Short-Term Rental Management in Seattle
Seattle rewards hosts who run their homes well. Guest demand is strong, summers are exceptional, and the rules are straightforward once someone walks you through them. We manage Airbnb, Vrbo, direct and mid-term stays across the city, and we own homes here ourselves.
Seattle, Washington · Airbnb Superhost since 2021 · 120+ homes managed
See if your Seattle home is a fit
Send us an email at [email protected] or call / text us at (206) 258-7041
120+
Homes managed
36,000+
Reservations hosted
17,000+
5-star guest reviews
4.9
Average guest rating out of 5
Why Seattle
Five kinds of guest, on five different calendars
Most short-term rental markets run on one kind of guest. A beach town has summer. A ski town has winter. Seattle has a six-month cruise season stacked on a convention calendar, a 52,000-student university, four major hospital systems and the second strongest tech workforce in North America. Different guests, different months, different reasons to be here. That is what stops a Seattle calendar from living or dying on one season.
39.7M
Visitors a year
$8.8B
Annual visitor spending
2.1M
Cruise passengers in 2026
89.2%
Downtown hotel occupancy, July 2025
Sources: Visit Seattle 2025 annual data and 2025 summer report; Port of Seattle 2026 cruise season.
01 · Tourism and the Alaska gateway
Travel + Leisure named Seattle one of the 50 Best Places to Travel in 2026. Seattle is also the West Coast’s largest cruise home port and the main US gateway to Alaska: 2.1 million passengers across 330 sailings between April and October 2026. They arrive and leave on fixed dates, and a lot of them need a bed either side.
02 · Tech, and the travel that follows it
CBRE ranks Seattle the second strongest tech talent market in North America. Amazon is headquartered here, Microsoft in Redmond, alongside Costco, Starbucks, Nordstrom, Expedia, Alaska Airlines and T-Mobile. Amazon returned to five days in office in 2025 and Microsoft to three in 2026, and visiting teams came with them. The convention center alone drove 367,375 hotel room nights in 2024.
03 · The University of Washington
52,316 students on the Seattle campus, and about 50,000 family and friends filled Husky Stadium for commencement in June. Move-in runs September 22 to 25, Family Weekend is November 6 and 7. That is September and June demand on a calendar with nothing to do with tourism.
04 · Families here for treatment
Seattle Children’s recorded 600,680 patient visits in 2025 and serves Washington, Alaska, Montana and Idaho, which it calls the largest region of any children’s hospital in the country. Fred Hutch runs only two patient lodging buildings, 70 apartments and 80 units, and asks transplant patients to stay within 30 minutes of the clinic. These families need a kitchen and a real bed, for weeks at a time.
05 · Corporate placements and healthcare staffing
Travel nurse contracts run thirteen weeks. Corporate relocations, project-based contractors and insurance placements run similar lengths, and many arrive as a business lease with the company as the tenant. Year round, and not weather dependent.
Three ways to rent the same home
Nightly stays. Mid-term stays of thirty nights or more. Business leases signed by a company for its employees. We run all three.
Under thirty nights your home is a short-term rental. At thirty and over it is a tenancy, with a full tenancy agreement, credit and background screening, and Washington and Seattle landlord-tenant rules. Two bodies of law, two ways to qualify a guest properly, and a much wider pool of people who can book your home.
And on what it costs to own here. Seattle is expensive, but it is not Bay Area expensive. The median Seattle home sold for about $890,000 in June 2026, against roughly $1.70 million in San Francisco and $1.47 million in San Jose. For an owner comparing West Coast markets, Seattle asks for close to half the capital.
The Seattle market right now
The easy years are over. That is good news if you run your home well.
Nationally the short-term rental market has settled back to roughly its pre-pandemic occupancy, and new supply is growing at a fraction of the 2021 and 2022 rate. Seattle is still adding listings a little faster than the country as a whole, so nightly rates are holding while occupancy softens. A rising tide is not going to carry your year any more. Pricing, lead time, photography and review quality decide it, and those are all things a manager controls.
11,627
Active Seattle listings
+6.9% year over year
$226
Average daily rate
+2.0% year over year
62%
Occupancy
−2.2% year over year
$129
Revenue per available night
−3.2% year over year
Source: AirDNA Seattle market data, updated August 5, 2026. Third-party estimates modeled from platform data, not Perch figures.
What the World Cup taught us, two months ago
Seattle hosted six matches at Lumen Field in June and July 2026. Across the city, hosts pushed nightly rates more than 30% higher on match days and the nights before them, and Seattle short-term rental occupancy still fell roughly 15% year over year, because new listings flooded in faster than demand did. Seattle hotels posted the steepest occupancy decline of all eleven US host cities.
Perch homes went the other way. Our Seattle portfolio ran 20% above market on occupancy and more than $100 above market on average daily rate.
The difference was not a secret. It was meeting guests where they actually were. Owners who held out for headline prices watched the calendar stay empty, and an empty night at a great rate is worth nothing. Pricing to an event is not a strategy. Pricing to demand, adjusted daily, is the whole job.
Market figures: AirDNA, World Cup Full Recap, July 22, 2026. Hotel comparison: HVS, August 2026, using CoStar data.
Seattle short-term rental rules
Seattle’s rules, in plain English, and what they actually cost
Good news first. Seattle is a licensed market, not a restricted one. There is no lottery, no cap on how many nights you can book, and no waiting list. It is paperwork, and it is cheaper than most owners expect: roughly $272 in your first year and about $227 a year after that, which is close to a single night of revenue at Seattle’s average nightly rate.
| Requirement | What it is |
|---|---|
| Seattle Short-Term Rental Operator License | $75 per dwelling unit, per year. Renews on its anniversary date. Your license number has to appear on every listing you publish. The license is held by the property owner, not by a management company. |
| Seattle Business License Tax Certificate | Required before you can apply for the operator license. Renews annually in December. $147 for businesses with $20,000 to $499,999 of annual Seattle revenue, which is where most single short-term rentals land. $73 below $20,000. |
| Washington State business license (UBI) | $50 to open a business and receive a UBI number, then $5 per location at annual renewal. |
| RRIO registration | Seattle’s Rental Registration and Inspection Ordinance applies to any rental that is not your primary residence. $126 per property covering the first unit, plus $31.50 per additional unit, on a two-year term. Inspection at least once every ten years. |
| RPZ parking permit, where it applies | Seattle has 35 Restricted Parking Zones, and a lot of the best short-term rental streets sit inside one, where parking is scarce and capped at two to four hours. Owners in those zones can hold a guest permit hangtag, and we keep it in the home so guests can use it. Cost and term vary by zone. Ballard and Green Lake have no zone at all. |
| Lodging tax | 15.70% total on Seattle short-term rental stays. Airbnb collects and remits Washington state and local taxes on your behalf, and the guest pays it. On direct bookings, that is on you. Washington B&O tax is always yours regardless of channel. |
The $272 and $227 figures cover the operator license, the business license tax certificate and the state UBI. If the home is not your primary residence, add $126 every two years for RRIO. Sources: City of Seattle Finance and Administrative Services, Seattle SDCI, SDOT, Washington Department of Revenue. Current as of August 2026. Rules and fees change. Confirm with the City before acting, and we are not attorneys.
What we file for you
Perch Luxe owners never touch a filing deadline
Licensing and tax filing is where most owners lose their weekends and occasionally their late fees. On our full-service tier we prepare it, file it, and track every renewal date.
Washington State Excise Tax
Monthly, quarterly or annually, based on prior year revenue
Washington State Business License
Renewal varies with when the licence was obtained
City of Seattle B&O Tax
Annually, on April 30
City of Seattle Business License
Annually, on December 30
Seattle Short-Term Rental Operator License
Renewal varies with when the licence was obtained
City of Seattle RRIO License
Renewal varies with when the licence was obtained
City of Seattle RPZ Permit
Depends on your parking zone
The Seattle booking year
Seattle summers are exceptional. We build the rest of the year around them.
Across the homes we run, peak summer months book at roughly two to four times what January through April book. That is a real advantage if you plan for it, and the job is making the other eight months pull their weight.
Illustrative shape of the Greater Seattle booking year.
How we keep October through March earning
Open the calendar early and price to book
We load and price the shoulder months well ahead of the season rather than waiting to see what shows up. Being live and attractively priced early is how you capture that demand before the rest of the market wakes up. The rate is set to book, then reviewed as the window closes, and never so low that it attracts the wrong guest.
Add a second kind of guest to the mix
Alongside nightly bookings we work the mid-term market: relocations, travel healthcare, insurance placements and project-based corporate stays, none of which care that it is raining. These stays are tenancies, so they run on a full agreement with credit and background screening. If you would rather not host longer stays at all, you can opt out.
Use the quiet months to get ready for summer
The slow season is when we do the work that protects your peak. Deep maintenance and deferred repairs all happen between January and March, so that when the months that actually make your year arrive, nothing is broken and nothing is off the market.
Neighborhood by neighborhood
Where we manage short-term rentals in Seattle
Capitol Hill is not Queen Anne, and neither one prices like West Seattle. Guest mix, rate ceilings, minimum stays and peak weeks change by neighborhood, and we run enough homes across the city to know the difference rather than guess at it.
Capitol Hill
Guests book Capitol Hill for the vibe. Pike and Pine, the bars and record shops, brunch on 15th, and a fifteen minute walk down to Pike Place and downtown. Light rail from Capitol Hill Station gets them anywhere. Shortest average stay in the city, strong midweek, and the one neighborhood where a small, well-styled apartment beats a big plain one.
Queen Anne
Two different markets stacked on a hill. Lower Queen Anne is Seattle Center, the Space Needle and Climate Pledge, so it books around events. Upper Queen Anne is quiet streets, Kerry Park views and families on longer stays. Know which one your home is in, because they price differently.
Ballard
Breweries, the Sunday farmers market, the Locks and easy access to the water. It is also one of the only high-demand neighborhoods with no Restricted Parking Zone, which matters more to guests arriving with a car than most owners realise.
Fremont
The troll, the Sunday market and a walkable stretch along the ship canal, with Adobe and the tech offices right there. That mix of weekend leisure and short business stays is what keeps Fremont steadier through the shoulder months than most of the city.
Wallingford
Gas Works Park, the Burke-Gilman and a quiet grid of craftsman houses between Fremont and the U District. Families book here, they stay longer, and they want a real kitchen and a yard more than they want a view.
West Seattle
The only part of Seattle where guests wake up near a beach and look back at the skyline. Alki and Lincoln Park carry the summer, the Junction gives it a walkable year-round core, and the water taxi puts downtown fifteen minutes away across the water.
Magnolia
Discovery Park, the bluff and quiet upscale housing stock. Fewer listings, longer stays, and a guest who picked the neighborhood deliberately rather than landing there on price.
Beacon Hill
Light rail puts guests downtown in minutes at a lower entry price than the north end, and the food along Beacon Ave is a genuine draw now. Steady rather than spiky, which is a good problem.
Columbia City
A walkable historic core, one of the best restaurant strips in the city and a station on the line. One of the better yield-per-dollar-of-purchase-price submarkets in Seattle.
Central District
Central to everything and priced below Capitol Hill next door, with Judkins Park now on the light rail line. Mixed leisure and relocation demand, which is exactly what you want in January.
Eastlake
Houseboats, Lake Union on your doorstep and a walk or short ride to the South Lake Union offices. Small market, distinctive homes, and the strongest mid-term potential in the city because of who works nearby.
U District
The university sets the calendar: move-in in late September, Family Weekend in November, graduation in June, plus admissions visits and visiting academics year round. Spikes when the rest of Seattle is flat, and Husky game days are their own event.
Northgate
Link light rail, a hospital campus minutes away and the Kraken’s practice rinks at Northgate Station. Three separate reasons to book, and none of them depend on the weather.
Rainier Beach
South end value with light rail and Lake Washington access. The lowest entry prices in the city, and a guest mix that skews extended-stay rather than weekend.
Own a home in a Seattle neighborhood that is not on this list? We manage across the whole city. Reach out anyway.
How we run your home
What we actually do, day to day
Everything above is about Seattle. This part is about us, and it is the same standard whether your home is on Capitol Hill or on Maui. Set it and forget it is a myth. Here is the work.
Revenue over occupancy
It is about dollars, not how often the calendar is booked. We optimize for what your home actually earns, not a vanity occupancy number.
A dedicated revenue manager
A real person with a strategy for your specific home, looking at the data every day and making manual adjustments. Best-in-class pricing software is step one, not the strategy.
Every channel, written for its audience
Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com and our own direct booking site, plus mid-term channels. Airbnb guests skew younger and respond to a different listing than the Vrbo audience, so the copy and photos are tailored rather than copy-pasted.
Guest screening and protection
Identity verification, channel due diligence and a damage waiver on every stay. Plus the unglamorous part: good neighbour relations, so your home stays welcome on its street.
Maintenance that is not deferred
Preventive and routine maintenance runs on a schedule rather than waiting for something to break, with vetted trades coordinated at zero vendor markup. Down to rolling your bins out for collection.
A real team you can reach
Direct access to leadership and named coordinators, not a ticket queue. Guest communication is one of our highest rated categories, and that is a large part of how Superhost status gets held quarter after quarter.
Getting started
One week from home-ready to live
Getting your home furnished and ready runs on your schedule, and it is the part that varies. Once it is ready, the rest is ours.
01
Fit call and model
An in-person tour, then a twelve-month revenue model on your home. If short-term is not right, we say so here.
02
Agreement and permits
Your onboarding specialist is assigned. On Perch Luxe we take Seattle licensing and every renewal off your plate.
03
Getting the home ready
A room-by-room furnishing list built from what performs in real Perch homes, marked required, recommended or skip.
04
Photography and listings
Professional photography, listings built per channel, and your pricing strategy set with your revenue manager.
05
Inspection and go live
Standards inspection, smart lock and doorbell, consumables stocked by us. Then live across every channel at once.
This is the short version. The full picture of how we work with you, what we stock in your home at no cost, how we protect the asset, and every question owners ask us is on our property management page. If you would rather read about the team first, that is on who we are.
Proof, not promises
Airbnb Superhost since inception in 2021
4.9 ★★★★★
Average guest rating across 17,000+ five-star reviews and 36,000+ reservations hosted.
Airbnb re-scores Superhost every quarter on rating, response time and cancellations. We have held it continuously since our very first listing.
Owner review
In an owner’s own words
“We use Perch to manage our STR and are very happy with them. Perch is always very responsive to guests staying at our home (evident by all the guest reviews that mention the host) and to us. They are also always looking out for the best interest of our home and keeping it in top condition for our guests. We are very happy to have them, Perch is the only way an STR would be realistic for us.”
Edgar
Perch owner since 2022
Pricing
Two tiers, one standard of care
A percentage of what your home earns. No onboarding fee, no supply fee, no restocking fee. Several Seattle managers charge an $800 onboarding fee or bill cleaning separately on top of commission. We do neither.
Full service
Perch Luxe
20% of what your home earns
Everything handled, including maintenance and Seattle compliance, so you stay hands-off.
✓ Dedicated revenue manager, pricing your home daily
✓ Guest communications, screening and 24/7 support
✓ Cleaning, plus full repair and preventive maintenance
✓ Vetted trades coordinated at zero vendor markup
✓ Multi-channel distribution, tailored per platform
✓ Seattle licensing, every renewal and every filing
✓ Consumables stocked, no supply or restocking fee
✓ Damage claims handled, plus an owner portal
By invitation
Perch Essentials
10% of what your home earns
You keep maintenance in your own hands. We run the listing, the pricing and the guests.
✓ Listing management and guest communications
✓ Dedicated revenue manager
✓ Cleaning coordination and multi-channel distribution
✓ 24/7 guest support and transparent owner reporting
✓ You coordinate your own repairs and maintenance
✓ You handle your own Seattle licensing and renewals
We only earn when your home earns. No vacancy fee, no minimum monthly charge, no retainer. If the home sits empty, you owe us nothing.
A full breakdown of what each tier includes is on our property management page.
Questions Seattle owners ask
The things worth knowing upfront
Do I need a license to run an Airbnb in Seattle?
Yes. Seattle requires a Short-Term Rental Operator License for any home rented for fewer than 30 consecutive nights. It costs $75 per dwelling unit per year. Before you can apply you need a Seattle Business License Tax Certificate and a Washington State business license. Your license number has to appear on every listing. The license is held by the property owner, so a management company cannot hold it for you, but on Perch Luxe we prepare and file it with you and track the renewals.
How many Airbnbs can I own in Seattle?
Most operators are limited to two units: your primary residence plus one more. Rooms rented inside your own home without their own kitchen and bathroom do not count. The legacy exemption for units operating before September 30, 2017 closed at the start of 2020 and does not transfer to a new owner. If you want more than two, there are two routes: look just outside city limits, or run a home as a mid-term rental, since a stay of thirty nights or more is a tenancy rather than a short-term rental and does not count against the limit.
How much does short-term rental management cost in Seattle?
Perch Luxe is our full-service tier at 20% of what your home earns. Perch Essentials is 10%, offered by invitation to hands-on owners who handle their own repairs. There is no onboarding fee, no supply fee and no restocking fee on either tier. Published Seattle rates run from roughly 10% to 25%, and it is worth reading what is excluded: some managers charge several hundred dollars to onboard, and some bill cleaning separately on top of commission.
How much can I actually make on an Airbnb in Seattle?
It depends on the neighborhood, the home and how it is run, so we would rather model your specific property than quote you a number cold. We will run the data for you using what comparable homes in your neighborhood actually book, and show you the slow months alongside the good ones.
What taxes do I pay on a Seattle short-term rental?
Short-term rental stays in Seattle carry a total lodging tax rate of 15.70% per the Washington Department of Revenue. When you book through Airbnb, Airbnb collects and remits Washington state and local taxes on your behalf and the guest pays them. On direct bookings, that is your responsibility. Washington’s Business and Occupation tax is owed by you regardless of channel, because the platforms do not file it for you. On Perch Luxe we handle the filings.
Is there a per-night city tax on Seattle short-term rentals?
No. Seattle passed one in 2017 and repealed it in June 2018 before it took effect. There is a $4 per night licensing fee, but the booking platform pays it to the City, not the owner or the guest, so it never appears on your statement.
Do I need insurance for a short-term rental in Washington?
Washington State requires operators to carry at least $1,000,000 in primary liability coverage, or to run every booking through a platform providing equal or greater coverage. Your standard homeowner’s policy very likely does not cover short-term rental activity, so this is worth a call with your broker rather than an assumption.
What is winter like for a Seattle Airbnb?
Quieter than summer. Peak summer months book at roughly two to three times what January through April book, so the summer upside is real and the job is making the shoulder months earn. We open and price the calendar early to capture winter demand before the rest of the market does, work the mid-term market alongside nightly bookings where a home suits it, and use the quiet season for the maintenance and photography that protects your summer. We will not promise that mid-term stays fill the winter, but when one lands it lifts a weak month a long way.
Do you only do nightly rentals, or can my home be rented for longer stays?
Both, and it is one of the main reasons owners come to us. We run nightly short-term stays, mid-term stays of thirty nights or more, and business leases where a company signs on behalf of its employees. Mid-term stays and business leases are tenancies rather than short-term rentals, so they run on a full tenancy agreement with credit and background screening and everything Washington and Seattle require. If you would rather not host longer stays, you can opt out.
How long does onboarding take?
Once your home is ready on your side, we take one week to get it live. That covers professional photography, listings for each channel, your pricing strategy set with your revenue manager, a standards inspection and smart lock setup. Getting the home furnished and ready is the part that varies, because it is on your schedule.
Do you manage Airbnb listings, or other platforms too?
Both. Your home goes on Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com and our own direct booking site, plus mid-term channels for longer stays. Perch has been an Airbnb Superhost continuously since 2021 across 120+ homes. For a full list of channels, see here.
Do you manage outside Seattle?
Yes. We manage across the Eastside and North Seattle, on Whidbey and Camano Islands, in the Mt. Rainier gateway towns of Ashford and Packwood, and on Maui. Eastside cities set their own rules and they differ sharply: Bellevue does not permit whole-home short-term rentals in single-family homes, and Redmond introduced its own licensing in January 2026. Ask us before you buy.
What happens after I get in touch?
A real person on our team replies within one business day. If your home looks like a fit we will set up a call and build your revenue model. If it is not a fit, we will tell you that directly rather than leaving you waiting. More answers are on our owner FAQ.
Have a question about the service itself rather than about Seattle? Our main management page covers what is included on each tier, how the team works and what onboarding looks like.
Regulatory and tax information on this page is current as of August 2026 and is provided for general information. Rules and fees change, and your situation may differ. Confirm with the City of Seattle and the Washington Department of Revenue before acting. Perch is not a law firm or a tax advisor.
Beyond the city
Where else Perch manages
Seattle limits most operators to two short-term rental units: your primary residence, and one more. For most owners that is plenty. If you want to go further, Greater Seattle is much bigger than the city, and these are markets we run homes in today.
Whidbey and Camano Islands
Weekend and multi-night leisure demand out of Seattle, with a longer average stay and less turnover cost per booked night.
Ashford and Packwood, at Mt. Rainier
National park demand on a different peak calendar from the city, plus winter access to White Pass from Packwood.
Maui, Hawaii
Our second core market, running the opposite calendar to Seattle. Winter is high season there, so an owner in both markets has a far flatter year than an owner in either alone. We file the Hawaii and Maui returns too.
The Eastside and North Seattle
Bellevue, Redmond, Sammamish, Shoreline, Kenmore, Woodinville and Lake Forest Park. Each city sets its own rules and they differ sharply. Bellevue does not permit whole-home short-term rentals in single-family homes, and Redmond introduced its own licensing in January 2026. Ask us before you buy.
Already at your two-unit limit in Seattle? That is the conversation we are best at. Tell us what you own and we will tell you where the next one should go.
Let’s find out if your Seattle home is a fit.
A real person replies within one business day, and if short-term is not right for your home we will say so.
Email [email protected] · Call or text (206) 258-7041