Every turnover costs something: cleaning, laundry, a check of the home, and a little wear. A longer minimum stay spreads those costs over more nights. But it also removes the guest who only wanted two nights, and it can leave short gaps between bookings that no one is allowed to fill. Choosing a minimum stay is therefore a trade-off between the cost of turnovers and the cost of empty nights.
What hosts actually choose
Inside Airbnb records the minimum stay set on each listing at the moment of collection. The table below groups active entire homes in three cities by that setting, with the median estimated nights booked per year for each group.
| Minimum stay | Brussels | Antwerp | Ghent | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Share of homes | Median nights booked / year | Share of homes | Median nights booked / year | Share of homes | Median nights booked / year | |
| 1 night | 42.1% | 168 | 55.4% | 84 | 46.6% | 150 |
| 2 nights | 30.5% | 138 | 31.4% | 114 | 36.1% | 114 |
| 3–6 nights | 18.4% | 78 | 7.6% | 40 | 12.0% | 52 |
| 7–29 nights | 4.0% | 60 | 4.7% | 57 | 3.8% | 84 |
| 30 nights or more | 5.0% | 255 | 0.9% | 60 | 1.5% | 180 |
Source: Inside Airbnb, September 2026 snapshots, CC BY 4.0. Active entire homes only (at least one review in the previous twelve months). See sources and method.
Estimated nights booked is a model published by Inside Airbnb, derived from reviews and capped at 255 nights a year.
Read the last column with care. The estimate of nights booked is derived from reviews, and guests on long stays review proportionally less, so the figure for longer minimums is probably understated. More importantly, the groups are different kinds of homes run with different strategies: the table shows how hosts set the minimum, not what would happen if one host changed it.
Thinking about the trade-off
The cost of a turnover. Start with your own numbers: what one cleaning and laundry cycle costs, and how much time it takes to organise. The higher that cost relative to the nightly rate, the stronger the case for a longer minimum.
The shape of local demand. In a city where most visitors come for a weekend, a three-night minimum shuts out much of the market. Where visitors typically stay a week, a one-night minimum mostly adds cleaning work.
The season. A single minimum all year is rarely optimal. Many operators set longer minimums at the peak, when demand is reliable, and shorter ones in the quiet months.
Gap nights. Most channel and pricing tools can automatically lower the minimum for the one- or two-night gaps left between bookings. This captures demand that a fixed rule would turn away, without opening the whole calendar to short stays.
The guests you want. Minimum stays also filter guests. Some hosts use them deliberately to favour families or longer visits over short city breaks, accepting fewer bookings in exchange for calmer stays and less wear.
Test, don't assume
Because the right setting depends on so many local factors, the most reliable method is a simple experiment: change the minimum for a defined period, compare occupancy, revenue and turnover costs with the same period of the previous year, and keep the change only if the whole picture improves.