How many nights a month does your Airbnb need to break even?

Plenty of hosts know their nightly rate to the penny and have no idea how many nights they need to sell before they're actually making money. That number, your break-even point, is the most useful figure in your hosting finances. It tells you whether a quiet month is a problem or just a quiet month.

Split your costs into two groups

Fixed costs you pay every month whether anyone stays or not:

• Mortgage or rent (or the share used for hosting).
• Council tax or property tax, insurance.
• Internet, TV subscriptions, standing charges on utilities.
• Software subscriptions.
• A monthly set-aside for maintenance and replacements.

Per-stay costs only happen when someone books:

• Cleaning and laundry.
• Supplies: toilet roll, toiletries, coffee, any welcome gift.
• The usage part of utilities: heating, hot water, electricity.

Some costs are in between. A cleaner paid per turnover is per-stay. A cleaner on a monthly retainer is fixed. Put each cost where it actually behaves. Our post on tracking income and expenses covers how to collect these numbers if you don't have them yet.

Use what you actually receive

Your nightly rate isn't what you earn. Airbnb takes a service fee, and depending on your fee setup that comes out of the host payout, the guest's total or both. Work from the payout you actually receive, which you can see in your earnings dashboard. Our payout calculator shows the breakdown if you want to check it.

The calculation

Work out what one night really contributes:

1. Take your average payout per stay and divide by the average number of nights per stay.
2. Take your per-stay costs and divide by the same number of nights.
3. Subtract the second from the first. That's your contribution per night.

Then:

Break-even nights per month = monthly fixed costs ÷ contribution per night

An example

A one-bedroom flat with:

• Fixed costs of £1,400 a month.
• Average stay of 3 nights, average payout of £330.
• Cleaning and laundry £55 per stay, supplies £10 per stay.

Payout per night: £330 ÷ 3 = £110. Per-stay costs per night: £65 ÷ 3 ≈ £22. Contribution per night: about £88.

Break-even: £1,400 ÷ £88 ≈ 16 nights a month, or roughly 53% occupancy.

Every night booked above 16 is profit. A month with 12 nights is a loss, and one with 22 nights is comfortably profitable. Our break-even calculator does this sum for you once you have the numbers.

What changes the answer

• Short stays cost more per night. One-night bookings carry a full clean for a single night's income. If your minimum stay is short, your contribution per night drops. Our post on setting a minimum stay covers this trade-off.
• Cleaning fee. A cleaning fee that covers your actual cleaning cost raises your contribution per night, especially on short stays.
• Seasonality. Fixed costs don't change in winter, but bookings do. Look at your annual break-even, not just a single month.

Don't forget the irregular costs

The costs that catch hosts out are the ones that don't arrive every month: a new mattress, a broken boiler, repainting after a few years of guests, replacing towels that have gone grey. Spread them across the year by setting aside a fixed amount each month as part of your fixed costs. If you don't, your break-even looks better than it is, until the boiler goes.

Use the number

Once you know your break-even, a lot of decisions get easier:

• Whether it's worth dropping the price to fill a gap.
• Whether a long-stay discount makes sense.
• Whether a quiet January is a problem or expected.
• Whether a new expense, like a smart lock or a pricing tool, pays for itself.

Recalculate whenever your nightly rate, fees or main costs change. It takes ten minutes and gives you a far clearer picture than looking at your monthly payout alone.