World Cup Boom, Rising Rates & What June’s STR Data Says About the Rest of 2026

**Bram Gallagher** (0:05)
Welcome to the STR Data Lab.

**Rohit** (0:12)
Welcome to today's episode of the STR Data Lab. I am Rohit, the CEO of AirDNA, and today we have a special episode with me is my colleague Bram. Bram is an economist from the AirDNA team. Welcome Bram. How are you doing?

**Bram Gallagher** (0:24)
I'm doing very well. Thank you, Rohit.

**Rohit** (0:26)
I'm wearing an Argentinian jersey. I'm a huge Argentinian fan for those of our listeners who don't know. India and Bangladesh got access to Cable TV in 1986 The first time Argentina won the World Cup, Maradona was playing in that World Cup. And for some reason, the whole country loves Argentina and loves big supporters of Argentinian football. So, you know, like World Cup is huge for me. I've been following it as a football fan, but now that I'm in the short-term rental and tourism industry, I'm also following it as a person in the space. So, Bram, before we get into the World Cup specifics, like, give us an idea. Everyone knows that June was one of the biggest short-term rental moments in the US.
How did June look for the US short-term rental industry?

**Bram Gallagher** (1:14)
Well, June was, I would say, it was a...
Nationally, it was a pretty good month. It was a solid month. Our occupancy has declined very, very slightly. But so far this year, it's followed last year's pattern very closely, you know. So as far as demand goes, you know, we had a pretty nice, you know, it was about 2%, which is a little bit higher than last month, you know, but not stellar. But, you know, one of the things that really did surprise on the upside, on the other hand, was rate, which was quite a bit, came in quite a bit stronger than we expected. At around, let's see here, 4.6% year over year. That's the highest it's been since last summer. So, again, but think that the World Cup had something to do with that.

**Rohit** (2:03)
If I'm a host listening to this Bram, how should I try and think about the June trends that you just spoke about? Let's say I'm in a World Cup city, it makes sense. But if I'm not in a World Cup city, one of the 16 cities, how should I think about and interpret this number that you just spoke about?

**Bram Gallagher** (2:21)
Last year, what Jamie and I were describing last year as a sort of a tail of two halves, because the first half of the year was extremely strong, and then the second half of the year was pretty weak.
This year, we're running into the year over year comparisons are running in reverse.
We're actually keeping up really, really well with the first half of last year. That's everywhere, not just the World Cup cities, but all over. So as we enter June, it's kind of, I think, at a turning point. We've been holding very, very steadily along closely with last year's occupancy. And we've pretty much closed the gap. There's a tiny, tiny gap. But I think the second half of the year, we're going to have some really, some easier comps, and it's going to be very, very strong. If you're an existing operator, that rate growth, well, it's really strong in those World Cup cities, but it's also strong in many other cities as well. So that rate has surprised not just this month, but actually we've been building that sort of rate strength this entire year. So I think there's some, I think there's definitely some positives in the data, and also definitely in expectations for the second half of the year as well.

**Rohit** (3:40)
And Bram, you track something that's very unique. It's called the Repeat Rent Index. I believe that grew even faster than ADR.
So why don't you unpack, like, again, keep in mind, I'm a single, I'm a host with one property. I'm listening to the show. What is that? What is Repeat Rent Index? Explain that. What is that number telling you?

**Bram Gallagher** (4:04)
This is a, yeah, that's a great question too. So the Repeat Rent Index of Mark Moreno and Jamie Lane, right? The Real Brain Trust here at AirDNA, they came up with this, this metric. It's like a Case Schiller index in that what it does is it looks at the existing properties that there are there. And it looks at how they're changing their rate. So we know that ADR can also be influenced by the mix. And we all know that STRs, short-term rentals are very high churn business. So you've got people coming in, you've got people coming out. So that can influence the total, the ADR, because if you've got really expensive properties going out and cheaper properties coming in, that can lower the ADR. RRI will take all of that sort of mix shift out and say, well, if you're an existing operator, how much were you able to change rates? So this is for existing operators, I think.