Can Airbnb Help Seniors Stay in Their Homes?
The evidence mounts that more seniors are working - oftentimes past 70 years of age (25% of us do that) - and the reason is blunt: inadequate retirement planning and a paucity of savings. That raises the question: are sharing economy lodging sites such as Airbnb and HomeAway potentially a lifeline for seniors who want extra income?
Senior hosts get their say below but, first, tune into the pros of attempting to monetize one's home.
Airbnb - which breaks out more demographic data than its competitors - is adamant that just maybe it is the lifeline seniors are looking for. According to the homesharing platform, "Hosts 60 and older are the fastest-growing age demographic of hosts joining the Airbnb community in the U.S." Airbnb added: "The community of senior women hosts is growing at a faster rate than other demographics, and nearly two-thirds of all senior hosts are women." It explained why: "The majority of senior women hosts are empty nesters who host to make ends meet."
Some 13% of Airbnb hosts in the U.S. are seniors and that number is growing, said the company.
The average senior host pulls in just under $6,000 annually, per Airbnb, which added: "For many of them, hosting provides essential income that aids in their retirement."
Third party experts corroborate the interest seniors have in the lodgings sharing economy. 81-year-old Art Koff, who runs RetiredBrains.com, a job board and employment information site geared to seniors, said that his pages about Airbnb and HomeAway "get huge traffic as more and more older Americans are looking for ways to make ends meet."
Retirees have their own tales to tell. In Ann Arbor, Mich., 62-year-old Josie Schneider said that she and her 76-year-old husband regularly rent out a spare bedroom in their three bedroom condo through Airbnb. She has been doing it for three years and, said Schneider, she grosses around $7,000 annually - money, she said, that helps the couple take many trips.
"It's fun, we meet awesome people," said Schneider about being an Airbnb host.
She added that she wanted to stand out with her Airbnb listing so she offers a free breakfast and also "free local taxi service," where her husband takes guests to/from their destinations in Ann Arbor.
In Gastonia, N.C. 56-year-old Lynn Stepp said she left a job - partly for health reasons - and a year ago decided to become an Airbnb host. "I tried it as an alternative to going to an office every day and in the last few months, it has really taken off." She rents out up to five bedrooms in her house and, she indicated, this is how she makes her living. She added that some of her guests are fairly longterm - one presently there is staying for a month as she looks for permanent housing.
Stepp said she has never had a negative experience with a guest in the year she has been an Airbnb host and she optimistically predicted that "I can do this until I am 65."
Good as being a sharing economy host sounds, know that there are cons involved in the sharing economy. Andrew McConnell, co-founder and CEO of rented.com, a site that helps homeowners rent out their second homes, said that for DIY sharing economy hosts, the workload is not insignificant. He pointed to HomeAway data that said the average host spends eight hours weekly managing their property. That's time spent checking guests in an out, managing emails involved in room bookings, and also dusting and cleaning.
Schneider in Ann Arbor said that when their bookings are solid, the couple put in 12 to 15 hours a week. Stepp in North Carolina said she puts in five to ten hours weekly.
But there may be hope for seniors who want the cash but not the work. Companies like McConnell's are entering the space, offering to match up homeowners with property managers so a second home can be monetized. "A lot of our clients are seniors," said McConnell. "Often they had not listed their homes at sharing economy sites because they did not want the work. When they see they can make the money without the work, they get interested." Note: McConnell's company, and similar, typically handle only whole home rentals.
The bottomline: Money can be made in short term rentals of one's home - but there are prices to pay in doing so. And yet, for some retirees, the sharing economy just may be the cash jolt they have dreamt about.
This article is commentary by an independent contributor. At the time of publication, the author held TK positions in the stocks mentioned.