How to Track Airbnb Income and Expenses (2026)

Written by Oscar Sanfelix, founder of Plannful. · Published 25 June 2026

If you run a short-term rental, the difference between a property that feels profitable and one that is profitable comes down to tracking the numbers properly. Most hosts log payouts and stop there — and never see how much each cleaning, fee and slow month quietly eats. Here is a simple system to track Airbnb income and expenses in 2026.

1. Record every dollar of income

Log each booking's gross payout, but separate the parts: nightly rate, cleaning fee charged, and platform service fees withheld. Track income per platform too (Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com, direct) — you will quickly see which channel actually pays.

2. Track every expense category

• Cleaning & turnover (your biggest variable cost)
• Platform & payment fees
• Supplies & consumables
• Maintenance & repairs
• Utilities, internet and subscriptions
• Property management (if you use one — often 10–25% of revenue)
• Mortgage, insurance and property tax (the fixed costs hosts forget)

3. Watch the metrics that actually matter

Payout totals hide the truth. These four numbers tell you how the rental is really doing:

• Net profit: income minus every cost, including the fixed ones. The only number that matters at year end.
• Occupancy rate: nights booked ÷ nights available. A healthy STR often runs 65–75%.
• ADR (average daily rate): room revenue ÷ nights booked.
• RevPAR (revenue per available night): ADR × occupancy — the single best measure of overall performance, because it blends price and how full you are.

4. Set it up once, then just log bookings

The goal is a system where you enter a booking and an expense, and your profit, margin, occupancy, ADR and RevPAR update automatically. Tax time becomes a copy-paste instead of a panic, and you can see at a glance which month — or which platform — is dragging you down.

You can try exactly this with our free Airbnb / STR dashboard — enter a few bookings and watch the live profit, occupancy and RevPAR calculate themselves.

Try the free Airbnb tracker →

When you are ready for the full system across a whole year and multiple properties, the STR Command Center tracks every booking, expense and metric in Microsoft Excel.

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