Most downloaded travel app in US, Hopper now offers home rentals

If your travel style favors short-term home rentals like Airbnb over hotels (or you plan to go that way once you get back on the road) you now have more options.

About 2 million of them.

They are all now bookable on the Hopper travel app, which you may already be using to book flights, hotels, and rental cars.

Launched this week, Hopper Homes has about 2 million global properties listing available, all managed by professional property suppliers, with more being added daily, says Hopper.

"Since our goal is to be the go-to place to book travel, it naturally made sense to expand to Homes given our customer base and their travel preferences," Susan Ho, Head of Hopper Homes told TPG.

Hopper says its users are primarily Gen Z and Millennial travelers who match the general profile of short-term home renters, who skew younger than the U.S. traveler population overall.

In surveys, Hopper found that 40% of its customers prefer homes over hotels and 24% have no preference between the two. Hopper also notes that 44% of its customers book for more than two people, which makes the short-term home rental market an appealing option.

If you are on iOS, Hopper Homes is now live. To access it, just update to the latest version of the app and you'll see a Hopper Homes tile on the home screen. Basic search and booking are live, and the Android version of Hopper Homes should roll out in the next couple of weeks.

Hopper home-rental shoppers can now use the app to filter their search by location, the number of beds and bedrooms (an important search term), bathrooms, pet friendliness, and other amenities such as laundry and outdoor space, but not yet by price. Hopper says in the next few months it plans to add its popular Price Prediction feature, the "Carrot Cash" cash back loyalty bonuses, and a cancellation policy feature.

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"At this point, we don't know the exact cancellation window, but we will aim to be as flexible as possible," says Ho. "We'll be testing to see what level of flexibility customers are looking for and adjust our offerings accordingly."

On Friday afternoon, TPG took a quick look at Hopper Homes offerings for Seattle and a "few miles away" and searched for a pet-friendly home for 2 guests for mid-February. The app said 245 homes were available but gave us just 3 properties to search. One was in Kirkland (11 miles from Seattle), one was in Covington (25 miles from Seattle), and one was in Monroe (32 miles from Seattle).

The total price with fees and taxes for each option was easy to spot. The Kirkland apartment rental, for example, started at $91 a night but would come to a total of $211 a night (with a possible pet fee) once the property fee and taxes were added.

Related: Hopper jumps into the travel experiences game with PlacePass acquisition

So, will Hopper Homes be giving services such as Airbnb, Vrbo and others a real run for their money?

Because people searching for lodging frequently compare hotel and short-term rental options for their trips, adding home-rentals to the Hopper platform is a smart move, says Madeline List, Senior Research Analyst at travel industry research company, Phocuswright. "This can keep shoppers on the Hopper platform if they do prefer a home or apartment rental and help maintain some of the business that may otherwise have been lost to platforms like Airbnb or Vrbo."

But, she adds, don't expect Hopper to unseat the major short-term home rental companies just yet.

"With 2 million rental properties on the platform they don't offer nearly as many rental options as platforms like Airbnb or Booking.com," says List. "Hopper has its work cut out for it when it comes to becoming a go-to option for rentals in the eyes of the consumer."

List adds that while Airbnb has standing advantages when it comes to consumer perception, "It will be interesting to see if Hopper continues to expand the number of rental properties over time, and whether they market to push their rental options as a strong component of their overall offerings."