How and Why to Use Smart Pricing and Rule Sets

[Guy991]

The Bottom Line:

Should you use auto pricing? Yes.
Should you rely solely on it? Definitely not.
Should you use rule sets? Yes, but not for the reason you might expect.

As hosts, our aim is to maximize profit, but maximizing involves taking risks. Setting the price too high can deter potential guests.
The smart pricing tool doesn't optimize profit and fails to anticipate future earnings. For instance, it treats high season nights for the next year the same as any other night, only adjusting prices when activity and demand are detected, often too late. Moreover, it may miss bookings made well in advance, leading to lost potential revenue.

However, it's still beneficial to use it because it operates in small increments, ensuring you at least receive the base price you've set, with a potential slight increase through automatic adjustments. It's better than nothing. You'll still need to manually adjust pricing for peak and off-peak seasons and disable smart pricing for those dates.

While rule sets offer the option to increase or decrease prices, they don't seamlessly sync with smart pricing, with or without it. Their primary advantage lies in customizing availability and length of stay for specific dates, although the pricing itself requires manual adjustment.

[Peter3651]

@Guy991 I agree that auto pricing makes me nervous.  It would miss key weekends.   I do pay attention but can not tell if a price is comparable as we offer a full house.  

[Rick4682]

@Guy991 I use smart pricing year round BUT I also put a min per night for each of my homes on AirBnb. That way I do get a slightly higher rate if the area becomes a more desirable or highly in demand. Setting the minimum price assures me I get the min I need to afford to rent it out.