Kennebunkport vs Kennebunk vs Ogunquit: What Independent Hosts Should

Jacob Mishalanie
Aug 18
12 min read

Updated: 2 days ago

A Kennebunkport purchase is a license question before it is a yield question. The AirROI cell dated 2026-08-08 prints one hundred fifty-eight listings, a $48,101 clear year, and a $4,906 month. Those figures describe one active unit in the current set. They do not describe an unlicensed house inside the town, because the 2026 portal is closed to new applications and to renewals. They do not describe a Goose Rocks house until the Chapter 129 listing exists. AirROI Moderate is a vendor badge, not the freeze and not a transferable listing.

Leftover underwriting that treated July as the only beach peak, or that imported a leftover $100,000 year from another aggregator, will buy the wrong calendar. That leftover is wrong on this file. Peak revenue month is August. The three strongest months are August, July, and September. January, February, and March are the hole. January is the lowest revenue month. Occupancy is lowest in January and highest in August. ADR peaks in July and is lowest in February. Do not annualize an August screenshot and call it $48,101.

This page is the purchase file. It will keep Kennebunkport at $48,101, Kennebunk at $47,644 on 237 listings, and Ogunquit at $33,812, and it will not blend those extracts into one Southern Maine year. If you still need the map, open the rules file. For the competitive set, use the market report. If you need the note, the finance file sits after this underwrite, not before the license lookup.

Underwrite Kennebunkport $48,101, not a leftover $100k

Build the base case on $48,101 and $4,906 for one active Kennebunkport-cell unit that can already list; ADR is $708; Occupancy is 36.4 percent. RevPAR is $255; The year sits on a clear line over the forty-five-thousand mark this shop prefers; The median month is $4,906. Those figures are the locked inputs for a one-hundred-fifty-eight-listing cell; They are not Maine Beaches visitor spend; They are not KPort's combined book. They are not twelve Augusts; Stress the $4,906 month, not an August Saturday.

Do not divide Maine Office of Tourism's $2.5 billion by one hundred fifty-eight and call the result a door. Visitor dollars are not host dollars. The tourism file owns that sentence. This purchase page only needs you to lock the host year. Revenue moved minus 23.8 percent while supply grew 12.1 percent. Name the drop. A new listing does not get to invent a better average because the last listing felt tight.

Kennebunk and Ogunquit stay off this line; A broker packet that pastes a leftover $100,000 year onto a York County house is not a Kennebunkport underwrite. Print this cell only; Then decide whether the expense stack still stands when January, February, and March go dark; The year is clear. The median is the month you take to a lender, not an August Saturday you liked; write the license number next to that sentence. Neighbor years stay comparison-only; They do not move this published year.

The 2026 freeze is the first acquisition fact

Open Planning before you write an offer. If the parcel is inside the incorporated Town of Kennebunkport, a short-term rental means offering a dwelling for less than 30 consecutive days, and it needs a Chapter 129 license to advertise. The 2026 portal is closed to new applications and to renewals. A mailing address that says Kennebunkport is not the test. The license number is the test. Dock Square, Cape Porpoise, and Goose Rocks Beach sit inside the town. A Dock Square walk is not a license. A live Airbnb published year is not a license.

This page will not coach an unlicensed nightly as if the freeze were a suggestion; Print the town sentence; Do not treat a seller calendar as a grandfather clause. Hedge whether an already-issued 2026 listing stays live, and print that sentence instead of inventing a reading; After the listing is yes, occupancy is still two tenants per bedroom plus two. Ads still must print the license number; the hall the map names; Hedge the current fee. The Select Board sets Tier I and Tier II; This packet will not invent the dollar.

The Dock Square versus Goose Rocks file keeps the beach off a lot you cannot list. Goose Rocks is still licensed and off the cap. Off the cap is not off the clerk. AirROI Moderate is not Chapter 129. A live published year on an unlicensed lot is not a license. Write the listing next to the APN before anyone talks about August. Kennebunk is a caption until the clerk line says otherwise. Ogunquit is a neighbor caption, not this slug.

A sale is not a license

Chapter 129 listings do not travel with a sale except a permitted transfer to a current owner, spouse, child, grandchild, sibling, niece or nephew, or a named estate-planning entity for those people. Any other sale needs a new license. Licenses do not move to a different dwelling. In a year when the portal is closed to new applications and to renewals, a non-family sale is not a $48,101 story. Treat that as a deal term, not as a footnote.

The buy file owns the purchase-agreement questions; This page only needs you to see that advertised STR income is not a transferable year. A seller screenshot of August is not a listing; A manager logo is not a listing; A live published year is not a listing. Confirm the license with Planning before the offer; Hedge whether an already-issued 2026 listing stays live through a closing; Print the town sentence.

If Planning cannot name the path, the year is not yours yet. AirROI Moderate is not the transfer. A Goose Rocks off-cap map is not the transfer. Write the owner name next to the license number before anyone talks about August. Do not import a Kennebunk $250 listing onto a Dock Square lot, and do not import a Chapter 129 listing onto a Kennebunk house. Two desks. Two stamps. A sale that is not a named family file waits.

Kennebunk $47,644 does not transfer

Kennebunk is a separate extract and a clerk-plus-fire product; Its $47,644 year is a comparison cell only; ADR there is $552. Occupancy is 39.9 percent; The set is 237 listings; RevPAR is $237. Those figures do not move; They are not a Kennebunkport floor and not a Kennebunkport ceiling; Two hundred thirty-seven doors is a different scale this one-hundred-fifty-eight-listing cell does not share. Guests may drive to both towns; The clerks do not share a file; Print the neighbor year only in the comparison column. Do not use it as a Kennebunkport base case.

Do not use Kennebunk occupancy, Kennebunk ADR, or a Gooch's sidewalk to rescue a Kennebunkport lot the 2026 portal will not listing. Do not use Kennebunkport's $48,101 to dress a Kennebunk purchase you have not extracted. Kennebunk registers stays of fewer than 15 days at $250 new and $150 renewal. There is no numeric cap on that clerk page. That is not a freeze waiver. Vacasa is 6 doors on the Kennebunk extract, not a one-hundred-fifty-two-door story. Coastline's 23-home Kennebunk book is their book.

A buyer who wants a Kennebunk door should underwrite that clerk and that extract. A buyer who wants Dock Square should 4 percent occupancy, and the Chapter 129 path. Mixing the two is how a packet starts lying. Print Kennebunk only when you are buying Kennebunk, not as a Kennebunkport shortcut. Do not hide an unlicensed town lot under a neighbor year. The $47,644 figure stays on the Kennebunk line.

Ogunquit $33,812 does not transfer

Ogunquit's $33,812 is a different published year, a different clerk, and a different guest. A seven-day TA-1 and a watch year do not travel up ME-9. Kennebunkport prints $48,101 on a clear line. That is real money on a one-hundred-fifty-eight-listing cell. It is not $33,812. Do not raise the Kennebunkport base case because a broker said both towns are Maine Beaches. Do not cut the Kennebunkport base case because Ogunquit felt more established. The year stays in this published market extract A beach photograph is not permission to mark a Kennebunkport house up.

The products look similar in a photograph and they are not similar on a map. Kennebunkport is a Chapter 129 published year with a 2026 freeze. Ogunquit is a seven-day TA-1 plus a Town Clerk business registration. Hedge the leftover 1 percent cap and leftover 5-unit operator limits. This week's primary file is the week, not those secondary write-ups. Kennebunk's $47,644 stays in the comparison column too. Keep this offer on $48,101, $708 ADR, 36.4 percent occupancy, and the August-July-September spine.

A stolen beach year will not survive the first lender who opens both extracts. A lender who asks why your pro forma shows $33,812, or a leftover $100,000, on a Kennebunkport APN is asking the right question. Answer with this extract, dated 2026-08-08: one hundred fifty-eight listings, a clear year, a $4,906 month, revenue down 23.8 percent, supply up 12.1 percent. That is the competitive set you would join if the parcel can list.

August is not the year

August is the peak revenue month; It is not the year; Peak-season averages on this pull sit near $11,806, 50.0 percent occupancy, and a $777 ADR. Low-season averages sit near $2,968, 19.5 percent occupancy, and a $645 ADR; The three strongest months are August, July, and September; The three weakest are January, February, and March. January is the revenue hole; Occupancy is lowest in January; ADR is lowest in February and peaks in July. Leftover July-only beach language is wrong on this file.

September is a peak; August is a peak; It is still not the year. Do not annualize an August weekend and call it $48,101; Christmas Prelude dated December 3 through 13, 2026, sits inside a winter month. It does not rewrite the year, and it does not turn July into the only spine; The shoulder-season calendar owns the month-by-month language. Stress $4,906; Cite $708 ADR beside it.

If the note, the Chapter 129 listing, Maine's 9 percent lodging tax, and the $301 median clean cannot survive the $4,906 month, the deal does not survive August either. Cleaning is a median, not an average you inflate. Occupancy for the year is 36.4 percent. That is a compressed-coast town, not a sold-out factory. Lead time averages ninety-seven days. Average stay is five nights. Those cadences explain why one August Saturday is not twelve months of coverage.

23 percent PM is not a franchise vacuum

Professional management is 23.4 percent; That is not an empty field and it is not a monopoly; KPort shows seven listings and $409,819 combined. Coastline Vacation Rentals shows nine listings and $264,690 combined; Evolve shows three listings and $116,720; Those totals are their books. They are not your year; They are not permission to invent a story that no operator is present on this pull; A nine-home local book is their book. A live published year is not a license.

Cohost share is 27.2 percent; Superhost share is 60.1 percent; Instant Book is 12.7 percent. Guest Favorite share is 56.3 percent; The set already looks finished; A purchase thesis that says you will beat the cell because you will finally hire a manager is not an underwrite. A purchase thesis that says you will beat the cell because you will finally self-manage is not an underwrite either; The DIY versus hire file owns the labor split. This page only needs you to see that 23.4 percent is a real layer and that most doors still run without a full-service firm.

A manager does not create a Chapter 129 slot inside a frozen portal, and a manager does not issue a Goose Rocks listing. Your year, if the parcel can list, is still $48,101 against that set. Do not buy their nine-home book. Do not use their combined ADR as your base case. Use $708, 36.4 percent, $4,906, and $48,101. Hiring is an expense after the clerk, not a substitute for the clerk. Vacasa is 6 in Kennebunk. Do not import that book onto this published year.

What a purchase file must include

The file starts with the Planning printout; Licensed or not; If the 2026 portal is closed and the parcel has no listing, stop treating $48,101 as a close. If Goose Rocks, add the off-cap map and still add the license; Add the transfer sentence: family file or new listing; Hedge whether an already-issued 2026 listing stays live. Add occupancy at two per bedroom plus two; Add the license number in the ads; Hedge the Tier I and Tier II fee. Add Maine lodging at 9 percent.

Then add the extract, dated 2026-08-08: one hundred fifty-eight listings, $48,101, $4,906, $708, 36.4 percent, $255 RevPAR, August-July-September up, January-February-March down. Add supply growth of 12.1 percent and revenue down 23.8 percent. Add the $301 cleaning median. Add a January reserve. Add Superhost share at 60.1 percent. Add the 53.8 percent thirty-plus share as a listing-setting fact, not as booked winter occupancy. Add the remote-stay file only if you intend that gate.

Add the how-to file only after the paper exists. Add the startup stack for the live paper, not for an invented purchase price. Do not add Kennebunk's $47,644, Ogunquit's $33,812, the $2.5 billion Maine Beaches line, or KPort's $409,819. Do not add a leftover $100,000 year or an unlicensed nightly dressed as a close. We do not make the DSCR loan. We do not file Chapter 129. We do not sit the waitlist.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Kennebunkport a good short-term rental investment in 2026?

The 2026-08-08 AirROI extract shows a $48,101 clear year and a $4,906 median month across 158 listings -- but that year belongs to a parcel that can already legally list. Kennebunkport's 2026 portal is closed to new applications and renewals, so an unlicensed lot isn't a $48,101 story yet. Underwrite the license status first, then the revenue.

Can I use Kennebunk or Ogunquit numbers to underwrite a Kennebunkport purchase?

No -- $48,101 belongs to the Kennebunkport cell specifically. Kennebunk's extract shows $47,644 across 237 listings, and Ogunquit's shows $33,812; both are useful comparison points but not substitutes. Print Kennebunkport's own published year, then test whether the $4,906 month actually covers the note, the license, Maine's 9 percent lodging tax, and the $301 median cleaning cost.

Does a Kennebunkport STR license transfer with a property sale?

Only in a narrow set of cases -- a permitted transfer to a current owner's spouse, child, grandchild, sibling, niece, nephew, or a named estate-planning entity for those people. Any other sale requires a new license, and licenses don't move to a different dwelling. Since the 2026 portal is closed to new applications, a non-family sale isn't a straightforward path to the $48,101 year.

Is the 2026 Kennebunkport license freeze the first fact a buyer should check?

Yes -- open a conversation with the Planning office before making an offer. The town isn't accepting new applications or renewals for the 2026 calendar year, so confirm whether an already-issued 2026 listing stays live and matches the parcel's tax map ID. A published Airbnb year isn't proof of a current license.

Should I annualize a strong August weekend as Kennebunkport's typical year?

No. August, July, and September are the peak three; January, February, and March are the hole, with January the lowest month. Full-year occupancy runs 36.4 percent against a $708 ADR, producing the $4,906 median month and $48,101 clear year on the 2026-08-08 extract. December's Christmas Prelude doesn't rewrite that curve, and neither does one strong summer weekend.

Does roughly a quarter of Kennebunkport listings running under professional management mean the market is thin?

No -- about 23.4 percent of the 158 listings are professionally managed (KPort Vacation Rentals runs 7 homes totaling $409,819, Coastline runs 9 totaling $264,690, and Evolve runs 3 totaling $116,720), but that's their book of business, not a ceiling on the market. Most Kennebunkport doors still run without a full-service firm, and hiring one is an added expense on top of the license, not a substitute for it.

What has to be in a Kennebunkport purchase file before making an offer?

Start with a Planning Department printout confirming the parcel is licensed or explaining why it isn't. Add the family-transfer rule, the 2026 application freeze, occupancy math at two guests per bedroom plus two, and Maine's 9 percent lodging tax. Then attach the dated AirROI extract -- $48,101, $4,906, $708 ADR, 36.4 percent occupancy, and August-July-September as the peak three -- rather than a leftover figure from a different year.

What does the Maine Office of Tourism's $2.5 billion figure actually measure, and does it belong in a purchase file?

It measures 2024 visitor spend across the whole Maine Beaches region, not Kennebunkport host income -- it isn't $48,101 and it isn't $4,906. Don't divide $2.5 billion, or the $661 million accommodations line within it, by 158 listings to manufacture a per-door figure; keep the tourism desk on the visitor side and the AirROI extract on the host side.

Is a Kennebunkport purchase primarily a license question or a yield question?

License first. Since the 2026 portal is closed to new applications, the yield case only applies to a parcel that can already legally operate -- an unlicensed lot doesn't get to claim the $48,101 published year. Once the license status is confirmed, the finance and yield conversation can follow.

What does the published market extract show for occupancy, revenue, and supply trends?

The 2026-08-08 extract shows 36.4 percent occupancy across 158 listings, with revenue down 23.8 percent and supply up 12.1 percent year over year. That combination -- more listings competing for a shrinking revenue pool -- is worth weighing alongside the $48,101 headline year before underwriting a purchase.

Work with Crest & Cove Creative

Kennebunkport, Kennebunk, and Ogunquit run three different tax maps and three different guest expectations, and an about block that blurs the towns into one Maine coast pitch sends bookings to the wrong driveway.

We keep Kennebunkport, Kennebunk, and Ogunquit listings pointed at the correct town's landmarks and arrival-weekend detail so guests never land on a neighbor's gallery.

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