Holiday Rentals in Cultural Tourism Destinations: A Comparison of Booking.com-Based Daily Rate Estimation for Seville and Porto

Abstract

Multiple variables determine holiday rentals’ price composition in cultural tourism destinations. This study sought, first, to test a model including the variables with the greatest impact on tourism accommodations’ prices in these destinations and, second, to demonstrate the proposed model’s applicability to cultural city destinations by identifying the adaptations needed to apply it to different contexts. Two cities were selected for the model application—Seville in Spain and Porto in Portugal—both of which are located in different countries and are well-known cultural tourism destinations. The data were extracted from Booking.com because this accommodations platform has adapted its offer to the sharing economy, becoming one of the most important players in the market, and because research on holiday rentals using data from Booking.com is scarce. The results show that the variables used are relevant and highlight the adaptations necessary for specific cultural tourism destinations, thereby indicating that the model can be applied to all cultural tourism destinations. The proposed approach can help holiday rental managers select the correct tools for determining their accommodation units’ daily rates according to their product and marketing context’s characteristics.