Airbnb hosts in Melbourne are making up to $150,000 annually, according to Airdna, an analytics company that tracks the performance of Airbnb rentals around the world.
Up to 15,640 properties were listed on Airbnb at the start of February this year, a significant increase from February last year, when 12,886 properties were listed on the platform.
The Airdna report also highlighted Melbourne’s top-performing Airbnb listings, with those making the most money for their owners appearing to be fairly humble dwellings. Of the city’s top-performing listings, the Fitzroy backpacker hostel The Nunnery is estimated to be making the greatest annual revenue, pulling in about $154,160. The Nunnery’s guesthouse can accommodate up to 21 guests at a time and is listed at $1,399 per night.
A studio apartment in Richmond is another top performer, making about $47,181 annually, while hosts renting out a bedroom in Oakleigh are bagging an estimated $43,000 annually.
Airdna calculates estimated annual revenue by adding up all the reservations over the last 12 months. It also calculates the advertised daily rate of each unique reservation and then factors in the cleaning fee.
Many of the top listings are clustered around Southern Cross Station, mirroring analysis by University of Melbourne researchers Andy Krause and Gideon Aschwanden. Other clusters exist on the northern end of Chapel St, St Kilda, and the southern end of Bay Street in Port Melbourne, among others.
While there’s no official data on the effects Airbnb is having on Melbourne’s private rental market, Krause and Aschwanden are exploring the impact Airbnb is having on this market.
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