Golightly members, currently at 2,500, must refer any new members in order to preserve the “friend of a friend” network (unaffiliated women can apply for membership and be vetted by a Golightly staffer, who becomes their referring friend).

The trick is gaining access to the offerings. Prices range from $80 for a mid-century-modern studio in Coronado, Calif., to over $1,000 for a country estate in Ireland. Most are in the United States and Europe, but there are also homes in Argentina, Israel and South Africa. Launched in January, Golightly was just getting out of the starting gate when the pandemic hit, but has grown 30 percent during it, to 590 properties. Can they drive demand? That’s going to be one of the hardest things to do.”īut for travelers willing to shop around, the following four new platforms offer novel twists on home sharing. “The real question is scale and can these other folks compete with Airbnb and Vrbo on a booking level. “You’re going to always see people who are trying to nip at the heels of Airbnb,” said Joseph DiTomaso, the founder and chief executive of AllTheRooms, a vacation rental search engine and data analytics firm for the industry. Travelers will find a limited inventory - perhaps one unit in San Francisco on the new site Zeevou Direct - versus more than 300 on Airbnb, the largest home-sharing site with over seven million accommodations. Recognizing the vagaries of travel since the pandemic began, some of these companies are offering flexible cancellation penalties this summer.īut in addition to the challenges any travel company faces in the Covid-19 era, the problem for most start-up, short-term rental platforms is their small size. community, and Noirbnb for Black travelers.ĭuring the pandemic, when Airbnb relaxed its cancellation policies and refunded renters, many hosts sought alternative platforms, which has helped some of the new sites grow. In the 12 years since Airbnb launched, the home-sharing category has only grown, spinning off niche platforms such as Misterb&b, which targets the L.G.B.T.Q.

House rental apps like airbnb