Perth Airbnb Net Yields Hit 3.0% After All Costs

The gross short-term rental premium is 72% for a 3-bed house in Perth, but after every cost is stripped out the picture looks very different. This article covers both a 3-bed house and a 2-bed apartment because the cost structures differ materially: apartments add body corporate but come with a lower entry price of $454,436 versus $776,814 for a house. The question is not which grosses more, it is which actually lands more cash in your account.

The 3-Bed House Nets 3.0% Short-Term, 1.7% Long-Term

Below is the full cost stack for a median Perth 3-bed house. Short-term rental is modelled self-managed (the default on the dashboard), long-term rental is modelled with an agent at around 9%, which is the standard arrangement in Western Australia.

Airbnb Fees and Utilities Eat Most of the House Premium

The biggest single line item on the short-term rental side is Airbnb fees at $8,252 per year, roughly 15.5% of gross revenue. Other platforms charge differently: Stayz is typically around 5% and Booking.com around 15%, so a host running across multiple channels effectively pays a blended rate. Utilities are the second swing factor: short-term guests expect heating, cooling, internet and consumables all included, so the full $2,892 sits with the owner rather than the tenant.

Insurance roughly doubles when the property shifts to short-stay use, from $1,545 to $3,090, and maintenance is higher too because furnishing replacement is bundled into the short-term figure. Net of everything, the 72% gross premium compresses to a 3.0% versus 1.7% net-yield gap, which is still in favour of short-stay but by a much narrower margin than the top-line revenue suggests.

The 2-Bed Apartment: Entry Price vs Body Corporate

A 2-bed apartment in Perth sits at $454,436 versus $776,814 for the 3-bed house, with monthly rent of $1,932 and a short-stay nightly rate of $221. On a gross short-term basis the apartment averages 1.9% against 1.4% for houses, a gap of 0.5%. Body corporate is the single cost line that houses do not pay at all, and in Perth strata schemes (especially those with pools, lifts or concierge) it can easily run into five figures per year, narrowing the apartment's entry-price advantage once you strip it out of net income.

The practical takeaway is that the two property types are closer on after-cost yield than the sticker prices suggest. A house is effectively paying for its land value; an apartment is paying for amenity-rich buildings through body corporate. Neither is automatically the better investment, and the answer depends heavily on which Perth suburb you are looking at, the age of the building, and how aggressively the strata committee spends on capital works.

Short-Term Rental Breaks Even at 31% Occupancy

The gross break-even for a Perth 3-bed house is 31%, meaning that is the occupancy level at which short-term gross revenue equals long-term annual rent. This is a floor, not a target: the market median occupancy is 53%, comfortably above the break-even line. Below 31%, short-term becomes a worse deal than simply handing the keys to a long-term tenant. Above it, the premium starts to build.

View Perth in the dashboard → Free preview · every bedroom count and property type

Hiring a Manager Costs Around $11,713 on the House

The tables above assume you self-manage the short-term rental, which is the default setting on the dashboard. Hiring a professional short-stay manager in Perth typically costs around 22% of gross revenue, or roughly $11,713 per year on a median 3-bed house. That drops the net yield from 3.0% to 1.5% and pushes total costs up to $41,597.

Whether that fee is worth paying depends on your time and location. Self-management in Perth is realistic if you live locally and can handle guest communication, turnover coordination and maintenance calls yourself. If the property is in a holiday area like Rockingham or Mandurah and you live interstate, a local manager is close to unavoidable. These are city medians; individual suburbs diverge significantly. The dashboard shows suburb-level data for every bedroom count and property type.

Negative Gearing Can Flip the Long-Term Rental Outcome

Australian tax treatment materially changes the head-to-head between short-term and long-term rental, and it does so in favour of long-term. Negative gearing allows rental losses to be offset against salary income: if a long-term rental property runs at a cash-flow loss (mortgage interest plus costs exceed rent), that loss reduces your taxable income. At a 45% marginal rate (income above $190,000), every $1 of rental loss saves $0.45 in tax. At 30% ($45,001 to $135,000), it saves $0.30. Short-term rental properties that are profitable on a pre-tax basis do not get this benefit, because there is no loss to offset.

Depreciation amplifies the effect. The building depreciation allowance sits at 2.5% per year of the building's construction cost for buildings less than 40 years old, and fixtures and fittings (air conditioning, carpets, appliances) depreciate separately. The CGT discount of 50% on gains from assets held more than 12 months applies equally to both strategies. Verify current state and council rules before investing; this is an active legislative area in Australia. The dashboard calculates your after-tax position including negative gearing and depreciation based on your income: enter your salary to see how the tax treatment changes the short-term rental versus long-term rental comparison for your tax bracket.

For a different angle on the same market, Perth's best suburbs for yield ranks the city's neighbourhoods by gross return, and what to buy in Perth covers house versus apartment choice at purchase.

Data reflects market conditions as of April 2026. Source methodology: market score methodology and data sources.

This information is for educational purposes only and should not be considered financial or legal advice. Regulations and market conditions change frequently. Verify current rules with local authorities before making investment decisions.