I have two Airbnb listings in different states, and about 90% of what I do day to day for them happens on my phone. These are the 12 apps I genuinely can’t manage the business without, what I use each one for, why I like it, and what it costs. By the end you should have a full picture of what you’d need to run a vacation rental smoothly from far away.
Quick note on pricing: the figures below are what I was paying when I put this together. Software pricing changes constantly, so treat these as ballpark and check current rates before you commit to anything.
Disclaimer: this is just my thought process based on what I’ve learned. I’m not a lawyer, and I can’t give tax, legal, or financial advice, so please treat this as a starting point for your own research and consult an actual expert about your situation.
1. Hospitable or Lodgify
Hospitable and Lodgify are PMS, which stands for property management software (not what I assumed PMS meant, but here we are). I use it to sync calendars between Airbnb, Vrbo, and Booking.com, and to automate my guest messages.
Every guest has different needs and questions, but the basic structure of the messaging stays the same: someone books and you confirm and welcome them, a few days before arrival you send check-in instructions, after they arrive you check that they’re settled and handle any issues right away, then checkout instructions, then a thank you and a review request. You don’t want to be in the business of remembering to send all of that manually. Hospitable handles it for me, and the interface is genuinely easy to set up and use.
Cost: Around $25 a month when I signed up, with a free trial to make sure you actually like it.
2. Minut
Minut is primarily a noise monitoring device and app. When the house goes over about 80 decibels for more than 15 minutes, we get an alert on our phones and can decide whether to contact the guests.
A lot depends on the time of day. Sometimes it’s just a group talking loudly as the evening winds down, and we’ve actually never needed to intervene. It’s still reassuring to be able to monitor it. It doesn’t record conversations, which matters for guest privacy, and the logged history means that if a dispute ever comes up, you have documentation.
Cost: Around $180 per year, which included the monitor itself.
3. Ring
We have a Ring camera at the entrance so we can see guests arriving and deliveries being dropped off. If someone’s fumbling around and looks like they’re having trouble, we can talk to them directly through the camera.
It’s motion-sensored, so the alerts are actually useful. When I’m expecting a check-in and it buzzes, I know they made it and everything’s fine.
Cost: Around $100 per year for a multi-camera subscription, slightly less for a single camera.
4. Yale
The house has a Yale keypad lock that connects to the WiFi, so I can add, remove, or change key codes from anywhere. I usually use the last four digits of the guest’s phone number, and it auto-populates through Hospitable, so I don’t even have to look the number up.
What I like most is being able to set time limits on each code, active from their exact check-in time (I give a few minutes of buffer) through checkout. I can set up multiple codes in advance so everyone has their own: our cleaners, the guests, us, and any handyperson coming to service the HVAC or the fireplace. I can also see who’s coming and going and whether the door is locked, which is real peace of mind from a few states away.
Cost: The lock itself is the main expense, no separate subscription for the basics.
5. TaskRabbit
We use TaskRabbit mainly to find handy people, whether that was assembling furniture during setup or repairing a door handle in a very specific window. Even with a few handyperson contacts, they aren’t always free exactly when we need them, and sometimes we only have a four-hour gap between checkout and the next check-in.
In bigger cities especially, where there are more taskers, it’s useful to filter down to people actually available right then. If we find someone good, we’ll often ask for their direct contact for next time.
Cost: Varies, since taskers set their own rates, plus a service fee on top that’s north of 10% and adds up.
6. Upwork
You probably think of Upwork as a place to find remote workers for things like YouTube thumbnails, but it’s also how I found our local assistant, who’s listed as our emergency contact on city paperwork and handles miscellaneous tasks.
For example, if deliveries arrive and we want them out of the way before guests check in, we’ll ask him to move them to the garage. Or when there’s a maintenance question and we’re not sure how serious it is, he’s a reasonable, smart person who can lay eyes on it before we decide who to call.
He’s been fantastic. We pay him a flat fee for being on call and available, even in weeks when he doesn’t work any hours, because I think if you’re expecting a certain level of responsiveness, that deserves to be paid for. That fee structure is something I came up with myself, so you can get pretty creative here with how you search and how you structure a contract that works for your business.
Cost: Whatever you negotiate, plus Upwork’s fees.
7. A Dedicated Business Phone Line
This one’s a bit boring. When we registered our LLC through Northwest Registered Agent, it came with the option of a phone line, and we decided that was more reliable than a Google Voice number, which you end up paying for anyway as a business line.
Having a completely separate app that isn’t used for anything else is nice, and this is the line linked to the Airbnb. When people call, it doesn’t ring through the app, it comes through as a normal call labelled under my Airbnb beach house, which is how I set up the contact.
Low maintenance, reliable, and cost-effective.
Cost: Around $9 a month, which felt competitive. At the time of writing, they’ve added the phone line as a bundle to new registrations (i.e. applies to you if you’re starting now!)
8. Stessa or Baselane
Stessa is bookkeeping software that links to certain banks (not all) and imports your transactions. It’s a quick way to upload receipts and store documents like inspection reports so everything lives in one place. Since then I have migrated to Baselane which just looks.. nicer. Like, Windows vs Mac.
It’s built differently from QuickBooks and other generic bookkeeping tools in that it’s very real estate focused, so the categories and valuations are more streamlined for this purpose. They also offer a cash management account, which works like business checking. They aren’t a bank themselves, but the interest rates have been genuinely competitive, better than what I’ve seen elsewhere, which is rare for a business account.
Cost: Free for the core bookkeeping.
9. American Express
We use the Amex Blue Business Cash card mainly for the 0% intro APR, which let us fund the furnishing purchases and pay them down over time. Standard credit card caveats apply: be mindful, be responsible, pay it down.
As a business, if you already have the cash reserves but you’d rather spread payments out and keep flexibility on cash flow, the pros outweigh the cons. We leaned on this for setting up both the tiny house and the beach house. Their app is the most user-friendly I’ve used among business cards, and Amex has some of the better purchase and travel protections.
Cost: Depends on the card, check current terms.
10. Novo
Novo is a business checking account. It doesn’t offer the high interest that a cash management account does, but it’s one of the few accounts that sends business checks for free and accept international wires. It’s straightforward, genuinely easy to use, and syncs with most other software.
Cost: Fee-free business checking.
11. Venmo
Not exciting, but Venmo is how we pay our cleaners and our lawn person. I’m including it because objectively we use it more than once a week.
Cost: Free for standard transfers.
12. Asana
Asana is a productivity app I use as both a to-do list and a place to brainstorm, keeping track of all the projects I have going for the house. It helps me set goals and stay on track.
I actually like both Asana and Trello. I’ve somewhat arbitrarily decided Asana is for business and Trello is for my personal life.
Cost: Free tier works for what I need.
A Few Honorable Mentions
PriceLabs and AirDNA are both dynamic pricing software and excellent market dashboards for looking at market data. It didn’t make the list because it isn’t technically an app yet (they really should make one), but it’s essential software if you want the complete picture of a short-term rental business.
Turno (formerly TurnoverBnB) is a great app for finding cleaners. I’m not using it because we have an amazing cleaning company and Sarah is a rock star, so I’ve never needed it. In bigger cities especially, it’s a really good way to match with cleaners who work with your schedule.
Which of your favourite apps made this list, and what did I miss?
Drop us a comment below! 🙂
