Denver edges ahead of Columbus on higher occupancy (36.4% vs 32.9%), stronger RevPAR (£53 vs £46).
Head-to-head metrics
| Columbus | Denver | |
|---|---|---|
| Median occupancy | 32.9% | 36.4% |
| Median daily rate | £138 | £146 |
| Median RevPAR | £46 | £53 |
| Active listings | 2,357 | 3,519 |
| YoY occupancy | +0 pts | -2 pts |
| YoY daily rate | +57.7% | +47.6% |
| Regulation risk | — | — |
| Annual night cap | None | None |
| License required | No | No |
Full analysis: Columbus vs Denver
On the money side of this comparison — what a listing actually earns against the nights it has available — Denver finishes narrowly ahead of Columbus. Denver turns its rate and occupancy into £53 per available night against £46 in Columbus, a 15.9% edge on the only yield figure that nets the empty nights out. Denver is the deeper market at 3,519 active listings against 2,357, which usually means better comparables going in and a wider buyer pool coming out. The margin is thin enough that a single strong year in Columbus would close it, so treat the ordering as a lean rather than a verdict.
Denver takes both halves of the yield equation, which is less common than it sounds. It charges more per night — £146 against £138 — and still fills more of the year, 36.4% against 32.9%. A market that leads on price and utilisation at once is normally one where demand has outrun supply, rather than one where hosts are discounting to keep the calendar busy. RevPAR reflects the double advantage at £53 against £46.
That verdict needs a caveat, because Columbus is not simply the weaker market of the two. Nightly rates are also climbing faster in Columbus, +57.7% over the last year against +47.6% in Denver. Columbus is the less crowded of the two — 2,357 active listings to 3,519 — so a well-run property has fewer near-identical rivals to out-rank. If your model leans on that dimension, the ordering above can reasonably flip.
Neither Columbus nor Denver currently has a verified short-term rental regulation record in our register, so the comparison above is a yield comparison only. Regulation is the single largest source of downside in this asset class — an unverified market is an unpriced risk, not an absent one.
The two calendars also behave differently. Columbus peaks in October at 51.5% and bottoms in February at 22.8%; Denver runs from 59.1% in October down to 31.7% in March. Both swing by a similar amount across the year, so neither offers meaningfully steadier cash flow than the other.
Who each suits, then. Columbus suits buyers who want a conventional, lightly regulated entry. Denver answers to the same regulatory profile, so the split between them is operational rather than legal. It is the contrarian side: buying it means buying a market that has cooled. Every figure above comes from the same Inside Airbnb snapshot pipeline on both sides, dated 2026-09, filtered to listings with at least one booking in the last twelve months. Occupancy medians are drawn from 2,357 active Columbus listings and 3,519 in Denver.
Frequently asked questions
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