Published April 3, 2026 · By Marquis Stays
If you have ever booked a vacation rental through Airbnb, VRBO, or Booking.com, you have paid more than you needed to. That is not an opinion or a marketing claim. It is a straightforward consequence of how online travel agencies (OTAs) make money. They insert themselves between you and the property owner, charge fees to both sides, and pass those costs directly to you through inflated pricing.
This article explains exactly how those fees work, why booking directly with a property manager like Marquis Stays saves you a genuine 15% on the same properties you see on those platforms, and why the benefits go well beyond just the price.
Online travel agencies are not charities. They are publicly traded companies with shareholders who expect growing revenue every quarter. That revenue comes from fees, and those fees come from you and the property owner.
Airbnb uses a split-fee structure for most listings. Guests pay a service fee that typically ranges from 14% to 16% of the booking subtotal. This fee appears during checkout, often after you have already fallen in love with a property and mentally committed to the trip. On top of the guest fee, Airbnb also charges the host (the property owner or manager) a 3% fee on every booking. So the total platform take on a single reservation is 17% to 19% of the booking value. That money does not go toward your vacation. It goes to Airbnb's operating costs, marketing budget, and profit margin.
VRBO operates similarly, though the fee structure has shifted over the years. VRBO typically charges guests a service fee in the range of 6% to 12%, while charging hosts a commission of 8% or more. Some hosts absorb part of this cost; others pass it along by raising their nightly rates. Either way, the total platform cost on a VRBO booking often lands between 14% and 20%.
Booking.com takes a different approach by charging the host a commission of 15% to 20% on every booking while advertising "no guest fees." This sounds better for the traveler, but the reality is that hosts simply build the commission into their listed nightly rate. You do not see a separate fee line, but you are paying for it all the same. The price is higher because the host needs to cover the platform's cut while still making the same revenue.
The key point is this: no matter which OTA you use, the total cost of your booking includes a significant surcharge that exists solely to compensate the platform. The property you stay in is the same. The towels, the pool, the view, the air conditioning, the kitchen, the Wi-Fi, the property manager who answers your questions at midnight when you cannot figure out the gate code -- all of that is identical regardless of where you book. The only difference is how much of your money goes to a technology company in San Francisco versus staying in your pocket.
When you book directly through the Marquis Stays website, no third-party platform takes a cut. There is no guest service fee. There is no hidden commission baked into the nightly rate. The price you see is the actual cost of renting the property, plus applicable taxes and a standard cleaning fee. Nothing more.
The properties listed on our website are the same properties you will find on Airbnb, VRBO, and Booking.com. We manage these homes on behalf of their owners, and we list them on OTA platforms because that is where many travelers search first. But when a booking comes through one of those platforms, we have to account for the commission in our pricing. When the booking comes directly through our site, that commission disappears, and we pass the savings to you.
On average, this translates to a savings of approximately 15% compared to the OTA price for the same property on the same dates. For a week-long stay in a luxury villa, that can easily amount to several hundred dollars -- money that could fund a private chef dinner, a sunset sailing excursion, or simply stay in your bank account.
There is no catch, no promo code required, and no fine print. The direct price is simply lower because fewer hands are reaching into the transaction. We earn our revenue through the management fee we charge property owners for maintaining, marketing, and managing their homes. That fee exists whether you book through Airbnb or through our website. The difference is that when you book direct, the OTA's commission is removed from the equation entirely.
The 15% savings is the most tangible benefit of booking direct, but it is far from the only one. The experience of working directly with your property manager is fundamentally different from communicating through a platform's messaging system.
Direct communication. When you book through an OTA, your messages are routed through the platform's system. This adds latency, filters out certain types of information (like phone numbers and external links), and creates an impersonal dynamic where you feel like you are talking to a system rather than a person. When you book directly with Marquis Stays, you communicate with our team through direct channels including email, phone, and WhatsApp. If you have a question about a property at 9 PM, you can text us and get a real answer from someone who has physically been inside that home.
Faster response times. OTA messaging systems introduce delays. Notifications can be slow, messages can get buried in platform inboxes, and the property manager has to navigate the same clunky interface you do. Direct communication eliminates all of that friction. Our average response time for guest inquiries is under 30 minutes during business hours and under two hours outside of them.
Personalized concierge service. OTA platforms are designed around transactions, not relationships. When you book direct, you get access to our concierge team from the moment your reservation is confirmed. We can arrange airport transfers, stock the refrigerator with groceries before you arrive, book activities and restaurant reservations, recommend the best beach for your group, and handle any special requests you might have. This level of service is simply not possible when a platform sits between us.
Flexibility with special requests. Need an early check-in because your flight lands at 7 AM? Want to arrange a surprise birthday setup at the villa? Have a group member with dietary restrictions who needs specific groceries pre-stocked? These requests are routine for us, but they are difficult or impossible to coordinate through an OTA's standardized booking flow. Direct bookings give us the flexibility to customize your experience in ways that platforms cannot accommodate.
Every direct booking with Marquis Stays includes a set of services that go well beyond handing you a set of keys and wishing you luck.
Concierge service is included with every reservation. Our team helps you plan activities, arrange transportation, make restaurant reservations, and handle any requests that come up before or during your stay. This is not an upsell or a premium add-on. It is part of what we do for every guest.
Experience booking is streamlined through our team. Rather than spending hours researching and vetting tour operators, surf instructors, and charter boat captains on your own, you can browse our curated experiences page and let us handle the booking and coordination. Every experience provider we work with has been personally vetted for quality, safety, and reliability.
Transparent pricing means no surprises at checkout. The nightly rate, cleaning fee, and applicable taxes are clearly displayed on every listing. There are no service fees, no processing fees, and no hidden charges that appear at the last step of the booking process. The price you see when you browse is the price you pay.
Price match guarantee. If you find one of our properties listed at a lower price on any OTA platform, let us know. We will match that price. This guarantee exists because we are confident in our direct pricing, but we want to remove any hesitation for guests who are new to booking direct.
Numbers are more convincing than promises, so let us walk through a real scenario.
Consider a luxury villa in Guanacaste listed at $400 per night. You want to book a two-night stay for a long weekend getaway.
Booking through Airbnb:
Booking direct with Marquis Stays:
Your savings: $232
The direct nightly rate is lower because we do not need to inflate it to cover Airbnb's 3% host commission. And you do not pay the 14% guest service fee. The combined effect is a 25% reduction in this particular example. On longer stays, the savings scale proportionally. A seven-night booking at the same property would save you over $800.
That $232 you saved on a two-night stay could fund a private chef dinner for your group, a half-day catamaran cruise, or a couples spa treatment. Or you could simply keep it. Either way, it is money that would have otherwise gone to a platform that contributed nothing to your actual vacation experience.
One of the main reasons travelers default to OTA platforms is trust. Airbnb and VRBO are known brands, and there is comfort in booking through a system you have used before. That instinct makes sense. When you book through an unfamiliar website, it is reasonable to wonder whether the property is real, whether your payment is secure, and whether anyone will actually be there to help if something goes wrong.
We take these concerns seriously, and we have built our direct booking process to address every one of them.
Secure payments. All transactions on the Marquis Stays website are processed through Stripe, the same payment infrastructure used by Amazon, Google, Shopify, and thousands of other companies. Your credit card information is encrypted and never stored on our servers. Stripe handles PCI compliance, fraud detection, and payment security at the highest industry standard.
Verified properties. Every property on our website is managed directly by our team. We are not an aggregator or a listing platform. We have physical access to every home, we coordinate cleaning and maintenance, and we inspect each property regularly. What you see in the photos is what you get when you arrive. If something is not right, we are a phone call away and can respond in person because we live and operate in the same communities where our properties are located.
Real reviews from real guests. We encourage every guest to leave honest feedback, and we publish it transparently. You can read reviews from past guests on our reviews page to get an unfiltered sense of what the experience is actually like. Many of our guests are repeat visitors, which tells you more about the quality of our service than any marketing copy ever could.
Responsive support. Unlike OTA platforms where support requests go into a ticketing queue and you wait hours (or days) for a generic response, our team is reachable directly. If the air conditioning stops working at midnight, you are not filing a support ticket with a call center in another country. You are contacting someone who can send a technician to the property that same night.
The trust you place in an OTA is really trust in the brand name, not in the quality of any individual property or the responsiveness of any specific host. When you book direct with a reputable property manager, you are placing your trust in the people who will actually be responsible for your experience. We think that is a better foundation for a great vacation.
Booking direct is not a complicated decision. It is the same property, the same amenities, and the same (or better) level of service, at a lower price and with a more personal experience. The only thing you give up is a platform service fee that was never adding value to your vacation in the first place.
Start by browsing our luxury property listings. Every property page shows the direct price alongside transparent details about what is included. You will also find detailed photos, amenity lists, location information, and availability calendars. On many listings, you can see the OTA comparison price so you know exactly how much you are saving.
If you have already found one of our properties on Airbnb or VRBO, search for the same property on our website. You will recognize the photos and description. The difference will be in the price and in the booking experience that follows.
Have questions about a specific property or want help choosing the right villa for your group? Reach out to our team directly. We are happy to walk you through the options, help you compare properties, and make sure you find the right fit for your trip. No algorithms, no automated responses, no upsell pop-ups -- just a real conversation with someone who knows these properties inside and out.
Your next Costa Rica vacation should be about the beaches, the sunsets, the food, and the memories you make with the people you care about. It should not be about padding a tech company's quarterly earnings report. Book direct, save 15%, and spend that money on something that actually matters to you.
