This paper explores the rise of short-term rental (STR) management companies and reveals the transition from a sharing economy activity to the consolidation of a professional industry hinging on what we call ‘corporate hosts’. By relying on interviews with companies operating in Lisbon and Porto, Portugal, we found: first, that a phenomenon of market concentration occurred in which individual hosts have outsourced the management of their properties to corporate hosts; second, that through the use of digital technology and vertical integration, corporate hosts are able to enhance the profitability of large portfolios of STRs; and, third, that corporate hosts imitate practices from the hotel industry, leading to the formation of a hybrid product in which the lines between hotels and STRs have blurred. We argue that corporate hosts constitute a new layer of intermediation that challenges the way we understand the STR industry and the overall functioning of this market.

本文探讨了短期租赁 (STR) 管理公司的兴起，并揭示了从共享经济活动到依赖于我们所谓的“企业托管”的专业行业整合的转变。通过对在葡萄牙里斯本和波尔图经营的公司的采访，我们发现：一是出现了市场集中现象，个别房东将物业管理外包给企业房东；第二，通过使用数字技术和垂直整合，企业主机能够提高大型 STR 投资组合的盈利能力；第三，企业主机模仿酒店业的做法，导致酒店和STR之间的界限变得模糊的混合产品的形成。