Show HN: I built an extension to book Airbnbs directly
openbnb.orgHi Hackers,
My wife and I have been slow traveling around the world for last 3 years, and our top travel hack that has saved us most amount of money is to book directly with Airbnb host. We usually rent for a month so savings in fees are easily ~$300 - $500 on each stay, i.e. about 15-20%. Not every host offers it we respect that, but there are so many hosts out there that would rather have you book directly via their website and we as guests want the same. The problem is these hosts can’t promote or say that on Airbnb.
This inspired me to build OpenBnB.org, where I’ve started collecting direct booking websites of hosts. So far, I have around 1,500 hosts representing 150,000 listings – most of them in USA. The idea is to give guests more options to book, and hosts another channel to distribute their listings.
The first solution is a browser extension that makes it really easy to find the direct booking website of hosts when you’re browsing Airbnb. It just a one-time easy install with no sign ups. It: 1) highlights all the directly-bookable listings on the search page, 2) lets you search listings only from hosts with direct booking option and then of course 3) gives you the direct booking link on the listing page. What I like about this solution is it doesn’t require guests to go to a different website; they can just browse Airbnb (largest inventory of short-term rentals) as usual and get more options to book when available.
Other than savings, I think there is something about the direct relationship with hosts and guests, without any intermediaries. The cool think is I estimate about 20-33% of Airbnbs can be booked directly! That means I’ve only collected around 6 to 9% of all directly-bookable listings around the world.
I’ve seen some other chrome extensions do something similar, but none of them highlight these listings nor let you search listings only with hosts that offer direct booking.
What do you think? Try it out and let me know if this is useful. I’m also planning to spin up a website that only has listings from these hosts, kind of like a meta-search engine for vacation rental websites.
This is a really good idea, and I like how it befits both users and sellers.
I can see that both sides have free access, so do you have plans to monetise in the future? There really is a large potential for this.
I want to bring value to both guests and hosts first before capturing it. Though I do think there is immense potential to monetize it on host side of things if starts to get them good amount of direct bookings. Until then, I'll just keep running the service for free (it doesn't cost that much to run)
Amazing idea! There is a really huge potential for this!
Thanks! I do think so too, esp. now that the vacation rental market is maturing there are more and more individual hosts either turning into professional hosts or hiring a professional property manager to host their homes. These professional hosts more often than not have their own direct booking website.
This is a great idea! Cutting out platform fees can be a game-changer for long-term travelers. The direct booking search/filter feature is especially interesting—do you have any data on how many users are actively using the extension so far?
Also, how are you handling trust and security for direct bookings? One advantage of Airbnb is their built-in protections (e.g., refunds, reviews, and customer support). Are hosts on OpenBnB verified in any way to prevent scams?
Would love to hear more about how you plan to grow this!
A quarter of people who have installed it use it weekly. So I think there are some digital nomads that are actively using it. I'm also curious about percentage of users who use it annually as most people don't book Airbnbs that often.
As of now, all transactions and support happen on host side. It helps you find available listings that direct prices thats it, similar to how Google helps you find businesses. Currently, guests rely on Airbnb ratings and reviews to pick good hosts. In my direct booking experience, the ratings translate. As in a good host is a good host, and their service don't go down if it was booked directly. Though I do think there is space for reviews and ratings on OpenBnB if it scales.