. Policies and broader conditions are full of changes and challenges. Making steady progress will remain the main theme going forward.

For the detached house in Seattle below, Redfin shows an estimated long-term monthly rent of approximately $3564.

With the owner’s trust and support, we carefully furnished the home and immediately began short-term rental operations. Fortunately, because the home’s condition and location are both good, short- and mid-term bookings have continued to come in.

As shown in the booking screenshot below, a guest recently booked this house from June 12 to August 23, a total of 72 nights, at an average monthly rent of

$10000.

In summary, under Snowball Rentals’ management, this home’s monthly rental income rose from $3564 to $10000—described here as an increase of nearly threefold.

For homeowners, combining short- and mid-term rentals in this way can earn more in peak season and help them get through low season smoothly. Even if the low-season rental figures look less dramatic, they still outperform long-term rentals and give homeowners a strong sense of financial security.

More importantly, the owner does not have to worry about maintenance or cleaning. When something needs to be discussed with guests, we also help with communication and oversight.

Here, we again thank the owner for placing trust in the Snowball Rentals team!

After nearly two years of Airbnb’s downturn, we at Snowball Rentals hope to help owners make steady progress in low season, navigate the challenges safely and lay a better foundation for next year’s peak season.

Once again, heartfelt thanks to our homeowners for their trust and support. Whether the market is strong or weak, Snowball Rentals will stand with you and look for ways to increase your income!

Some homeowners will surely ask the hard question: was a large booking like this just a stroke of luck? What if the home does not rent? A long-term rental is more stable—even earning less is better than earning nothing!

Our answer is: the outcome depends on what we do.

Vacation-Rental Styling

Competition on Airbnb is becoming increasingly intense. The days of piecing together secondhand furniture, taking phone photos and earning easy money on Airbnb are over. Airbnb hosts have moved toward professional operations.

Careful design and furnishing before launch, followed by professional short-term rental operations, will be the only choice for a rental that continues to generate high income.

Here is another of Snowball Rentals’ core services: vacation-rental styling!

Here is what the detached home described above looks like after our careful furnishing:

When choosing a short-term rental on Airbnb, would this home’s appearance attract you?

If you would also like to make your home more attractive and earn more rent, please contact us at any time!

This Week’s Short Videos

We regularly update short videos every week.

The content you need is all here.

👇🏻 Homeowners are welcome to follow us 👇🏻

Snowball Rentals

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We also share practical vacation-rental styling plans and creative ideas to help you achieve more with less spending and keep rental income growing!

Xiao An’s Vacation-Rental Styling

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Referral Rewards

If you are already a Snowball Rentals homeowner, you receive a US$500 referral fee for each referral.

If you are not yet a Snowball Rentals homeowner, you receive a US$250 shopping voucher for each referral.

Snowball Rentals Management

1. Full service — We provide pre-launch rental design, furniture procurement, furnishing, professional photography, online marketing, copywriting, tenant service and sales, cleaning, supply purchasing and property repairs. You only need to be a hands-off owner; we handle the rest.

2. Multi-platform promotion — We promote the home on Airbnb, VRBO, HomeAway and other mainstream platforms for maximum exposure.

3. Dynamic pricing — Using big data, we adjust prices every day according to seasonal demand, holidays, last-minute vacancy offers, weekends and local activities, maximizing the owner’s income.

4. Income-improvement SOP — We follow 44 secrets for maximizing short-term rental income, optimizing each property’s online marketing, on-site operations and other aspects to work toward maximum income.

5. Flexible owner stays — Owners can flexibly choose when to stay themselves. This is especially suitable for owners with multiple residences around the world.

6. Terminate at any time — Management does not require an annual commitment. The owner can end the agreement with one month’s advance notice.

7. Corporate housing — In addition to nightly rentals, we work with insurers and assignment companies to provide executives with hotel-style managed accommodation for stays longer than 30 days.

8. Transparent fees — For rentals longer than 30 days, we charge 15% of accommodation revenue. For nightly rentals under 30 days, we charge 20% of accommodation revenue.

Author’s tip: Personal views, for reference only.