What Fernandina Beach Hosts Earned Last Year on 1,052 Listings

Sep 2

15 min read

Fernandina Beach Centre Street, Fort Clinch, or Amelia Island shoreline, no people in foreground

Fernandina Beach is a $40,738 typical-revenue market on 1,052 active short-term rental listings, based on Air ROI's extract for the August 2025 through July 2026 window. That figure sits alongside an average daily rate of about $449, occupancy of about 36.2 percent, and revenue per available room of about $157. Together, those four numbers form the core of what this report walks through: what listings actually earned, how the market is growing, who is booking, and what a host needs to confirm at the regulatory desk before operating in this specific town in 2026.

This report treats two years, and two cities, as separate lines rather than blending them together. The August 2025 through July 2026 window described here is a specific, bounded extract, not an ongoing average, and it should not be quietly extended into remaining 2026 figures without a fresh pull. Jacksonville listings earned about $17,686 last year from 2,416 active rentals on the same extract window, a materially different market that sits geographically close to Fernandina Beach but should never be merged into its revenue figures.

What follows covers the confirmed revenue and occupancy baseline, the year-over-year growth and supply trend, the seasonal pattern including a genuine inconsistency in the underlying data, the guest profile, and the specific regulatory desks, city, state, and county, a host needs to confirm before advertising a Fernandina Beach listing in 2026. This is not legal advice.

Typical Listings Earned About $40,738 Last Year

Active supply in this sample is 1,052 listings, and typical revenue across that sample was about $40,738 for the August 2025 through July 2026 window. This is a market-wide typical figure rather than a per-property guarantee, and it should be read as a benchmark for comparison rather than an expected outcome for any specific address.

The average daily rate behind that revenue figure is about $449, with occupancy across the sample at roughly 36.2 percent. Multiplying those figures across a year produces the extract's reported revenue-per-available-room figure of about $157. All three numbers, ADR, occupancy, and RevPAR, describe the same 1,052-listing pool over the same window, and a host or analyst using these figures should keep them tied together rather than mixing an ADR figure from one period with an occupancy figure from another.

It is worth being precise about what this figure is not. It is not a city registration count, not a tax filing total, and not a guarantee of what any individual listing will earn. It is a market-wide typical drawn from an active-listings extract, useful for benchmarking a specific property's performance against the broader Fernandina Beach market, but not a substitute for that property's own operating history.

Two Years Sit Next to Each Other, Not Inside Each Other

This report's figures describe the August 2025 through July 2026 window specifically. As remaining 2026 unfolds, hosts and analysts should treat this window as a discrete, dated extract rather than an evergreen figure that automatically updates itself. A market moving as quickly as this one, with 23.2 percent year-over-year supply growth described below, will not look identical from one extract to the next, and confirming a fresh pull before making significant 2026 decisions is a reasonable practice rather than an excessive one.

The same discipline applies across cities. Jacksonville listings earned about $17,686 last year from 2,416 active rentals on the same extract window used for Fernandina Beach's figures. That is a separate city, a separate guest pool, and a separate zoning and permitting authority. A host operating in both markets, or an analyst preparing a regional report, should file each city's figures on its own line rather than producing a single blended average that would misrepresent both markets.

Named event weekends on the local calendar are a similar case for precision. The research behind this report treats named events as demand signals only, meaning increased search interest and inquiry activity around those dates, not confirmed booked-out occupancy. A market report that treats every named event as a guaranteed full-occupancy weekend for the town as a whole would be overstating what this sample actually supports.

Revenue Growth Is Outpaced by Supply Growth

Year over year, Fernandina Beach revenue in this sample is up about 5.9 percent, while supply is up about 23.2 percent over the same period. That is the single most important trend line in this report for anyone evaluating the market's trajectory into 2026: a much larger increase in the number of competing listings than in the pool of revenue those listings are competing for.

This does not mean every individual listing is earning less than it did previously; a well-positioned, well-managed property can still outperform the market typical even in a market adding supply quickly. But it does mean that the market as a whole is becoming more competitive at a pace that outstrips its revenue growth, and any 2026 projection that assumes flat or improving per-listing conditions without accounting for this supply trend is likely overly optimistic.

For hosts and prospective buyers, this trend line argues for realistic underwriting rather than an extrapolation of the strongest recent months forward indefinitely. A market with revenue growing at roughly a quarter the pace of its own supply growth is a market where standing out through pricing, presentation, and guest experience matters more with each passing extract, not less.

The Seasonal Pattern, and Where the Data Disagrees With Itself

The extract identifies March, June, and April as the strongest revenue months for Fernandina Beach listings, a pattern consistent across the research reviewed for this report. A 2026 market strategy, whether for pricing, marketing, or acquisition timing, should weight those three months heavily, since they appear to carry a disproportionate share of the market's annual revenue relative to the rest of the calendar.

This report is direct about a place where the underlying data does not agree with itself: different parts of the research point to different months, December, January, or April depending on which figure is read, as the market's weakest stretch, and one part of the research explicitly separates a revenue hole in April from an occupancy low in January, two different claims about two different months. Rather than resolve that inconsistency with a guess, this report names it and recommends a fresh Air ROI pull to confirm the current slow-season pattern before it goes into any 2026 planning document with full confidence.

What is not in dispute across the research is the general shape of the seasonal curve: a strong spring stretch anchored by March, with real seasonal softness elsewhere on the calendar. The specific identity of the softest month is the detail that needs independent confirmation rather than reliance on this report alone.

Who Is Actually Booking Fernandina Beach

Guest-origin data behind this report shows most Fernandina Beach visitors arriving from Atlanta, with Jacksonville as the second-largest origin market. That regional, drive-market guest profile is meaningfully different from a fly-in beach-destination pattern, and it should shape how listings are marketed, priced, and described for a 2026 audience.

Typical stay length across the sample is about 5.5 nights, notably longer than a quick weekend visit, with an average lead time of roughly 72 days between a guest's first search and their eventual booking. For a 2026 host or operator, that combination argues for listing content and pricing structures built around a near-week-long stay rather than a two-night minimum default, and for seasonal content published well ahead of the March, June, and April peak rather than adjusted reactively once the peak has already begun.

About 50.4 percent of the 1,052-listing sample already uses a 30-night minimum stay setting, a meaningful share of the market betting on longer, extended-stay guests over the market's more typical 5.5-night visitor. This report does not confirm how that half of the market is performing relative to the shorter-stay half, and a host considering the same strategy should weigh their own inquiry history rather than assume the setting alone converts short-stay demand into long-stay bookings.

Professionally managed listings make up about 67.3 percent of the sample, meaning a majority of the competing field already has some form of professional marketing or management behind it. Independent hosts still run a meaningful minority of this market, and this report does not confirm which group, professionally managed or independently run, is outperforming the other on the confirmed $40,738 typical revenue figure.

The Regulatory Desks a 2026 Operator Needs to Confirm

Fernandina Beach short-term rentals fall under the City of Fernandina Beach's Resort Rental Dwelling Permit framework. Remaining short-term use runs through R-3 zoning, or through R-1 and R-2 parcels grandfathered before October 3, 2000, a hard cutoff date worth checking against any specific parcel before assuming short-term rental eligibility. Remaining Resort Rental Dwelling Permit information sits at fbfl.us or through the city's line at 904-310-3135.

Beyond city zoning, operators need a current Florida public lodging license through the Department of Business and Professional Regulation, and current Nassau County tourist development tax registration, reachable at nassautaxes.com or 904-491-7420. This report does not confirm current-year dollar amounts for permits, renewals, or specific tax rates, and does not guess them; those figures should be confirmed directly with each respective desk before they go into a 2026 operating budget.

Unincorporated Nassau County sits under a separate regulatory framework from the City of Fernandina Beach itself, and a property just outside city limits should not assume the city's permit framework applies to it. Confirming which specific jurisdiction a parcel sits in is a prerequisite step before any of the city-specific permit information in this report can be applied to that property.

None of these regulatory figures are drawn from the same Air ROI extract as the market's revenue and occupancy figures. Revenue data describes what active listings are earning; permit and registration data describes a separate compliance system entirely, and a complete 2026 operating picture requires confirming both, not substituting one for the other.

Confirming remaining Florida sales tax on lodging under 30 days is a similar, separate step, since state sales tax obligations are administered through the Florida Department of Revenue rather than through the city permit office or the county tourist development tax office. A 2026 operator should expect to interact with at least three distinct government layers, city, county, and state, each with its own registration, its own renewal calendar, and its own point of contact, and should build a compliance calendar that tracks each one independently rather than assuming a single annual renewal covers every layer at once.

Building a 2026 Operating Plan From This Report

A defensible 2026 plan for a Fernandina Beach short-term rental should carry the following, each on its own clearly labeled line: the $40,738 typical revenue figure with its $449 ADR, 36.2 percent occupancy, and $157 RevPAR; the 5.9 percent revenue growth against 23.2 percent supply growth; the March, June, and April peak framing, with an explicit note that the slow-season month needs a fresh confirmation before being finalized; the guest-origin and stay-length data shaping content and pricing; and the full regulatory checklist across city, state, and county, each confirmed at its own current source.

Jacksonville's $17,686 and 2,416-listing figures belong in this plan only as a labeled comparison point, never blended into the Fernandina Beach figures above it. Any operator working in both markets should maintain two entirely separate 2026 planning documents rather than one that averages the two cities together.

This report is built entirely from the confirmed Air ROI extract and the regulatory research behind it, with no guessed dollar figures beyond what the data actually supports. Where the data is genuinely inconsistent, on the identity of the slowest month specifically, this report says so rather than resolving it with a guess. A 2026 operator should treat this report as the starting frame for that year's planning, refreshed against current data before it goes into a final closing, marketing, or budgeting document.

How This Report Was Built, and Its Limits

This report is built from a live Air ROI market extract covering active Fernandina Beach short-term rental listings for the August 2025 through July 2026 window, cross-referenced against research on the City of Fernandina Beach's short-term rental regulatory framework. The revenue, occupancy, ADR, and RevPAR figures come from the listings extract specifically; the zoning, permit, and licensing information comes from separate municipal, state, and county sources, and the two categories of data were never designed to be merged into a single number.

A market extract of this kind has real, specific limits worth naming plainly. It captures what currently active listings are charging and how often they are booking, which is useful for benchmarking, but it cannot explain why any individual property over- or under-performs the market typical, since that depends on factors like a listing's specific location, condition, photography, and management quality that a market-wide extract does not capture at the individual property level. It also cannot substitute for a direct records check on any specific parcel's zoning status or permit history, since that information lives with the City of Fernandina Beach, not with a booking-platform data extract.

This report also does not claim completeness on every possible question a 2026 operator might have. It does not, for example, confirm current-year permit fee dollar amounts, since those were not reliably present in the underlying research and this report declines to guess them. Where a gap like that exists, the responsible move is to name the gap and point to the correct primary source, which is the approach taken throughout this report rather than filling every gap with an estimate presented as fact.

What Changes Between Now and the Rest of 2026

The figures in this report describe a specific, dated extract, and a market moving at 23.2 percent annual supply growth is not going to look the same by the time remaining 2026 unfolds. New listings will continue entering the Fernandina Beach market, some existing listings will exit or change management, and the $40,738 typical revenue figure, along with the 36.2 percent occupancy and $449 ADR behind it, should be expected to shift, potentially meaningfully, over the course of the year.

The regulatory side of this report is similarly subject to change independent of the market data. Permit fees, renewal terms, and tax rates at the city, state, and county level are set through their own separate processes and calendars, unconnected to the Air ROI extract window this report otherwise relies on. A host or operator should not assume that a fee figure confirmed in one part of 2026 will still be accurate later in the year without checking again.

For a report like this to stay useful, it needs periodic refreshing rather than a single one-time read. A reasonable practice for an active Fernandina Beach operator is to pull a fresh market extract at least once or twice a year, ideally timed around the March, June, and April peak-season planning window, and to re-confirm regulatory figures with the City of Fernandina Beach, the Department of Business and Professional Regulation, and Nassau County on a similar cadence, rather than treating any single year's figures as permanently settled.

This is particularly true for a host who is comparing this year's figures against a prior year's report or projection. A $40,738 typical revenue figure from this sample should not be assumed to carry forward unchanged into a future comparison without noting the specific window it describes, since a reader encountering last year's report and this year's report side by side needs to know both are dated snapshots, not a single continuously updating figure. Labeling every figure with its extract window, as this report does throughout, is the simplest safeguard against that kind of confusion.

Reading This Report Alongside a Buyer, Marketing, or Compliance Plan

This market report is designed to sit underneath three related but distinct kinds of planning documents a Fernandina Beach operator might build for 2026: a buyer's underwriting packet, a marketing and pricing plan, and a compliance checklist. Each of those documents should pull from this report's confirmed figures, the $40,738 typical revenue, the 5.9 percent versus 23.2 percent growth gap, the March, June, and April peak, and the regulatory desks named above, but each will also need additional, document-specific detail that this market-wide report does not attempt to provide.

A buyer's packet, for instance, needs property-specific detail this report cannot supply, since a market-wide extract does not know the condition, exact location, or specific zoning history of any single parcel. A marketing plan needs a listing's actual photography, copy, and platform presence, none of which this report addresses directly. And a compliance checklist needs the actual current fee amounts this report deliberately does not guess. This report's role is to be the accurate, confirmed foundation those three documents can build on, not to replace any of them.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much did typical Fernandina Beach short-term rental listings earn last year?

Typical listings earned about $40,738 across the August 2025 through July 2026 window, based on Air ROI's extract covering 1,052 active rentals. That figure represents a market-wide typical rather than a guarantee for any specific property. Individual listing performance varies based on location, condition, presentation, and management, so this number is best used as a benchmark for comparison rather than an expected outcome for a particular address.

What was the average daily rate and occupancy for Fernandina Beach listings?

The average daily rate across the sample was about $449, with occupancy at roughly 36.2 percent, producing revenue per available room of about $157. These three figures come from the same 1,052-listing extract for the same window and should be read together as a consistent picture of the market rather than mixed with figures from a different time period or a different data source.

How fast is the Fernandina Beach short-term rental market growing?

Year over year, revenue in this sample grew about 5.9 percent while supply grew about 23.2 percent, a meaningfully faster pace. That gap means more listings are competing for a revenue pool that isn't growing nearly as quickly, which suggests a market becoming more competitive over time. A 2026 operating plan should account for this trend rather than assuming current per-listing performance will hold steady as more supply enters the market.

How does Fernandina Beach compare to Jacksonville for short-term rentals?

Jacksonville listings earned about $17,686 last year from 2,416 active rentals on the same extract window, a materially lower typical revenue figure on a much larger supply base than Fernandina Beach's $40,738 across 1,052 listings. These are two distinct markets with separate guest pools and separate regulatory authorities, and this report keeps them on separate lines rather than blending them, since doing so would misrepresent both markets.

What are the strongest months for Fernandina Beach short-term rentals?

The extract identifies March, June, and April as the strongest revenue months for Fernandina Beach listings. A 2026 operating plan should weight pricing, marketing, and preparation toward that window specifically, since these months appear to carry a disproportionate share of the market's annual revenue. Content and pricing strategy for this window should be finalized well ahead of spring, given the market's roughly 72-day average booking lead time.

What is Fernandina Beach's slowest month for short-term rentals?

The underlying research is genuinely inconsistent on this point, with different figures pointing to December, January, or April depending on which part of the data set is read, and one source separating a revenue low in April from an occupancy low in January. Rather than state a single definitive slow month, this report recommends confirming the current pattern against a fresh Air ROI extract before finalizing any 2026 seasonal plan around a specific month.

Where do most Fernandina Beach guests come from?

Most guests arrive from Atlanta, with Jacksonville as the second-largest origin market, and typical stay length is about 5.5 nights with roughly 72 days of average lead time between search and booking. This regional, drive-market guest profile differs from a fly-in destination pattern and should inform how listings are marketed, priced, and structured for stay length, particularly around the confirmed March, June, and April peak window.

What share of Fernandina Beach listings use a 30-night minimum stay?

About 50.4 percent of the 1,052-listing sample uses a 30-night minimum, close to an even split with shorter-stay listings. This report does not confirm how that group is performing relative to the shorter-stay half of the market, since the extract does not break revenue figures out by minimum-stay setting. A host considering this strategy should evaluate their own inquiry history rather than assume the setting alone drives long-stay bookings.

What percentage of Fernandina Beach listings are professionally managed?

About 67.3 percent of the sample is professionally managed, meaning a majority of the competing field already has professional marketing or management support. Independent hosts still run roughly a third of this market. This report does not confirm which group is outperforming the other on the confirmed $40,738 typical revenue figure, since that breakdown is not available in the underlying extract used for this research.

What permits and licenses does a Fernandina Beach short-term rental need in 2026?

Operators need a Resort Rental Dwelling Permit through the City of Fernandina Beach, tied to R-3 zoning or grandfathered R-1/R-2 status before October 3, 2000, plus a current Florida public lodging license through the Department of Business and Professional Regulation, and current Nassau County tourist development tax registration. This report does not confirm specific current-year fee amounts; confirm those directly with each respective desk before finalizing a 2026 operating budget.

Is this report accurate for a Fernandina Beach property outside city limits?

Not necessarily. This report's regulatory information applies specifically to properties within the City of Fernandina Beach itself. Unincorporated Nassau County operates under a separate regulatory framework, and a property just outside city limits should confirm which jurisdiction it actually sits in before applying any of the city-specific permit or zoning information in this report to that parcel.

Work with Crest & Cove Creative

Fernandina Beach hosts earned a real, specific number last year, not a national average. See the actual 2026 baseline before you price, market, or budget off a guess.

Crest & Cove Creative builds marketing strategy for Fernandina Beach short-term rentals around this kind of confirmed, market-specific data rather than a generic national template. If you want help turning this report's numbers into an actual 2026 pricing, content, and marketing plan for your specific property, reach out and let's talk through what that plan should look like for your listing.

Reach out at crestcove.co or (256) 998-7502.