Airbnb and short-stay income calculator for Georgia

What this forecast shows

Letting an apartment by the night to visitors, through Airbnb, Booking.com or a local operator, earns more per night than a long let and costs far more to run. The platform takes a fee from every booking, every stay needs cleaning and fresh linen, someone has to answer guests and hand over keys, the owner pays the utilities, and the apartment stands empty on the nights nobody books. This calculator turns a nightly rate and an occupancy into a year of income and then takes those costs away, line by line, to show what an owner keeps before and after tax, the gross and net yield on the money invested, and the occupancy the apartment needs just to cover its fixed costs.

The defaults describe a turnkey Batumi apartment of about 40 square metres at the average 2Q26 price of $1,960 per square metre, let at the 2025 average nightly rate and occupancy that the data firm Airbtics reported for Batumi: $43 and 54%. The cost lines are our planning assumptions. With these inputs the apartment grosses about 10.8% of its price in bookings, and keeps about 4% after everything. Replace every figure with numbers for the apartment and the operator you are considering. The result is an estimate for planning, not a forecast of what any apartment will earn.

What each field means

Total investment, USD

The price, the purchase costs and the furniture and equipment a short-stay apartment needs. The buying cost calculator gives the first two.

Average nightly rate, USD

The average price per booked night over the whole year, high and low season together, not the summer peak. Galt & Taggart reports an average daily rate of $34.6 for Batumi apartments with up to two bedrooms in the second quarter of 2026; Airbtics reports $43 for Batumi and $41 for Tbilisi across 2025. Check comparable listings in the same building or street.

Occupancy over the year, %

The share of available nights that are booked. Airbtics reports 54% for Batumi and 63% for Tbilisi in 2025, as averages across listings; a seaside apartment is far fuller in summer than in winter.

Nights you keep for yourself

Nights you or your family use the apartment, which are not available to guests.

Average stay, nights

Used to count the stays, and so the cleanings. Shorter stays mean more turnovers for the same income. Three nights is an assumption.

Cleaning and linen per stay, USD

What a cleaner and the laundry cost for each changeover, plus consumables such as toiletries and coffee. The default of $15 is an assumption; ask local providers.

Platform fee, % of bookings

Airbnb's single host-only fee is 15.5% for most hosts; under its older split fee the host pays about 3% and the guest pays a separate fee. Other platforms and operators charge their own commission. If you list on several platforms, use an average.

Management, % of payouts

An operator's fee for running the listing, guests and cleaning, charged on what the platform pays out. The default of 20% is an assumption, not a market rate; enter 0 if you manage the apartment yourself.

Utilities and internet, USD per month

Electricity, gas, water and internet, which a short-stay owner pays. The default is an assumption.

Building charges, USD per month

The owners association's or management company's monthly charge. The default is an assumption; ask the building.

Repairs, insurance and other costs, USD per year

Breakages, replacements, insurance and other annual costs.

Income tax on payouts, %

Owners letting their own home by the night can instead apply for an optional fixed tax of GEL 10 per m² of the let area a month, extended until 1 January 2028, which this calculator does not model; outside that regime our accountant is still confirming how such income is taxed. The default of 5% follows our rental tax guide's working assumption; the separate line shows the result at the 20% general rate.

Assumptions

How the forecast is calculated

Available nights are 365 minus the nights you keep. Booked nights are available nights times the occupancy. Bookings are booked nights times the average nightly rate. The platform fee is taken from bookings, which leaves the payouts. The number of stays is booked nights divided by the average stay, and cleaning is that number times the cost per stay. Management is a percentage of payouts. Fixed costs are twelve months of utilities and building charges plus the yearly other costs. Net income before tax is payouts minus cleaning, management and fixed costs. Tax is the rate you enter applied to the payouts, and the 20% line repeats the calculation at the general rate. The occupancy needed to cover fixed costs is the share of available nights at which what each booked night leaves after the platform fee, management, tax and its share of cleaning adds up to the fixed costs.

The second and third cases use invented inputs to show how sensitive the result is; they describe no particular apartment.

Walk through the default case. At 54% of 365 nights, the apartment is booked about 197 nights, which at $43 brings $8,475 in bookings. The platform keeps 15.5%, about $1,314, so $7,162 is paid out. Cleaning 66 stays of three nights costs about $986, the operator takes 20% of payouts, about $1,432, and utilities, building charges and other costs come to $1,280. That leaves $3,464 before tax and about $3,106 after 5%, or about $259 a month: 4.0% of the investment, against 10.8% gross. If the income were taxed at 20%, the net yield would be about 2.6%. To cover its fixed costs alone, the apartment needs about 16% occupancy.

How to read the forecast

Start with the gap between gross and net. Short stays look generous on bookings and thin after costs: in the default case, more than half of every booked dollar goes to the platform, the cleaner, the operator, the utilities and the building before tax is paid. If your own forecast shows a much smaller gap, check whether a cost line is missing.

Then test occupancy and rate together, because they move together. A new building full of identical short-stay apartments competes on price; Airbtics counted 45% more Batumi listings at the end of 2025 than a year earlier, and Galt & Taggart's average daily rate for Batumi fell by 4.2% year on year in the second quarter of 2026. Run the forecast at the occupancy and rate of a weak year, as the third example does, and decide whether you would still be content.

Finally, compare the result with a long let of the same apartment in the rental yield calculator. A long let earns less per night and asks far less of the owner; for an owner abroad without a trusted operator, the difference in work and risk often matters more than the difference in yield.

Before you let by the night

• Read the building's rules. Some buildings restrict short stays or charge short-stay owners differently; ask the owners association or management company before you buy for this purpose.
• Settle the tax position. Short-stay income is declared in Georgia: you can apply for the fixed tax per square metre until 1 January 2028 or be taxed on the income, as described in our rental income tax guide. Ask an accountant before your first booking, not after your first year.
• Check registration and insurance. The Law on Tourism sets rules for accommodation; whether a private host must register is a question we have put to our lawyer.
• Get the operator's terms in writing. What the percentage covers, who pays for cleaning and repairs, how often you are paid and how you can end the contract.
• Furnish for guests. A short-stay apartment needs a higher standard of furniture, equipment and linen than a long let, and replacements are more frequent; put them in the investment and the other costs.

Our guide to renting out an apartment as a non-resident compares long lets and short stays in detail, including contracts and management.