THE AIRBNB COMMUNITY contributed an estimated €74 million to regional and rural communities across Ireland in the last year.

That’s according to an Airbnb report entitled “Home-Sharing: Empowering Regional & Rural Ireland”.

This includes €47 million of estimated visitor spending by driving extra footfall to local businesses and €27 million earned by the hosts themselves.

Some highlights of the report include:

• In the past year alone, 11,000 unique hosts welcomed over 650,000 guests to their homes across Ireland (including Dublin).
• There were 331,000 inbound guests to regional and rural Ireland in the past year staying an average of 2.6 nights each visiting for holiday and leisure.
• In the last year, 6,000 hosts in regional and rural Ireland have earned an average additional income of €2,700 per household.
• 44% of hosts in the regional and rural report said that they are using the income to make ends meet.
• It is worth noting that in Dublin, 88% of hosts share their primary residence. Outside of Dublin this figure is 64% and includes many traditional holiday destinations.
• 82% of guests said that Airbnb accommodation would make them more likely to return and 85% of guests chose Airbnb accommodation because they wanted to ‘live like a local’

Global Head of Customer Experience at Airbnb, Aisling Hassell said,

This report shows the positive impact this new form of tourism is having on more remote parts of the country that haven’t traditionally benefited from tourism, enabling guests to experience some of the most beautiful parts of The Emerald Isle, away from the typical holiday destinations.

The report is an analysis of all travel to, and within, regional and rural Ireland outside of Dublin, from September 2015 through to August 2016.

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