About Hosts & Home Teams | STR and Destination Strategy Think Lab

HOSTS & HOME TEAMS™

THE VISITOR ECONOMY ALREADY WORKS AS ONE SYSTEM.

IT’S TIME WE DID.

Different roles. Same place. One team.

2027 Road Show

Nate Lee, CEO VillaFact

"I've spent the past week looking for my socks. They blew off at the Hosts & Home Teams Think Lab in Oregon. Can't find them and I've been walking around looking like Bigfoot ever since."

David Krauss, Rent Responsibly

“The Lab represents exactly what our industry needs, a space where hosts putting their fingerprints on the destination experience can collaborate on raising the bar. When empowered with shared standards and community support, everyone wins: the host, the guest, the neighborhood, and the destination.”

Annie Holcombe Founder, Annie & Co. · Co-Host, Alex and Annie: The Real Women of Vacation Rentals

“For years, these conversations happened in fragments, if at all. Hosts & Home Teams brings those perspectives into the same room with the intention of building shared language and moving toward actual alignment. A true catalyst for change.”

Tyann Marcink Hammond, Queen of Hospitality

“If you ever get the opportunity to be in a room with DMOs and STRs working together for the benefit of their local economy, I 100% recommend it. Jenn Barbee is shining a light on a piece of tourism that has been neglected, and she knows the incredible economic impact that can happen.”

MISSION: CRITICAL

A DESTINATION CANNOT LEAD AN ECONOMY IT ONLY HALF SEES.

Short-term rentals are no longer alternative accommodations. They are lodging supply, tax revenue, jobs, guest spending and thousands of front doors through which visitors experience a place. Yet in many destinations, they still sit outside the relationships, data and decisions shaping the visitor economy. That is why we created Hosts & Home Teams.

Our first Lab brought tourism leaders, short-term rental professionals and civic voices from across the country into one working room.

The response was immediate: destinations asked us to bring the Lab home, leaders asked for more research and the conversation kept moving long after everyone left Portland.

Turns out, the industry is ready to see the whole system.

$72 BILLION

U.S. short-term vacation rental market, 2025 (lodging only)

1 IN 7

DMOs surveyed say they “have it handled”

DOWNLOAD THE LODGING GAP REPORT

BLOG & ANNOUNCEMENTS

THE LODGING GAP REPORT

AMERICA HAS TWO LODGING ECONOMIES. Its destination infrastructure was built for one. ACCESS THE REPORT Hotels and resorts are counted, benchmarked, represented, marketed, and built into the machinery of destination management. Short-term rentals have become a permanent pillar of the visitor economy. But the systems around

We’ve Reached the Fake-Mustache Phase of STR Regulation

We’ve Reached the Fake-Mustache Phase of STR Regulation Salt Lake City reportedly created fake Airbnb guest accounts to catch people operating illegal short-term rentals. Please pause here and enjoy the visual. Somewhere inside city government, a perfectly respectable employee may have been sitting at a desk

Hosts, Short-Term Rental Operators, and PMGs

For Short-Term Rental Hosts, Operators, and PMGs Who Want a Seat at the Table Hosts & Home Teams™ creates space for hosts to engage with destination systems from a place of context, not assumption. In the lab, hosts meet destination and civic leaders and gain insight

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