Little Rock, AR STR Market Report 2026: $15,505 on 453 Listings

Thomas Garner
2 days ago
13 min read

Updated: 1 day ago

Empty downtown Little Rock Arkansas skyline, no people

Little Rock's short-term rental market is a genuinely urban one, built around a river, a set of distinct downtown neighborhoods, and a permit system the city has been actively enforcing since 2023. AirROI's current extract, covering August 2025 through July 2026, towns typical Little Rock listings at about $15,505 in annual revenue across 453 active rentals, at a $149 average nightly rate and 40.1 percent occupancy. Revenue per available night runs $59, year over year the market is down 6.2 percent, and active supply has held roughly steady.

An older data pull, still worth naming because it circulates in some broker materials, printed $16,183 on 461 listings at $151 average night and 41.7 percent occupancy. That earlier figure shouldn't be averaged into the current extract — the two are separate dated pulls, and this report works from the current $15,505 figure throughout.

This is also a two-city market in practice, even though it's frequently discussed as one metro area. Little Rock and North Little Rock sit across the Arkansas River from each other, each with its own city government, its own permit desk, and its own separate AirROI figure. Treating the two as a single blended metro year is one of the more common mistakes in how this market gets pitched, and this report keeps them on separate lines throughout.

The city's regulatory posture also shapes how this market functions differently from a purely tourist-driven town. A 500-permit cap, an active Treasury and Planning registration process, and a defined split between owner-occupied and non-owner-occupied rental types all mean a Little Rock host is operating in a genuinely regulated environment, not the kind of low-oversight market a data provider's scrape label might suggest at a glance.

What follows works through the current market year, the seasonal calendar, the city's 500-permit cap and how it actually gets enforced, the neighborhood breakdown, and where North Little Rock's own figures fit in — using only the numbers this specific extract and the city's own regulatory record support. This is not legal advice.

The Current Extract: $15,505 on 453 Listings

Four hundred fifty-three active listings make up the current Little Rock extract — a meaningful sample size for a mid-sized capital city, and one that gives this report's figures reasonable statistical weight compared to a smaller coastal town's dataset. Within that sample, Superhost share runs 64.0 percent, a genuinely high proportion, and professionally managed listings account for 7.3 percent, with the largest single operator, identified in the data as Christopher, holding nine listings.

Entire homes make up 94 percent of the sample, and houses specifically account for 59.6 percent of that listing stock — this is a market dominated by whole-home stays rather than shared or partial-unit listings. One- and two-bedroom units make up 60.5 percent of the bedroom mix, which should shape guest-count and amenity expectations for a typical Little Rock listing rather than a larger group-stay assumption.

It's worth being precise about what the 453-listing count actually represents: it's a gallery of active marketplace listings, not a permit roster. Conflating the two — assuming 453 listings means 453 issued city permits — is a mistake worth avoiding when building a compliance picture of this market, covered in more detail below.

October, March, and December Carry the Calendar; July Is the Hole

October is the busiest month on the current extract, with March and December rounding out the three strongest months. July is the slowest month and also shows the weakest occupancy — an important nuance, because nightly rates in this sample actually peak in July even as occupancy drops. That combination means a host shouldn't read a high July ADR as evidence of a filled summer calendar; it more likely reflects a smaller number of bookings clearing at a premium rate rather than a broadly booked month.

Typical stay length across the extract is 7.4 nights, and guests book about 28 days ahead on average — a considerably shorter lead time than a leisure-destination market, consistent with Little Rock functioning partly as a business and event-travel city rather than purely a vacation destination. That 28-day window means pricing adjustments made even a few weeks out can still meaningfully affect a listing's near-term bookings, unlike a market where guests lock in rates months ahead.

River Market weeks and other named downtown events genuinely drive demand, and a listing that can credibly walk to that district should say so in its copy. But a named event or a busy calendar week is evidence of demand, not proof of occupancy on its own — the October-March-December pattern and the 40.1 percent annual occupancy figure are the numbers that actually describe how full the calendar runs.

The 500-Permit Cap, and Why 453 Listings Isn't 453 Permits

Little Rock's Board of Directors adopted its short-term rental ordinance on June 20, 2023, after ten deferrals, and the ordinance caps citywide STR permits at 500. The city defines short-term rentals as properties rented for 29 days or less, and it splits registration into two types: STR-1, for owner-occupied properties, which uses a special-use permit, and STR-2, for non-owner-occupied properties, which falls under planned-development zoning — two genuinely different application processes and lifts.

A March 2026 Planning staff report listed 141 registered STR-1 and STR-2 permits in the city's database, a figure well under the 500-unit cap but also meaningfully smaller than AirROI's 453 active listings. That gap between the marketplace listing count and the registered permit count is worth taking seriously rather than assuming away — it likely reflects a mix of unregistered listings, listings pending registration, and the normal lag between a data provider's scrape and a city's official database. A buyer or host should confirm remaining cap slots directly with Planning rather than assuming availability from either number alone.

The Treasury registration form for owners of three or fewer units lists a $35 annual fee, with additional inspection fees to confirm directly with Planning. It's also worth being direct about what a data provider's "low-regulation" label and a "zero licensed listings" figure actually mean here: that's a reflection of what a public scrape could find, not the city's actual permit file. Little Rock Treasury, at 501-371-4568, and Planning and Development, at 723 West Markham Street with the Planning Manager reachable at 501-371-4789, are the two offices that hold the real registration record.

Neighborhoods: Downtown, SoMa, and Hillcrest Are Three Different Occasions

AirROI's neighborhood-level data names Downtown Little Rock, SoMa (South Main), and Hillcrest as the city's leading short-term rental submarkets, and each represents a genuinely different kind of trip. Downtown and the River Market district pull business travelers and visitors centered on the Clinton Presidential Center and Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site. SoMa has built a distinct arts-and-dining identity in recent years. Hillcrest offers a quieter, more residential, walkable neighborhood feel.

A listing should be written toward the specific occasion the house can actually host rather than a generic "urban retreat" pitch that could describe any of the three. A downtown high-rise five minutes from the Clinton Center is selling a different trip than a Hillcrest bungalow near a neighborhood coffee shop, and matching the copy and photography to the correct neighborhood does more for conversion than broad, undifferentiated language.

The Clinton Presidential Center and Central High School National Historic Site are worth naming specifically in listing copy for their draw, but it's worth being precise about their role: they're evidence of why visitors come to Little Rock, not a substitute for the market's own occupancy and revenue figures. Confirm current visitor hours on each site's own page rather than citing a specific visitor count this report doesn't have.

Taxes and the Full Compliance Picture

Beyond the city's registration and permit system, a Little Rock host is stacking several tax obligations on top of nightly revenue. Arkansas state sales tax runs 6.5 percent, the state tourism tax adds another 2 percent, and the Little Rock Advertising and Promotion lodging tax adds 4 percent on top of that, with the A&P office reachable at 501-370-3204 for current details. Pulaski County and any additional city sales tax should be confirmed directly with the Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration rather than assumed from a general summary, since local tax add-ons are exactly the kind of detail that can shift.

None of this is legal or tax advice, and a host building a pricing model should run these percentages past an accountant familiar with Arkansas short-term rental taxation before finalizing rates. What can be said plainly is that a $149 average night in this sample already has to absorb all of these obligations, and a host pricing purely against a competitor's advertised nightly rate without accounting for the full tax stack risks underpricing relative to actual net revenue.

The registration side deserves the same discipline. A $35 annual Treasury fee for owners of three or fewer units is a small line item, but the STR-1 versus STR-2 distinction and any additional inspection fees Planning applies can meaningfully change the cost and timeline of getting a listing legally live. Calling both Treasury at 501-371-4568 and Planning at 501-371-4789 before finalizing a purchase or listing timeline is a better plan than assuming a generic "low-regulation" city means a fast, cheap path to market.

What a Little Rock Marketing Plan Should Actually Say

Given the current market's shape — a 40.1 percent occupancy figure, a 7.4-night typical stay, and a relatively short 28-day booking window — the listings that perform best in this market tend to be specific about which occasion they're built for rather than generic about being an "urban Little Rock stay." A property near the medical center corridor should say so plainly for the traveling-nurse and medical-visitor audience that search represents. A property that's walkable to River Market should lean into that specifically rather than a vague downtown claim.

Photography matters here in a way that's easy to underrate in a market this size. With 453 active listings competing for attention, a listing photographed generically — daytime-only shots, no sense of the actual neighborhood — blends into a crowded field. Photographing the specific walk, desk setup, or nearby landmark a listing can actually deliver on, in both daylight and evening light, does more to differentiate a property than another round of stock interior staging.

It's also worth being disciplined about origin data in marketing copy. Most Little Rock guests in this sample arrive from within the city itself, followed by Austin — a pattern that doesn't support broad claims about drawing a specific out-of-state professional audience unless a listing has its own booking history to back that up. Write toward the guest this data actually shows rather than an assumed demographic.

North Little Rock Is a Separate City, a Separate Hall, and a Separate Year

North Little Rock, across the Arkansas River, is a genuinely different municipality with its own city government, its own separate permit desk, and its own separate AirROI figure: about $13,266 in typical annual revenue from 105 active rentals on the current extract. That's meaningfully lower than Little Rock's $15,505, and the two numbers shouldn't be blended into a single "metro" figure in a buyer packet or marketing pitch.

Argenta, North Little Rock's arts-and-entertainment district, is a genuine draw on that side of the river, but it's a North Little Rock neighborhood, not a Little Rock one — a listing on the Little Rock side shouldn't lean on Argenta's identity, and vice versa. The regulatory picture is separate too: Little Rock's Treasury and Planning offices, ordinance, and 500-permit cap apply only within Little Rock's own city limits. A North Little Rock host needs to confirm that city's own registration process rather than assuming Little Rock's rules carry across the river.

Conway, a third Arkansas city sometimes mentioned in the same regional conversation, doesn't have its own dedicated AirROI town-level figure in this current pass. Rather than guessing one, the honest approach is to leave Conway unlabeled until a dedicated figure exists, and to treat it as its own separate market whenever it does come up.

Confirming a Property Sits Inside Little Rock City Limits

Given how tightly this report separates Little Rock from North Little Rock and how much of the regulatory picture depends on which city desk actually governs a parcel, it's worth stating the most basic step plainly: confirm which municipality a specific address falls under before assuming either city's rules apply. Little Rock's city limits, North Little Rock's, and unincorporated Pulaski County are not always intuitive from a street address alone, particularly near the river or along the edges of either city.

The practical way to do this is to call the office that would actually issue the permit rather than guessing from a map. Little Rock Treasury at 501-371-4568 or Planning and Development at 501-371-4789 can confirm jurisdiction for a Little Rock-side address; North Little Rock has its own separate office for its own side. Getting this confirmation before signing a purchase agreement or listing a property is a cheap, fast step that avoids discovering a jurisdictional mismatch after money has already changed hands, and it's a step worth repeating any time a purchase involves a parcel near a city boundary rather than one clearly interior to a single jurisdiction.

Reading the Year-Over-Year Decline Honestly

The current extract's minus-6.2-percent year-over-year figure, alongside a roughly steady supply count, is worth sitting with rather than smoothing over in a sales pitch. Revenue softening while the number of active listings holds roughly flat suggests per-listing performance is the thing actually declining, rather than the market simply diluting across more competing listing stock. That's a meaningfully different diagnosis than a supply-glut story, and it points toward pricing discipline, photography quality, and listing differentiation as the levers most likely to matter for an individual host trying to outperform the market average.

It's also worth comparing this current figure honestly against the older $16,183 pull mentioned earlier. The two data points, read together, describe a market that has softened somewhat from an earlier measured period rather than one that's collapsing — a $15,505 current figure against a $16,183 prior figure is a real but moderate decline, not a market in freefall. A buyer or host should factor that trend into a purchase decision without either dismissing it or overstating it into a story the data doesn't actually support.

None of this report attempts to explain the specific cause of the decline — broader interest-rate conditions, changes in business travel patterns, or shifts in guest preference could all plausibly play a role, and this dataset doesn't isolate which factor matters most. What a host or buyer can do productively is treat the current $15,505 figure as the honest starting point for a 2026 projection, rather than either the more optimistic older figure or an assumption that the market will keep declining at the same rate indefinitely.

A buyer weighing whether now is the right time to enter the Little Rock market should also weigh the 500-permit cap against the current 141-permit registered count. A market with real headroom under its own regulatory ceiling, even one showing a modest revenue decline, is a different proposition than a market at or near its cap facing the same decline — the first has room to absorb a well-differentiated new entrant, while the second would mean competing harder for a shrinking available slot count. Confirm the current registered count with Planning directly, since the 141 figure is dated to a March 2026 staff report and may have moved by the time a specific purchase closes.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much did typical Little Rock listings earn on the current extract?

AirROI's current extract, covering August 2025 through July 2026, towns typical Little Rock listings at about $15,505 a year on 453 active rentals. Average night was $149, occupancy was 40.1 percent, and revenue per available night was $59. Year over year ran minus 6.2 percent with supply holding roughly steady.

Is $16,183 the current Little Rock figure?

No. An older data pull printed $16,183 on 461 listings at a $151 average night and 41.7 percent occupancy. That earlier pass shouldn't be averaged with the current extract — file both figures on their own separate lines, and use the current $15,505 figure for any active underwriting.

When is Little Rock's strongest month?

October is the busiest revenue month, with March and December also running strong. July is the slowest month and shows the weakest occupancy in this sample, even though nightly rates actually peak in July — treat that as leftover pricing rather than a filled summer calendar.

Does Little Rock cap the number of STR permits?

Yes. A June 2023 ordinance caps citywide STR permits at 500, and a March 2026 Planning staff report listed 141 registered STR-1 and STR-2 permits against that cap. AirROI's 453 active listings is a different, larger count than the permit roster, so confirm remaining slots directly with Planning before assuming availability.

What's the difference between an STR-1 and an STR-2 permit?

STR-1 covers owner-occupied properties and uses a special-use permit. STR-2 covers non-owner-occupied properties and falls under planned-development zoning — a meaningfully different application process. Confirm current requirements for either type with Planning and Development at 723 West Markham Street, 501-371-4789.

Can I use North Little Rock's numbers as this year's Little Rock figure?

No. Little Rock's average night was $149 across 453 listings, while North Little Rock separately earned about $13,266 across 105 listings on its own city-level extract. — they're different municipalities with different permit desks and different performance.

Which neighborhoods lead the current Little Rock extract?

AirROI names Downtown Little Rock, SoMa, and Hillcrest as the leading submarkets, each representing a different kind of trip. Argenta is a North Little Rock neighborhood with its own separate identity and shouldn't be folded into a Little Rock listing's copy.

What share of Little Rock listings are entire homes?

Entire homes make up 94 percent of the 453 active rentals in this sample, and houses specifically account for 59.6 percent of that listing stock. One- and two-bedroom units make up 60.5 percent of the bedroom mix, which should guide guest-count and amenity expectations for a typical listing.

Who books a Little Rock stay, and how far ahead?

Most guests arrive from within Little Rock itself, followed by Austin. Typical stay length is 7.4 nights, and guests book about 28 days ahead on average — a shorter lead time than a leisure-destination market, consistent with a mix of business and event travel.

Should I hire a property manager in Little Rock?

Professionally managed listings make up 7.3 percent of the extract, with the largest operator, Christopher, holding nine listings; Superhost share runs 64.0 percent. Independent hosts still write most of this market. North Little Rock and any future Conway listing should get their own separate city-level pitch rather than sharing a Little Rock management deck.

What taxes apply to a Little Rock short-term rental?

Arkansas state sales tax is 6.5 percent, plus a 2 percent state tourism tax and a 4 percent Little Rock A&P lodging tax, reachable at 501-370-3204. Confirm any remaining Pulaski County or city sales tax obligations directly with the Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration.

Where do I confirm current Little Rock STR rules before I list?

Call Little Rock Treasury at 501-371-4568, or visit Planning and Development at 723 West Markham Street, 501-371-4789, to confirm registration type, fees, and remaining permit slots under the 500-unit cap. A data provider's low-regulation label is a scrape, not a substitute for the city's actual permit file.

Work with Crest & Cove Creative

Little Rock is $15,505 on 453 listings, and North Little Rock is a separate $13,266 on 105. Stop pitching a blended metro year that doesn't exist.

Send us your Little Rock address and we'll build listing copy and pricing around the real current extract, the correct city permit path, and the neighborhood your property actually sits in. Reach out at crestcove.co/audit or (256) 998-7502.

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