KEY TAKEAWAYS
- Surfside Beach is a small, boutique management market served by local operators, a few franchise brands and national platforms.
- The Village of Surfside Beach requires short-term rental owners to register the property with the Village before advertising or renting it (annual registration, expires Dec 31) and remit the 5% Village hotel occupancy tax quarterly — on top of the 6% state HOT, 11% combined. Getting this wrong is the most expensive mistake an owner can make here.
- Industry guides commonly cite full-service fees of roughly 20–35% of revenue, and many managers calculate it on gross booking revenue. Hooray Stays starts at 20% of net nightly revenue — a different number on the identical reservation.
- Hooray Stays owners Matt and Carissa Codd are Gulf Coast operators running their own short-term rentals, not a national brand with a regional contractor list.
- Every reservation includes a $1,500 damage waiver and a signed rental agreement with government-issued ID from every guest. Consumables, quarterly in-person visits and daily human revenue management are included.
Surfside Beach Is a Small Market — and That Changes Everything 🏖️
Surfside Beach is a village of a few hundred permanent residents sitting between the San Luis Pass and the mouth of the Brazos, with Surfside Jetty Park at one end and miles of drive-on sand at the other. It draws a steady, loyal, year-round mix: families in summer, anglers and birders in the shoulder seasons, and Houston day-trippers whenever the weather turns good.
The management landscape reflects that scale: a handful of local operators, a few franchise and regional brands, and national platforms that list Surfside coverage. Compare that to Houston or Galveston, which are much larger markets.
That is genuinely good news for owners. In a boutique market, the quality of the individual managing your home matters far more than the size of the brand behind them — and you have a realistic chance of being a meaningful client rather than a row in a spreadsheet.
The Compliance Question Most Owners Underestimate ⚖️
Surfside Beach is more formal about short-term rentals than much of the Texas coast, and this is the single most important thing to establish before you sign with anyone. Under Village ordinance, anyone intending to rent a property on a short-term basis — defined as less than 30 days per renter — must:
- Register the property with the Village of Surfside Beach, and do so before the property is advertised or rented. Registration is annual and expires December 31.
- Pay the Village’s short-term rental registration fee
- Remit hotel occupancy tax to the Village — 5%, reported quarterly (due April 20, July 20, October 20 and January 20), with all taxable income reported. File even if no tax is due. This Village tax sits on top of the 6% state hotel occupancy tax, for 11% combined.
Two things worth flagging. First, the Village has revised its registration fee — council approved a new annual short-term rental fee, so confirm the current amount directly with the Village rather than relying on any figure you read online, including ours. Second, and more important: these obligations sit with you, the owner — not with your management company — regardless of what your manager does or does not do about them. Airbnb and Vrbo typically remit only the state tax, so the owner is responsible for the 5% Village tax.
A manager who cannot tell you, precisely and in writing, who files what and when is a manager leaving your exposure on the table. The Village can be reached on (979) 233-1531, and the current rules live on the Village’s own Short-Term Rental & Hotel Occupancy Tax page.
Hooray Stays helps owners work out exactly what applies to their address, and can handle the permitting process on their behalf for a fee. It is unglamorous work and it is the reason a lot of Surfside owners sleep better.
The Real Cost of STR Management in Surfside 💰
Industry guides commonly cite full-service management fees of roughly 20–35% of revenue, and many managers calculate their percentage on the gross booking total (source). Some national platforms advertise much lower headline rates for reduced-service tiers. Those headline rates are not lies, but they are not comparable either, because the number that matters is what the percentage is charged on.
Gross means everything the guest pays, cleaning fee included. At Hooray Stays, net means net nightly revenue: the nightly rate after the booking platform’s host fee, with cleaning fees and taxes excluded. The cleaning fee is not income — it is a bill you pay a cleaner. Charging commission on it means charging you a percentage of someone else’s wages.
A Worked Example: A $300/Night Surfside Beach House
Hypothetical example, not a market forecast. Exact terms vary by property and agreement.
A four-night summer booking at $300 a night with a $200 cleaning fee:
- Gross booking: $1,200 nightly + $200 cleaning = $1,400
- Manager at 25% of gross: $350 fee — and you still owe the cleaner $200.
- Manager at 30% of gross: $420 fee.
- Hooray Stays at 20% of net: the fee is calculated on net nightly revenue — the $1,200 less the platform host fee (illustrative 15.5%, about $186), or about $1,014 — not the $1,400. That’s about $203, with the cleaning fee passing straight through and never generating commission.
On this single hypothetical booking the spread between the 30%-of-gross manager and 20%-of-net is about $217. Across a season of summer weekends, that is a real number.
The question to ask every manager you interview: “Twenty-something percent of what, exactly — and is the cleaning fee inside or outside that base?” Get it in writing.
Who Actually Manages Vacation Rentals in Surfside Beach 🔍
An honest map of the field, because you should be comparing us against real alternatives rather than a straw man.
The local market leaders
Local operators active in Surfside Beach include The 979 Crew, 979 Vacation Property Services (based in Freeport) and Coastal Sisters Rentals (Surfside-based, which states 20-plus years of combined property management and real estate experience). These are serious local operators and any of them belongs on your shortlist.
Franchise and regional operators
PMI Surfside Beach Bay brings the franchise back office — bookings, inspections, maintenance coordination and formal accounting. iTrip Texas Coastal is a franchise operation covering this stretch of coast. Home Team Luxury Rentals concentrates on the upper end of the market.
National platforms
Awning, Summer and Guestable all list Surfside Beach coverage. If you want scale and self-service tooling more than you want a relationship, they are worth a look.
Where Hooray Stays fits
We are a small, deliberately local operator. What we offer is a specific stack: commission starting at 20% of net rather than gross, consumables included with no markup, daily human revenue management rather than an algorithm on autopilot, quarterly in-person walk-throughs, and real help with the village’s registration and hotel occupancy tax requirements.
Matt answers the phone himself at (832) 224-6713. That is the operating model, not the marketing — and it works precisely because we do not manage a thousand doors.
What Surfside Properties Need That Software Cannot Provide 🛠️
Pricing software is useful and we use it. But an algorithm does not know that San Luis Pass is fishing well this week, that a red tide advisory just went out, that beach access is restricted after a storm, or that a Brazoria County event is about to fill every house south of the bridge. On a coastline this specific, those judgement calls are where the revenue actually is.
What local management actually looks like here
- Turnovers built for beach traffic — sand management, outdoor rinse areas, cooler and fishing-gear realities, and same-day turns on peak weekends.
- Salt-air preventative maintenance — scheduled HVAC servicing, hardware and hinge checks, exterior inspections before failures become guest complaints.
- Village compliance — hotel registration with the Village, the registration fee, and quarterly 5% Village hotel occupancy tax reporting tracked properly rather than remembered in a panic.
- Guest vetting proportionate to the market — signed rental agreement and government-issued ID from every guest.
- Quarterly in-person visits — a human physically inside your property four times a year, documenting condition with photographs.
What you get on day one
- Full photographic, item-level onboarding documentation of contents and condition
- $1,500 damage waiver on every reservation
- Consumables and guest supplies included — no markup
- Listing built and distributed across Airbnb, Vrbo and Booking.com, plus direct booking
- Daily human revenue management from the first night
- Annual human-trafficking-prevention certification held by every team member
- Setup fee waived on select longer-term agreements; 30-day notice to cancel
- First 30 days of management commission-free (current promotion)
The Practical Timing Argument ⏰
Surfside’s demand is concentrated into summer weekends and holidays, and the booking window for those dates opens months in advance. Pricing, photography and listing quality have to be right before the window opens, not during it. Changing managers mid-season means paying for a transition at the exact moment your calendar matters most; changing in the shoulder season costs almost nothing.
If your current arrangement is not working, the cheapest month to fix it is always the one before you need it.
Frequently Asked Questions ❓
How much do Airbnb management companies charge in Surfside Beach TX?
Industry guides commonly cite full-service management fees of roughly 20–35% of revenue, and many managers calculate their percentage on gross booking revenue; some national platforms advertise lower rates for reduced-service tiers. Hooray Stays starts at 20% of net nightly revenue. Headline percentages are not comparable across companies until you establish the base they are calculated on.
Do I need a permit to run a short-term rental in Surfside Beach?
Yes. Under Village ordinance, anyone intending to rent a property for less than 30 days per renter must register that property with the Village of Surfside Beach before advertising or renting it (registration is annual and expires December 31), pay the Village’s registration fee, and remit the 5% Village hotel occupancy tax quarterly (due April 20, July 20, October 20 and January 20, even if zero is due). Combined with the 6% state tax, that is 11%. Airbnb and Vrbo typically remit only the state tax. The registration fee has been revised recently, so confirm the current amount with the Village on (979) 233-1531. These obligations sit with the owner, not the management company. Hooray Stays helps owners work out what applies to their property and can handle the process for a fee.
What is the difference between gross and net STR management fees?
Gross includes everything the guest pays, including the cleaning fee. At Hooray Stays, net means the nightly rate after the booking platform’s host fee, with cleaning fees and taxes excluded. Since the cleaning fee is passed straight to a cleaner and never kept by the owner, a commission charged on gross is partly a commission on someone else’s wages. In our hypothetical $1,400 gross booking, the difference between 30% of gross and 20% of net is roughly $217.
Who manages vacation rentals in Surfside Beach?
Local operators active in Surfside Beach include The 979 Crew, 979 Vacation Property Services and Coastal Sisters Rentals, alongside franchise brands such as PMI and iTrip and national platforms. Compare any manager on the fee base, what is included, and how often someone visits in person.
Does Hooray Stays charge extra for supplies and consumables?
No. Guest consumables are included at no markup. Owners should always ask any manager whether supplies are passed through at cost, marked up, or billed separately each month.
How does Hooray Stays protect a Surfside Beach property from parties and damage?
Every reservation carries a $1,500 damage waiver. Every guest signs a rental agreement and provides government-issued ID before arrival. Quarterly in-person inspections back that up with documented condition reports.
Talk to an Actual Person
If you own a beach house in Surfside Beach and you want a straight answer about what it should be earning — and whether your permitting is actually in order — see our Surfside Beach vacation rental management page and what’s included in Hooray Stays property management, request a free rental income estimate, or call Matt at (832) 224-6713. No pitch deck, just the numbers.