What is Alcove's Rent Estimate Methodology?

The Alcove rental estimate uses data from thousands of recently leased units on Alcove as well as publicly available MLS data to provide a projected rent range for an address

What is the Alcove rental estimate? 

The Alcove rental estimate is powered by data from thousands of leased homes, and 84% of homes on our platform lease within or above their projected rent range. It reflects what similar homes in the region have recently leased for through Alcove, adjusted for your property’s specific attributes.

What data do we use? 

1. Historical Alcove Lease Data: Homes recently leased through Alcove in your region with the same bed/bath configuration as your property. 
2. Publicly Available MLS Data: We then layer in features of your specific home including but not limited to:
   1. Square footage
   2. Location
   3. Number of bedrooms
   4. Number of bathrooms
   5. Property amenities
   6. Local market leasing dynamics
   7. Seasonality 

How accurate is this estimate?

Alcove’s rent estimate comes from a layered estimation model that blends multiple linear regression, feature weighted scoring, as well as AI-driven pattern detection and other factors. The model evaluates key home attributes (beds, baths, square footage, private bathrooms), neighborhood comps, demand signals, and thousands of historical lease outcomes across our markets. This lets us capture both structural factors and the real-world behavior of Alcove roommates in shared homes.

To validate our approach, we compared Alcove’s predicted rent ranges to the actual pricing of homes leased over the past 12 months:

• 84% of homes leased within or above our projected range

  • 72% leased within the estimate range

  • 12% leased above the upper bound

  • 16% leased below the lower bound

Error Metrics (vs. median estimate)

• Mean error: -3.1%

• Median error: -3.0%

• Standard deviation: 10.3%

• Mean absolute error: 7.9%

• Median absolute error: 5.0%

Performance by Category

Of the 28% outside of the range, 43% were underestimated and 57% were overestimated. 

Why do some homes fall outside the estimate? 

While 72% of homes lease within our projected range, 12% lease above and 16% below.
Homes typically fall outside the estimate for several factors :

What can you do to maximize your home's rental rates? 

1. Ensure your property is in good condition and presentable for marketing materials and tours
2. Access for Tours: 65% of Alcove applicants take a tour before signing a lease. If a property is not available to tour, applicants will often apply and sign elsewhere rather than wait for tour access. This results in a slower lease up period for homes without currently available tour access. 
3. Make timely decisions on applicants, most applicants will deactivate their application and apply to another home if they do not receive a response within 72 hours 
4. Add signing promotions, a $500+ signing promotion typically increases applicant volume by 50% 

Owner Rent Cost Comparison: Airbnb vs. Alcove vs. Traditional Leasing

(What’s actually included in “rent”?)

When comparing rent across platforms, it’s important to understand what costs are bundled into the number you see.

Short-term platforms (like Furnished Finder, Airbnb, VRBO), Alcove’s long-term per-room model, and traditional leases all structure “rent” differently.

The primary difference in rent between Alcove and traditional leasing is utilities and common space furnishing (for 3+ bedroom homes). All utilities and wifi must be included in rent on Alcove - however, any variable usage above $100/room per month can be billed to your tenants and reimbursed back to you. 

All Alcove homes include utilities and Wi-Fi, with tenant reimbursement for usage that exceeds $100 per bedroom
(See policy: Utility Overage Policy & Reimbursements)

Below is a side-by-side comparison of what “rent” typically includes on each platform: