Hostaway makes you request a quote. Our price is on the page.
Hostaway is a capable PMS and channel manager — this isn't a takedown. The difference is the bill: hostaway.com asks how many listings you have and books a demo, and its booking engine adds a 1.8% fee to what your guests pay. VacayOps takes no fee on your direct bookings and publishes one flat price — the Full Platform at $29/property/month for the PMS, direct connections to Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com, Expedia, Google Vacation Rentals, and Hopper, operations, owner statements and trust accounting, comms, CRM, and AI, with unlimited users.
Same core job. Different bill.
Both are real PMS + channel-manager platforms. The gap is what's included, what's metered, and whether you can see the price without a sales call.
| Capability | VacayOps | Hostaway |
|---|---|---|
| System of record for your properties (PMS) | ||
| Direct OTA channel connections | Direct API connections with Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com, Expedia, Google and more | |
| Published pricing on the website | $29/property/month, on the page | no subscription price — pick a listing count and request a quote |
| Guest messaging & unified inbox | ||
| AI guest responses | AI replies that draft or send, included in the subscription | |
| Task scheduling, checklists & inspections | ||
| Form builder & AI form creation | Drag-and-drop builder; AI drafts a form from a description or rebuilds one from a PDF, Word file or photo of the paper form | Checklist Templates as sub-task lines on auto-tasks; AI form creation not marketed |
| Form answers as automation triggers | A submitted form or a single answer (a “Fail”) starts a workflow — create the maintenance task, notify the manager | Booking-driven auto-tasks and completion notifications; “approval conditions” named, answer-driven triggers not documented |
| Nightly pricing | Rate rules included; PriceLabs natively synced for market data | Native dynamic pricing, rates updated daily |
| Business phone system & recorded calls | lines $7/line/month, unlimited users | not marketed as a Hostaway feature; AI call answering through a marketplace partner |
| Smart locks & thermostats | $5/device/month | Smart-lock management built in (third-party locks); thermostats through marketplace partners |
| Sales CRM & owner pipeline | not marketed natively; Pipedrive, Salesforce, HubSpot and others through the marketplace | |
| Email marketing | Email campaigns, pop-ups and promo codes with Booking Website Pro | |
| Owner statements & owner portal | Customizable statement templates and an owner portal | |
| Trust accounting & three-way reconciliation | included (Full Platform) | Through marketplace integrations such as VRTrust, Clearing and BookingTrust, priced separately — VRTrust from $375/month for up to 25 properties, with volume-tier discounts |
| Owner payouts | payouts recorded — you send them from your own bank, no VacayOps fee | Disbursements scheduled from owner statements |
| When revenue counts on owner statements | Check-in, check-out or night by night | Check-in, check-out, booking creation or calendar-prorated |
| Co-owners of one property | Percentage shares — each owner credited and shown their share | separate owners for sub-units of a multi-unit listing |
| 1099s | 1099-NEC and 1099-MISC rents as IRS IRIS-layout CSV files you upload | through accounting partners such as VRPlatform |
| QuickBooks | QuickBooks Online sync (invoices and bills); your own ledger built in | QuickBooks Online integration, a separate subscription — listed at $4 per listing |
| Per-seat fees | None — unlimited users | billed per listing; no per-user fee published |
| Setup fees | None | $500 onboarding |
| Fee on direct bookings | None — card processing billed by your own processor | 1.8% charged to the guest (every plan using the hostaway booking engine) |
Hostaway column from hostaway.com — feature pages, pricing, marketplace, blog and help center — as of 23 October 2026. Hostaway does not publish subscription rates; the $500 onboarding fee is from its Hostaway-vs-Guesty page and the $4-per-listing QuickBooks price from its QuickBooks integration page (its help center says to ask your account manager about integration pricing). The direct-booking fee is from Hostaway's own direct-booking page as of October 2026. The trust accounting row is from Hostaway's marketplace and vrplatform.app as of 23 October 2026. VRPlatform and VRTrust are trademarks of their owners. Hostaway is a trademark of its owner; VacayOps is not affiliated with Hostaway.
Where VacayOps pulls ahead
The price is public
$29/property/month with exactly two published add-ons: smart devices at $5/device/month and phone lines at $7/line/month. No quote call, no negotiation, no listing-count tiers — the price you see is the price every property manager pays.
More of the stack, one bill
Both platforms hold your reservations, channels and field operations. VacayOps also runs the business phone system and a sales CRM with an owner pipeline — on Hostaway those come from marketplace partners.
Owner accounting in the same books
Hostaway’s own pages point to marketplace partners for trust accounting, owner ledgers and 1099s. In VacayOps they are part of the Full Platform: a running balance for every owner, co-owners split by percentage, and 1099 rent files in the IRS IRIS layout.
Trust accounting in the same books as your bookings
Hostaway offers trust accounting through partners — its marketplace lists VRTrust, Clearing, BookingTrust and others in its Accounting category, each priced separately. If you hold owner and guest money, VacayOps trust accounting is part of the Full Platform: guest payments recorded into trust automatically, owner balances from issued statements, and a monthly three-way reconciliation your accountant can sign off. VacayOps records the money in your own bank — it never holds or moves it.
- A separate trust bank account, or one account with owner money tracked separately
- Plain-language checks for shortfalls and money without an owner
- A reconciliation PDF with schedules by owner and by property
A quote vs a price
You can't compare invoices when one of them is a negotiation. Here's ours.
Hostaway
Custom quoteper listing tier
The pricing page asks how many listings you manage and requests a quote — no subscription rate is published. The prices hostaway.com does show: $500 onboarding, and $4 per listing for the QuickBooks integration.
100 properties = whatever the quote says.
VacayOps
$29/property/mo base
PMS, direct channel connections, operations, owner statements and trust accounting, comms, CRM, email marketing, website builder, and AI — unlimited users. The only add-ons: smart devices $5/device/month, phone lines $7/line/month. Rate rules included; PriceLabs optional, billed by PriceLabs.
100 properties = $2,900/mo — published, same for every manager.
Hostaway pricing approach as shown on hostaway.com on 23 October 2026. Current VacayOps pricing at vacayops.com/pricing · Trust accounting.
What the booking-engine fee adds
Hostaway charges 1.8% on bookings through its booking engine. Your guests pay it, so it raises the price they see on your own site.
Hostaway booking engine
$9,000/yr paid by your guests
1.8% added to the guest’s total on every booking through the Hostaway booking engine, on $500,000 a year of direct bookings. Plan: every plan using the hostaway booking engine.
A $1,000 stay costs your guest $1,018.
VacayOps
$0booking fee
Keep 100% of your direct bookings. No booking fee, no revenue share — card processing is billed by your own processor at its rates. Guests pay through your own Stripe or Slim CD account.
A $1,000 stay costs your guest $1,000.
Hostaway fee as published on Hostaway's direct-booking page, as of October 2026. Card processing is not counted on either side. See how other platforms charge on direct booking fees compared · Trust accounting.
One published per-property price. Rate rules included — and PriceLabs plugs in natively if you want market data.
One login. One bill. Unlimited users. Priced per property. No seat fees, no setup fee, no contract, and no booking fee on your direct site. 14-day free trial — no charge until it ends.