Founding OfferMonth 1 at 5% — Founding 10 cohort. 10 slots, tiered cleaning guest-paid, no extras.
The Honest Fee Page
What London short-let managers charge — and what they don’t tell you.
Every manager quotes a headline percentage. The difference between them is the second line — the line that never makes it to the homepage. This page puts ours, and theirs, on the same table.
Cleaning (tiered, guest-paid): Studio £100 · 1 BR £120 · 2 BR £140 · 3 BR £160 — all-inclusive of towels, shampoo, toiletries, linen, bin liners and consumables. Charged to the guest at booking, never to the owner.
We make money only when you do. If your month is quiet, our month is quiet. If a booking gets cancelled, neither of us keeps a cut.
The same table, everyone on it
What London managers charge
Published headlines cluster ~12–19%. Effective take-rates land higher — we stay at 10% flat, £140 all-in cleaning, no add-ons.
Snapshot dated 19 April 2026. Fees change — treat this as a starting point and verify each operator’s current T&Cs at the linked source. Where a figure is not independently citable, we use “reportedly” or “operator-dependent” and link to the operator’s own page so you can confirm.
Manager
Headline fee
Hidden / additional costs
Notes & source
Big Ben SuiteUs
5% month 1 · 10% month 2+ · tiered cleaning
None charged on top. Cleaning is tiered by bedroom count and charged to the guest, not the owner: Studio £100 · 1 BR £120 · 2 BR £140 · 3 BR £160 (all-inclusive of towels, shampoo, toiletries, linen, bin liners and consumables). No onboarding fee, no photo fee, no software fee, no marketing fee, no clawback on exit. Founding 10 cohort: month 1 at 5%, 10% thereafter, price locked for life.
Operator-dependent extras not disclosed on the homepage. Trustpilot complaints in 2025 cite onboarding delays and deposit issues — verify yourself before committing.
Pricing is variable / operator-dependent. Headline claim is a return ("30–40% more than high-street lettings"), not a fee. Ask for the fee in pounds before you sign.
Some franchise-model managers — Pass the Keys most visibly — reportedly retain up to 60% of the value of cancelled future bookings when an owner exits, on the basis that those bookings came from the manager's marketing effort. Per public reports, this can turn a clean exit into a five-figure invoice. We do not do this. When you leave, the forward pipeline leaves with you; we only keep the 10% on stays we have already delivered.
Headline percentages assume the listing is live. Some operators' 2025 public reviews — Houst is the one to read — describe onboarding stalling well past the quoted SLA, which means the fee starts but the revenue doesn't. We don't invent a timeline here; instead, read the most recent three months of Trustpilot reviews on your shortlist before signing. Our own contract writes a 7-day onboarding SLA into the agreement, with credit back if we miss it.
The third trap is the long tail: listing-refresh fees, photography retake charges, minimum-stay restructuring fees, early-termination admin, software/platform levies. Most of these are not on the homepage; they live in the T&Cs you receive after you've signalled intent. Our internal audit of London short-let operators catalogues which competitors charge which extras; wherever we could not find a published figure, we left it as 'operator-dependent' on the table above and linked to the operator's own pricing page so you can verify before you sign.
Every claim above is either linked to a public source or softened with “reportedly” / “per public reports” where a figure is not independently verifiable. If any operator wants to correct a line here, we will update it on request and log the change.
Fee Leakage Calculator
See what your current fee really costs you
Enter your numbers. We’ll compare a 10% flat structure to a headline-% + extras structure. No account. Indicative — the real answer lives in your statement.
Enter your monthly gross to see the comparison.
What stays feel like under a 10% flat fee
Real guest reviews — not owner testimonials
We don’t publish owner testimonials yet — we are a small portfolio building trust the slow way. The quotes below are verified Airbnb guest reviews from our Canary Wharf flagship. They speak to the operational standard the 10% fee buys.
“What a fantastic host, and what a fantastic place to stay. The view, looking at the city skyline over the River Thames, simply magnificent. Everything as described, everything worked as it should. Out of all the places we've stayed at in London this is by far our favourite. We hope to stay again in the future.”
Simon · Airbnb guest review · March 2026
“Lovely 2-bed overlooking the Thames. Check-in was easy, Guray communicated well throughout. The apartment was clean and tidy, and had all the amenities required. About a 15 min walk from the tube station and 10 mins from Tesco Express.”
Beth · Airbnb guest review · February 2026
“The apartment was just as described. WiFi worked great. Exceptional view over the Thames with Tower Bridge and St. Paul's just visible in the distance. Direct access to the Thames footpath was great. Walked back and forth to meetings at Canary Wharf.”
The Renters’ Rights Act 2025 brings a two-tier civil penalty regime — up to £7,000 for a first breach and up to £40,000 for a continuing offence — plus a tighter compliance paper trail for every London landlord. An honest, flat-fee structure isn’t a marketing flourish any more; it’s the only way you can see, at a glance, whether your manager is absorbing the new compliance work or invoicing you for it as an “extra.” We absorb it.
Yes — for the management scope listed on this page (listing, pricing, guest vetting, turnover coordination, maintenance triage, compliance tracking, monthly statement and the 24/7 guest line). There is no onboarding fee, no listing-photo fee for the first shoot, no software surcharge, no marketing top-up and no platform fee. Cleaning is tiered by bedroom count and charged to the guest at booking, not to you: Studio £100 · 1 BR £120 · 2 BR £140 · 3 BR £160 — all-inclusive of towels, shampoo, toiletries, linen, bin liners and consumables. If any third-party cost ever needs to be passed through, you see it on the statement before it is billed.
What if my revenue is low — do you still charge 10%?
Yes, the percentage does not change, but the whole point of a flat fee is that you pay less in absolute pounds when the month is quieter. We make money only when you do. If your property is genuinely under-performing its area, the conversation we need to have is about positioning, pricing strategy and seasonality, not about swapping to a higher-fee contract with a different operator. We will tell you honestly if the property is not a short-let fit. Founding 10 owners pay 5% in month one regardless of revenue, then 10% thereafter — locked for life.
What happens if I want to exit?
You give us written notice per the contract and we hand the listing back. We do not retain any percentage of forward bookings as a cancellation penalty — no clawback. Bookings already confirmed through the exit date are managed to their normal conclusion and paid out normally. This is different from some franchise-model competitors whose contracts reportedly retain a share of cancelled future bookings; we wrote the contract to be exit-clean on purpose.
Who pays the cleaner?
The guest does, via the platform cleaning fee. We publish the per-turn cleaning rate in your onboarding pack so you can see the exact amount — it is not a margin we keep. On longer mid-term stays where the platform cleaning fee does not apply, we will agree a per-clean price with you up front and invoice at cost. You will never see a surprise cleaning charge on a statement.
Do you charge for listing photos?
The first professional photography shoot is included — £0. If you want a full re-shoot later (seasonal refresh, furniture change, new building view) we will quote the photographer's day rate at cost and show you the quote before we book. No retouching surcharge, no listing-refresh fee, no photo licensing charge.
How do you make dynamic pricing decisions?
We use a pricing tool that pulls nightly comp data for the postcode and applies rules we set per property (minimum-stay, weekend premium, event uplift for Canary Wharf, last-minute discount floor). A human — the same person on your account — reviews the output weekly. We do not run unattended algorithm-only pricing. You can ask for the rules sheet for your property at any time.
What if the property under-performs?
We tell you within the first 60 days. The review covers area comp data, our booking conversion rate and the listing-level metrics (views, saves, wishlist adds). If the problem is positioning or asset condition, we propose a fix. If the property is genuinely not a short-let fit for where you are, we will tell you to let long and exit the contract cleanly — we would rather be honest than keep a mismatched property.
Can I see a sample monthly statement?
Yes — the Canary Wharf 2BR case study page shows the structure of a monthly statement (gross revenue, platform fees, cleaning charged to guest, our 10%, net paid to owner). Your statement arrives on the first working day of the month with the previous month's numbers, and every line links back to a booking ID you can cross-check on the platform.
Two ways to go from here
See the receipts, or price up your property.
Take the 10% fee for a test drive. Read a sample monthly statement from our flagship, or get an indicative revenue estimate for your own address in 60 seconds.