Best Vacation Rental Marketplaces

Airbnb was founded in 2008 and is headquartered in San Fransisco. Airbnb has lodging available in over 34,000 cities and 190 countries. Airbnb is unique in the fact that it offers vacation homes as well as the ability to rent out simply a private or a shared bedroom in someone’s home. AirBed & Breakfast was originally created for a unique business networking opportunity for those who were unable to book a hotel in an oversaturated market. The founders started by creating a bed and breakfast in their San Francisco apartment because they could not afford the rent. They would accommodate three guests in their living room on air mattresses and provide them a homemade breakfast. It started as a simple idea, but now their website includes so much more. Not only can people book a shared room, but also they can book their own private rooms or choose to rent out an entire private home.

HomeAway, a subsidiary of Expedia, was founded in 2004 as a place for homeowners to post their vacation rental homes. HomeAway does charge an annual fee for homeowners to post their homes and this fee makes up about 80% of their revenue. They also have an alternative posting option where homeowners can choose to give up 10% of the commission for each booking if they do not want to pay an annual fee. Since homeowners are paying the fees, travellers benefit since there are no fees added from booking with HomeAway. HomeAway introduced a referral network of about 40 companies where they support rental owners in managing their rentals, assist with reservations, and answer guest inquiries. HomeAway has also purchased about 20 different vacation rental sites and consolidated them onto the HomeAway site.

HomeAway has locations spread all over the world, and with an easy search bar travellers can quickly find the exact vacation home that they need for their perfect vacation. HomeAway has over 65 million travellers trafficking their sites each month and they offer a wide range of rental properties including from the lowest prices all the way up to high-end luxury rentals.

HomeAway acquired VRBO in 2006 as a host site for over one million vacation homes. VRBO is part of the HomeAway family, this means that VRBO shares advertised postings with HomeAway and they share a mobile app. In 2015, Expedia purchased HomeAway. VRBO has locations spread all over the world with an easy search bar so travellers can easily find the exact vacation home that they need for their perfect vacation. Since VRBO is partnered with such a large vacation rental property they have over 65 million travellers trafficking their sites each month. VRBO offers a wide range of rental properties including the lowest prices all the way up to high-end luxury rentals.  

Tripz.com is striving to keep what makes vacation rentals unique by eliminating unnecessary fees and keeping rentals affordable. Tripz.com does not charge owners commission which inevitably gets reflected in owners driving up the costs. By eliminating these fees, there is no need to monitor communication between travelers and owners to ensure a fee or commission is collected. With thousands of homes worldwide, Tripz.com offers a lower priced option to book vacation rentals direct from owners.

Wimdu started as a small international company in 2011. They have since grown to a group of 250 employees worldwide. Wimdu offers private accommodations for all tastes and budgets for those who are looking for an alternative to hotels. They offer more than 300,000 rental spaces in 100 countries around the world. Wimdu also allows members to rent out their own spaces. Listing properties is free to homeowners and provides an easy way to make money while the home is not in use.  

On 9flats.com, travelers can rent someone else's apartment, room, or house and enjoy the feeling of home while traveling. There are also opportunities for hosts to list their own accommodations to make extra money while they're away from their home. 9flats' goal is to make travel more comfortable, rewarding, and affordable and to give homeowners an easy way to boost their income. 

TripAdvisor is a travel website started in 2000. TripAdvisor is one of the worlds largest travel sites and offers a variety of locations and planning features to help travelers plan their ideal vacation. Their website not only advertises rental listings, but it assists travelers with all their travel options including nearby restaurants, attractions, accommodations, and flight information. TripAdvisor receives around 375 million unique monthly visitors, has more than 5.2 million accommodations or attractions, and supports more than 250 million customer reviews and opinions. TripAdvisor a very large travel website that offers a lot of information to travelers so they can maximize their vacation experience. 

Gulivers is an advertising service for property owners to list their vacation rentals. It boasts over 11,000 properties at any given time across North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Africa.

Unlike other vacation rental listing services, renters don’t go book rentals directly through them. Instead, Gulivers connects renters with the rental owners so they can negotiate rates and fees without a middleman to drive prices up. This allows renters to work directly with rental owners so they know exactly who they’re renting from and can contact should anything unexpected come up. It operates in similar fashion to Craigslist, except it focuses exclusively on rental properties. 

Users that take advantage of HolidayLettings can browse popular destinations to find rental listings in remote areas or heavily populated cities. HolidayLettings is part of the TripAdvisor family. Users can take advantage of the hundreds of thousands of reviews on various rental properties. 

Owner Direct Vacation Rentals was originally founded in 1994 as a service that rented out Big White ski condos in British Columbia. Now, the Owner Direct provides listings on over 13,000 vacation rentals, including rental homes in resorts throughout the world. While Owner Direct's global reach, transparency, and online features are impressive, the service lists much fewer properties than top vacation rentals companies. Additionally, customers will need to pay a service fee with Owner Direct.