Why do the data sources disagree so much?
Because they're measuring different things and drawing different boundaries around the same place.
Look at the listing counts. AirDNA counted 192 active Conway listings; Rabbu counted 128. That's not a rounding difference. It's a different definition of what's in the market. Some platforms count any listing that appeared during the period, others only listings available consistently. Some blend Airbnb, Vrbo, and Booking.com; others don't.
Then there's geography. "North Conway" is a village within the Town of Conway, and platforms draw that boundary differently, which produces different numbers for what people think of as the same market.
Occupancy is calculated differently too. A rate based on nights booked out of nights listed as available will run far higher than one based on nights booked out of the whole year, and an owner who blocks the property for personal use in mud season pulls those two figures apart dramatically.
None of these platforms is lying. They're answering slightly different questions and presenting the answers with equal confidence.
How to use them anyway: treat published figures as a range, weight RevPAR over headline occupancy or ADR alone, and plan to the low end. If a deal only works at the most optimistic source's numbers, it doesn't work.
Before you underwrite anything up there, the first question is whether the town permits it. Give me a town or an address and I'll pull the current zoning ordinance language. Two business days, no obligation.
When do White Mountains rentals actually make their money?
Summer carries the year. This is the single most common misconception about the market, because most people assume ski season does.
Rabbu's monthly data for Conway shows revenue peaking in August at an average of $7,758 and July at $6,664. April bottoms out at $1,454, a swing of more than five times between the best month and the worst.
That's worth sitting with. A property that clears nearly $8,000 in August will do closer to $1,500 in April. The winter ski season and the October foliage window are real secondary peaks, but they don't carry the year the way summer does.
AirDNA's market scoring reflects the same thing from a different angle: Conway scores 86 out of 100 overall, but its seasonality subscore is 55, where a smaller gap between the best and worst months scores higher. The market rates well on demand and poorly on evenness.
What this means for underwriting:
- Annual averages hide the shape. A monthly cash flow model matters more here than in a year-round rental market.
- The spring shoulder, roughly April into May and known locally as mud season, is close to dead. Plan for it rather than being surprised.
- Carrying costs run twelve months. Mortgage, taxes, insurance, and heat don't take April off.
- Four-season appeal is genuinely valuable. It means the property earns across multiple windows, which is different from earning evenly.
Which White Mountains towns should investors look at?
The regulatory picture varies more than the market data does, and it matters more.
Conway and North Conway are the region's commercial center and the deepest STR market. The legal position is unusually clear: in Town of Conway v. Kudrick, decided May 2, 2023, the New Hampshire Supreme Court held that non-owner-occupied short-term rentals fall within Conway's ordinance definition of a residential dwelling unit and are permitted in residential districts. Local registration and life-safety requirements still apply.
Lincoln and Woodstock, at the base of Loon Mountain, run a more tourism-oriented regulatory posture with a registration process.
Bartlett and Jackson sit closer to Attitash and Black Mountain, quieter and generally higher-priced per property.
Waterville Valley is a self-contained resort community, which changes both the demand profile and the governing rules.
Franconia and Bethlehem anchor the western side near Cannon.
Every one of these is a separate ordinance. Conway's Supreme Court outcome tells you nothing about what Bartlett allows, because the ruling turned on how Conway drafted its own definitions. Read the town's current text before you make an offer. That's the whole subject of the New Hampshire short-term rental laws guide.
Does property size change the math?
Substantially, and more than in most rental markets. Rabbu's Conway data shows larger properties commanding disproportionate returns, with six-plus bedroom units averaging $133,771 annually against a market-wide average of $42,842.
That's roughly three times the market average, and it reflects how this market actually works: group travel. Ski trips, family reunions, and hiking weekends bring parties that a two-bedroom condo can't host, and there are far fewer large properties competing for them.
The offsets are real. Large properties cost more to buy, more to heat through a New Hampshire winter, more to clean and turn, and they concentrate your risk in one asset. Occupancy limits tied to bedroom count and septic capacity are common in these towns, so the number of bedrooms you can legally advertise may be lower than the number the house has.
What about financing?
Conventional lenders generally won't count projected short-term rental income, which is why most buyers in this market use DSCR loans, underwritten against the property's income rather than the borrower's tax returns.
Given the seasonality, be careful about which income figure the loan is sized on. A DSCR calculation built on a full-year average smooths over the fact that the property earns most of its money in three months, and that shape is what determines whether you can actually cover carrying costs in April.
