The Future of Short-Term Rentals: Industry Leaders Look Ahead at Skift Summit

The short-term rental industry has experienced a major boom coming out of the pandemic, driven in large part by the surge in remote work.

But what does the future hold, especially since the sector's enormous recent growth may not be sustainable? Executives speaking at Skift's Short-Term Rental Summit offered their thoughts about what comes next.

Steve Milo, founder and CEO of VTrips: "We all know that part of the biggest problem with guest satisfaction is the product is not optimized right. In many cases, we talk about vacation homes — they're retrofitted second homes and those second homes were never really built to be a vacation rental."

"Imagine this product if you were to design it from the beginning and truly make it a true guest experience. So that means smaller bedrooms, smaller closets, smaller bathrooms – but bigger open areas, bigger kitchens, bigger dining areas ... I'm talking about the product in general being built from the ground floor up to maximize occupancy, guest experience and revenue. If you do that, we crush the hotels."