What airbnb hosts need from their software, from sources outside Wave and outside Nexa:
Wave covers the general bookkeeping side of hosting well. Pro imports bank transactions for banks Plaid supports, merges and categorizes them automatically, and captures receipts, so a host can keep income and expenses in order. The free Starter plan keeps unlimited bookkeeping records, and the app is simple enough to run without an accountant. What Wave does not list is anything specific to short-term rentals. There is no per-night log separating rental days from personal days, which hosts who also stay in the property need to split expenses by days. Nothing indicates it handles the Schedule E versus Schedule C question or tracks occupancy tax apart from rental income.
Nexa also covers general bookkeeping: expenses, bank reconciliation, profit and loss, receipt scanning, and sales tax tracking. It adds a public booking page with intake forms and reminders, which some hosts might use for direct bookings. But it has no per-night rental and personal day log. Nothing stated about it says its sales tax tracking handles lodging tax, or helps a host sort out which bookings the platform covers and which the host handles. It has no QuickBooks or Xero sync, and no marketplace that brings guests. It is software you own and run yourself, with no hosted support desk or vendor-run onboarding.
Over three years Wave Pro is $684 ($19 a month, $228 a year). Nexa is $279 once, or $458.64 with optional Cloud Sync at $4.99 a month over the same period. So Nexa costs less, but price is not the deciding factor here. Hosts who only need to categorize bank activity and capture receipts can stay on Wave, using the free plan or Pro if they want bank import. Hosts who need day-count splits and occupancy tax records should keep that log in a tool built for short-term rental tax tracking, and treat either product as the general ledger underneath it.
Our read for airbnb hosts: Neither tracks personal versus rental days or occupancy tax, so use a short-term-rental tax and day-count tracker, with Wave or Nexa only as the general ledger.
Read on each linked page in October 2026. Check them again before you decide; vendors change plans often.
Wave costs airbnb hosts $228/year at today's list price. Nexa is $279 once for invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking and accounting in one suite — so after 14.7 months it has cost less than Wave, and you own it after that. What it is not: hosted-for-you software with a support desk and a roadmap you can lobby. That is the trade, and the rest of this page is the detail behind it.
Nexa is $279 once, about $23 a month over its first year. Its Drain Guard reads your expenses (from a linked bank, an imported statement, or ones you type in), finds the charges that repeat, and adds them up by the month. Keep or Cut then walks you through them one at a time. Cancel $23 a month of charges you'd forgotten about and Nexa has paid for itself inside the first year, before you count the Wave bill you'd stop paying.
It depends on what you find and what you cancel, so we don't promise a number. In our demo data, Drain Guard finds 5 subscriptions adding up to $110.13 a month. That is sample data, not a customer's.
The verdict for airbnb hosts: Neither Wave nor Nexa is the main system for this work; start with software built for it. Nexa only makes sense beside it, at $279 once against $684 for Wave over three years.
The books, job tracking and scheduling are the pieces of that day. Some tools rent you each piece separately. A few — Nexa among them — bundle the lot and carry their own booking link, with no per-appointment cut. The sections below price both routes honestly.
None of that is a software problem you can buy your way out of in one click — it is why the tool you pick matters more than what it costs. Wave solves some of it. So does Nexa. The difference is what you are left holding in three years.
Today's list price is $19/month — $228 a year, from Wave's own pricing page. Every figure below is that price, multiplied. Nothing is projected.
Nexa: $279 once (or 3 × $99). Over the same three years, that is $405 less.
If Wave raises its price, the three-year cost goes up; if it cuts it, the cost comes down. We don't guess which. Add-ons, extra seats and card-processing fees are not included, on either side.
| Feature | Wave | Nexa |
|---|---|---|
| Invoicing | ✓ | ✓ |
| Scheduling | ✗ | ✓ |
| CRM | ✗ | ✓ |
| Time Tracking | ✗ | ✓ |
| Full Accounting | ✓ | ✓ (SIMPL) |
| Task Management | ✗ | ✓ |
| Works offline | ✗ | ✓ |
| Price | $19/mo | $279 once or 3 × $99 |
| 3-Year Total | $684 | $279 |
| You own it? | No — stop paying, lose access | Yes — forever |
✓ and ✗ for Wave come from its own published feature list. — means the feature isn't in that list, which is not the same as Wave lacking it: check with them. Three years is at today's price.
Straight from Wave's own feature set. If one of these is the reason you pay them, that reason does not disappear because Nexa is cheaper.
Wave is the better call if you need free plan covering unlimited invoices and bookkeeping specifically, or if your team is large enough that per-seat pricing still beats buying software outright.
Wave says it is built for small business owners and solopreneurs at every stage, not accountants. Its page names freelancers, contractors and consultants. (waveapps.com)
What people outside Wave and outside Nexa say:
Read on each linked page in October 2026. Check them again before you decide; vendors change plans often.
Software doesn't do the actual work — it automates the business around it. And that part is the same for every airbnb host: find the work, manage it, bill for it, get paid. Each step has a tool — and the right single tool runs the whole loop, so the handoffs are automatic and you get back to the actual work. Tap a step to see what gets automated.
A lead, a call, a referral — and a quote or estimate that turns it into a booked job.
The part you actually get paid for — with the time, materials, add-ons, and tasks tracked as you go, not guessed at later.
The work becomes the invoice — the hours, the add-ons, the materials, the deposit credited — totaled and sent, instead of re-typed at 9pm.
Paid by card or link, the deposit credited, and what's overdue chased — without you doing it by hand.
You can stitch four separate subscriptions across these four steps, or run one tool that does the whole flow so a booking becomes a job becomes an invoice becomes a payment without re-typing. Either way the goal is the same: less time on the business of the business, more on the actual work. (Nexa is built to be the one — but the honest options for each step are above and below.)
This is the connection that makes the rest worth it. A airbnb host's job already holds the services, the hours, the add-ons, and the materials — so the invoice builds itself from the work instead of you re-typing it at 9pm. Toggle an add-on or nudge the hours and watch it recompute.
You didn't write this invoice — the job did.
Wave plus whatever else you're paying for:
Email yourself this comparison?
The median Airbnb host earns $45,000/year. At $228/year, Wave is a recurring slice of that — paid again every year, whether the year was good or not. Owning the same jobs outright is $279 once, and the slice stops.
Nexa is $279 once. Invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking, accounting — all connected, built for airbnb hosts. You own it like you own your Furnishing and decor for rental property.
An honest fit check — because the wrong tool is worse than no tool.
The honest fit: if you're a solo or small airbnb hosts business that owns its tools and is sick of renting software, Nexa replaces your whole stack for $279 once. If you're scaling into a large team with dedicated admin staff, a bigger platform may fit better — and we'd rather tell you that now than sell you the wrong thing.
Your people are already online — swapping real numbers, tool picks, and war stories. Here's where to find them.
Active community — tool picks, pricing, and day-to-day questions.
Open on Reddit →Active community — tool picks, pricing, and day-to-day questions.
Open on Reddit →Active community — tool picks, pricing, and day-to-day questions.
Open on Reddit →Active community — tool picks, pricing, and day-to-day questions.
Open on Reddit →The books, job tracking and scheduling are the pieces of that day. Some tools rent you each piece separately. A few — Nexa among them — bundle the lot and carry their own booking link, with no per-appointment cut. The sections below price both routes honestly.
I run three short-term rentals, and every checkout starts a clock. Guests leave by eleven, the next ones arrive at four, so the turnover in between has to be perfect: my cleaner strips beds, runs laundry, cleans every surface, restocks coffee, toiletries and paper goods, and sends me photos of each room so I can check nothing was missed before I release the door code. Messages never stop: questions before booking, check-in instructions, the Wi-Fi password at midnight, and the occasional guest who can't find the lockbox in the rain. Pricing is a constant job; I adjust rates for weekends, local events and seasons, and a quiet week means dropping the price before the dates go unbooked. Reviews decide everything, so I respond quickly and fix small problems before they turn into a two-star review. Maintenance is ongoing, a leaking tap or a broken dishwasher found by a guest, and I keep a handyman on call. Local rules on short-term rentals keep changing, so permits, occupancy taxes and registration are part of the job too.
Real airbnb hosts near you who run their business on Nexa — book directly, no platform fee. Are you an airbnb host? Post your business and get found in your area — $2.99 one-time. Or browse every airbnb host on Nexa →
The tools of the trade — each a one-time buy that earns its keep for years.
You paid for these once because good tools last. That's the bar your software should clear too — priced like a tool you own, $279 once, not a subscription that costs more than your kit every year.
We build an airbnb host's guide the same way every time, and we'd rather you trust it than take it on faith. Nexa is our product, so the test we hold ourselves to is simple: a tool only "wins" a job here when it genuinely does that job better for an airbnb host — and where something free, open-source, or buy-once does it better, we say so and link you to it. Where Nexa falls short (payroll is the honest example), we name the alternative outright.
Found something out of date? Prices change and we don't catch every move the day it happens. This guide is published and maintained by the Nexa team; if a figure here is wrong, tell us and we'll fix it — getting it right matters more to us than the sale.
For solo airbnb hosts and small teams, yes. invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking, task management, and full accounting — all for $279 once. Wave may be better if you have a large team (10+) or need enterprise-specific features.
Wave has features like Free plan covering unlimited invoices and bookkeeping and Bank transaction import on Pro that some businesses rely on. For most solo airbnb hosts, these aren't dealbreakers.
At $19/month, Nexa pays for itself in 14.7 months. After that: $228 saved every year.
Yes. Nexa is $279 as a one-time payment, or 3 payments of $99 ($297 total). Either way it's a one-time purchase — no subscription, no recurring fees ever.
Own your tools. Stop renting your software.
Get Nexa — $279 Once