The Traveler's Guide To Home Sharing

Whether you’re new to short-term rentals or an old hand, you can improve your experience by following these tips.

- Miriam Cross

For a twist on your next vacation, swap an ordinary hotel room for a rustic cottage along the banks of a secluded river, a tree house nestled at the summit of a volcano or an open-air villa on a private beach. Websites offering short-term rentals put homes all over the world up for grabs, meaning you can access creature comforts while in unfamiliar territory, experience life as a local or spend a few nights enjoying luxurious amenities—such as an infinity pool overlooking the ocean—that would normally appear out of reach. Because home rentals are scattered throughout residential areas, the sites can also be your only source of accommodations if you want to stay in the suburbs, sleep in a quiet neighborhood away from tourist zones or test-drive a retirement location.

The two big names in short-term rentals are Airbnb, which lists more than 5 million properties worldwide, and HomeAway, which offers more than 2 million. (VRBO is owned by HomeAway and shares the same inventory.) Airbnb tends to pop up more often in urban areas and, unlike HomeAway, gives the option of bunking down in a private guest room (or even a shared room) while sharing common areas with the host. HomeAway is more popular in rural or traditional vacation-rental spots. But search both sites to cover your bases, as well as a number of other “alternative accommodations” websites for the full array of options (see the box on page 68).