Airbnb.com, Booking.com, Holidayletting.com and other online community marketplaces for renting accommodations became wildly popular in the last years. The reason is that these sites offer much cheaper accommodation than most hotels and hostels and landlords can often get more revenue this way than if they found tenants for the whole year.
But it is not the best choice for everyone. Frequented cities – if we take Hungary this would basically mean the capital and towns around Lake Balaton – have enough tourist to provide enough customers, but smaller and less popular towns don't.
Even in Budapest your chances are best if you have a flat to rent out in the inner city – few tourist will go to the outskirts if they can have a whole apartment in the inner districts for 50 dollars a night.
Also you have to work more with getting the apartment into shape after every visitor – and more "enthusiastic" tourist who visited the party places can trash your apartment pretty badly. You have to think about neighbors also.
All of this means that renting your flat for a few nights at a time is a full-time job which requires a lot of work and commitment. If you have a nice flat at a good location you have better chances to get a good revenue – but you also have to pay to be on a prime place on the Airbnb site.
Also you have to pay for utilities and taxes – avoiding the latter can be very expensive as the authorities watch Airbnb very closely.
All in all yes, it can be a very prosperous business to put your flat on one of these sites. But only if you have all the good conditions and willing to work hard for the revenue. Otherwise finding a long-term tenant may be a much better choice.
(Source: http://kiszamolo.hu/airbnb-megeri-foglalkozni-vele/)
