Should blocked nights count as available?

Pick one rule and hold it. Including maintenance and personal-use nights tells you what the asset did with the whole year, which is the honest figure. Excluding them tells you how well you sold the nights you offered. Both are useful; mixing them across years is not.

Is ADR calculated gross or net of channel commission?

Whichever matches the figure you are comparing against. Market data is usually gross, so a net ADR will make you look worse than you are. Keep both if you can, and label every chart with which one it shows.

Should cleaning fees be included in ADR?

Conventionally no — ADR is meant to describe the rate for the accommodation. Including cleaning fees inflates ADR on short stays and makes properties with different fee structures incomparable. Track cleaning fees separately, against what the turnover actually costs.

How far below the market average is a problem?

There is no threshold worth quoting, because a market average includes properties nothing like yours. The useful test is directional: is the gap widening, and can you name a comparable property doing better and say what it does differently? If not, the gap is probably describing the comparison set rather than your property.

Occupancy, ADR and RevPAR, read against your market

The arithmetic, stated precisely

These three definitions are simple, and almost every argument about a property’s performance comes from two people using slightly different versions of them.

Occupancy = nights sold ÷ nights available. The fight is always over "available": does a night you blocked for maintenance count, and does a night blocked for your own stay count?
ADR (average daily rate) = room revenue ÷ nights sold. The fight is over "revenue": gross or net of channel commission, and whether cleaning fees are in it.
RevPAR (revenue per available night) = room revenue ÷ nights available, which is also ADR × occupancy. It is the number that cannot be gamed by moving one lever.

Write your version of each definition down once and keep it. A property that looks 8% better this year because you changed what counts as an available night has not improved.

Why occupancy on its own lies

High occupancy feels like success because an empty calendar feels like failure. But occupancy is the easiest number in the business to move: price low enough and the calendar fills. Occupancy near the top of its range is usually evidence that you have left money on the table, not evidence that you priced well.

Low occupancy with a high ADR is the opposite trap, and the harder one to spot, because the nights you do sell look excellent. The revenue you did not earn does not appear anywhere.

RevPAR reconciles them. It answers the only question that matters at portfolio level: what did an available night earn, on average, across everything — the sold ones and the empty ones.

RevPAR has a blind spot of its own: it counts revenue, not profit. A property with a high RevPAR and a punishing turnover cost can earn less than a quieter one. Read it next to what a turnover costs you. What a turnover really costs.

What "your market" actually means

A market comparison is only useful if the comparison set resembles your property. City-wide averages mix a studio above a takeaway with a four-bedroom townhouse, and the average of those two describes neither.

A usable comparison set holds these roughly constant:

Bedroom count and sleeps — the single biggest driver of rate.
Sub-area, not city. Two miles can be a different market entirely.
Property type — a flat with no parking is not a house with a garden.
Amenity tier — hot tub, parking, garden, workspace. Each moves the achievable rate.
Guest mix — a property that sells to contractors midweek behaves differently from one that sells to weekend groups.

Market data is a connection you bring rather than something a back office invents. With a PriceLabs account connected, HostHQ shows your figures next to the local market for the same period — included in Complete, and available as an add-on on Core. Connections and add-ons.

Comparing like with like

Even with a good comparison set, three things break a comparison:

Different period definitions. Your February against a market February is fine; your rolling twelve months against a calendar year is not.
Different revenue bases. If the market figure is gross of channel commission and yours is net, your ADR will look worse than it is. Compare gross to gross.
Different availability rules. If you excluded blocked nights and the market figure did not, your occupancy is not comparable.

And one thing that is not a break but feels like one: a market figure is a distribution, not a target. Sitting below the market average is only a problem if the properties above you are comparable to yours and you can identify what they are doing differently.

Pace and lead time: the numbers that arrive in time to act on

Occupancy, ADR and RevPAR are all backward-looking. By the time they tell you a month was weak, the month is gone. Two forward-looking readings give you time to do something.

Pace is how much of a future month is already sold compared with the same point in the run-up to previous months. On-the-books occupancy for August, measured in May, next to what June had on the books in March. Falling pace is a signal that arrives while you can still move a rate.

Lead time is how far ahead your bookings arrive. A property that normally books six weeks out and is suddenly booking two weeks out is telling you something about either your rate or your visibility, and it tells you before the occupancy number does.

A worked example

Two properties, same month, same 30 available nights. The one that looks better is not the one that earned more.

Two properties, one 30-night month
	Nights sold	Room revenue	Occupancy	ADR	RevPAR
Flat A	25	£2,750	83%	£110	£91.67
Flat B	18	£2,880	60%	£160	£96.00

Illustrative figures, chosen to make the arithmetic visible.

Flat A wins on occupancy by a wide margin and loses on RevPAR. It also ran seven more turnovers to get there. Once turnover cost is subtracted, the gap widens further. Occupancy was the number that felt like success and the number that was wrong.

What to actually change

A reading is only worth taking if it changes a decision. Roughly, the map looks like this:

Occupancy high, ADR below the comparison set: you are underpricing. Raise the rate in small steps on the strongest dates first and watch pace.
Occupancy low, ADR at or above the set: check visibility and conversion before cutting rates — photographs, review count, minimum stay, and whether the listing is being seen at all.
Both below the set: this is usually a listing problem rather than a pricing one. A rate cut on a listing nobody is choosing just earns less from the same bookings.
Both at or above the set: leave it alone, and look at cost instead. The revenue side is doing its job.
Strong RevPAR, weak margin: the answer is in turnover cost, minimum stay or the cleaning charge, not in the rate.

Change one thing at a time, and give it long enough to show up in bookings for the period you changed. Moving three levers in a week leaves you unable to say which one worked.

A monthly reading checklist

Reading the numbers

Your definitions of available night, room revenue and stay are written down and unchanged.
Occupancy, ADR and RevPAR calculated on the same revenue basis as the market figure you are comparing against.
The comparison set matches on bedrooms, sub-area, property type and amenity tier.
Pace checked for the next two months, not just last month’s result.
Lead time compared with the same property’s own history.
Turnover cost read alongside RevPAR before drawing a conclusion.
One change made, and a date set to review it.

Common questions

Should blocked nights count as available?: Pick one rule and hold it. Including maintenance and personal-use nights tells you what the asset did with the whole year, which is the honest figure. Excluding them tells you how well you sold the nights you offered. Both are useful; mixing them across years is not.
Is ADR calculated gross or net of channel commission?: Whichever matches the figure you are comparing against. Market data is usually gross, so a net ADR will make you look worse than you are. Keep both if you can, and label every chart with which one it shows.
Should cleaning fees be included in ADR?: Conventionally no — ADR is meant to describe the rate for the accommodation. Including cleaning fees inflates ADR on short stays and makes properties with different fee structures incomparable. Track cleaning fees separately, against what the turnover actually costs.
How far below the market average is a problem?: There is no threshold worth quoting, because a market average includes properties nothing like yours. The useful test is directional: is the gap widening, and can you name a comparable property doing better and say what it does differently? If not, the gap is probably describing the comparison set rather than your property.

Guide · 6 min read

What a turnover really costs

The cleaner’s price is the part you can see. Linen, consumables, replacement and coordination time are the rest of it — and they decide whether a short stay is worth taking.