Machias and Lubec Are Two Separate STR Underwriting Lines, Not One

Jacob Mishalanie
Aug 4
11 min read

Updated: 3 days ago

Machias and Lubec sit less than an hour apart on the Downeast Maine coast, and it would be easy to treat them as one regional short-term rental market. The data says otherwise. AirDNA's Machias figures (updated August 25, 2026, as of July 2026) show roughly 353 active listings, about $35,800 average annual revenue, 58 percent occupancy, a $238 ADR, and $139 RevPAR. Lubec's own AirROI figures for the trailing year run about $21,152 average annual revenue, 44.0 percent occupancy, a $252 ADR, and $101 RevPAR, with an average booking lead time near 85 days. Those are two different underwriting lines, not one Downeast average.

The gap runs both directions. Machias shows meaningfully higher occupancy than Lubec -- about 58 percent versus roughly 44 percent -- while Lubec's ADR band, corroborated by a separate Edge/Teeco snapshot near $259 with about 45 percent occupancy, sits above Machias's $238 AirDNA figure. A model that blends these two towns into a single 'Downeast Maine' number will misstate both the pricing and the occupancy an investor should actually expect, depending on which town they're evaluating.

This piece walks through what each town's own numbers say, why Machias's ADR range is unusually wide, what neighboring Machiasport's table shows by contrast, and why the honest conclusion here is a real but conditional opportunity -- not a blanket 'good investment' claim for either town. It also walks through how to turn those separate figures into two separate revenue models, rather than one blended Downeast pitch that would misrepresent both towns to whichever investor ends up relying on it. This is not legal advice.

Machias: Wide ADR Range, Higher Occupancy, Explosive Listing Growth

AirDNA's Machias data, updated August 25, 2026 and reflecting the market as of July 2026, shows about 353 active listings, average annual revenue near $35,800, occupancy at 58 percent, an ADR of $238, and RevPAR of $139. That occupancy figure is notably higher than Lubec's -- a meaningful difference for an investor comparing the two towns rather than assuming a shared Downeast pattern.

Machias's ADR range is unusually wide across cross-provider samples, running from roughly $120 to $348 a night depending on the source and the specific comparison set. When a range runs that wide, the safer underwriting move is to price toward the lower end of the observed band rather than the top, particularly until a specific host has unit-level comps to work from rather than a market-wide average.

One figure demands real caution here: AirDNA's year-over-year Machias listing growth shows an extreme increase of plus 443.1 percent in active listings. That kind of jump is far more likely to reflect a boundary or coverage change in how the market is being measured than an actual multiplication of Machias's rental supply overnight, and it should be treated as a data-quality flag, not a straightforward growth story.

The practical takeaway for Machias: use the $238 ADR and 58 percent occupancy as your baseline, price conservatively within the wide observed range, and underwrite against actual comparable listings rather than the market score alone, especially while that listing-count discontinuity remains unexplained.

Lubec: Tighter ADR Band, Lower Occupancy, Longer Booking Lead Time

AirROI's trailing-year window for Lubec (August 2025 through July 2026) shows average annual revenue near $21,152, occupancy at 44.0 percent, an ADR of $252, and RevPAR of $101, with an average booking lead time around 85 days. A separate Edge/Teeco snapshot corroborates the town's ADR band closely, citing roughly $259 and about 45 percent occupancy -- consistent enough across two aggregators to treat as a reasonably reliable read on Lubec specifically.

Lubec's ADR sits above Machias's $238 AirDNA figure, even though Lubec's occupancy runs meaningfully lower -- about 44 percent versus Machias's 58 percent. That combination matters for an investor's model: a higher nightly rate does not automatically translate into higher annual revenue if the property sits empty more often, and Lubec's own $21,152 average annual revenue figure reflects exactly that tradeoff.

The roughly 85-day average booking lead time on AirROI's Lubec data is also worth building into a marketing and pricing calendar. Guests planning this far ahead are less likely to be responding to last-minute promotions and more likely to be locking in a trip around a specific seasonal event or window, which argues for getting pricing and listing content right well before peak season rather than adjusting reactively once bookings are already underway.

For Lubec specifically, the honest underwriting baseline is the $21,152 average annual revenue and 44.0 percent occupancy figure -- not the higher, more headline-friendly ADR number on its own, and not a number blended in from Machias or any other neighboring town.

Don't Blend Lubec's Seasonality Onto Machias

AirROI's data identifies August as Lubec's strongest month and February as its softest. That's a real, specific seasonal pattern -- but it describes Lubec, not Machias, and pasting those same month labels onto a Machias pricing calendar without a Machias-specific seasonality chart would be exactly the kind of cross-market assumption that produces a mispriced calendar.

Downeast Washington County towns share a broad coastal tourism season, but that doesn't mean every town's peak and trough line up identically. Machias and Lubec sit close geographically, yet their occupancy and ADR figures already diverge meaningfully on the annual numbers -- there's no basis in the available data for assuming their month-by-month curves are identical just because the towns are neighbors.

An investor or host building a 12-month pricing calendar for a Machias property should look for Machias-specific seasonal data before locking in a calendar based on Lubec's August-peak, February-low pattern. Where that Machias-specific breakdown isn't yet available, it's more honest to price conservatively around the annual $238 ADR and 58 percent occupancy figures than to borrow a neighboring town's calendar shape.

This caution runs in both directions. A Lubec host shouldn't assume Machias's higher occupancy rate reflects anything about Lubec's own booking pace, and a Machias host shouldn't assume Lubec's August-peak pattern maps cleanly onto Machias's own calendar.

What Machiasport's Table Shows -- and Doesn't

A neighboring Machiasport table, appearing near Lubec's data on AirROI, shows about 49 percent occupancy alongside higher average annual revenue than Lubec's own figure. That's a useful contrast for understanding the broader Downeast picture, but it is not a Machiasport-for-Lubec or Machiasport-for-Machias substitute in an actual underwriting model.

Three separate towns -- Machias, Lubec, and Machiasport -- each carry their own occupancy, ADR, and revenue figures in this small corner of the Maine coast, and the differences between them are large enough that averaging any two into a single regional number would misstate all three. Machiasport's roughly 49 percent occupancy sits between Machias's 58 percent and Lubec's 44 percent, which itself illustrates how much local variation exists across towns that a broader map might otherwise group together.

For an investor scanning this corridor for opportunity, that variation is itself useful information: it means town selection, not just the general 'Downeast Maine' label, is doing real work in what kind of occupancy and revenue outcome to expect. Comparing Machiasport's table against both Machias and Lubec side by side, rather than picking whichever number looks best, is the more honest way to use this data.

None of this changes the core rule: cite each town's own figures, label the source, and use a neighboring town's table as a labeled contrast point -- never as an interchangeable stand-in for the town actually being underwritten. Keeping Machiasport, Machias, and Lubec on three separate lines in any comparison table, rather than folding one into another, is what allows an investor to actually see the town-by-town variation instead of a flattened average that hides it.

Pricing Conservatively Until You Have Unit-Level Comps

Across both towns, the same discipline applies: price toward the lower end of the observed ADR bands until a specific host has unit-level comparable listings to work from, rather than starting at the top of a market-wide range and hoping to grow into it. This matters more in Machias, where the $120-to-$348 cross-provider range is unusually wide, but it applies in Lubec too, where AirROI and Edge/Teeco's figures cluster closely enough to be treated as reasonably reliable, yet still represent an average rather than any single property's guaranteed performance.

The extreme Machias listing-count growth (plus 443.1 percent year over year on AirDNA) is a second reason for caution specifically in that market. Until it's clear whether that number reflects genuine new supply or a change in how the market boundary or listing coverage is being measured, treating the underlying market score with some skepticism -- and leaning harder on direct comparable-listing research -- is the more defensible underwriting approach.

None of this is a reason to walk away from either market. It is a reason to build a purchase or launch model around each town's own, specifically labeled numbers, priced conservatively within the observed range, and checked against real comparable listings rather than a market-wide average alone.

A host or investor who does that work -- separating Machias from Lubec, pricing conservatively, and treating Machiasport and any other neighbor as a labeled contrast rather than a substitute -- ends up with an underwriting model that actually reflects the town they're buying into, rather than a blended Downeast number that describes no real property at all.

The Honest Case for Each Town

This is not a slam-dunk market for either town, and honest content shouldn't pretend otherwise. Machias offers higher occupancy on AirDNA's figures but carries real caution flags around its ADR range and its extreme year-over-year listing growth. Lubec offers a corroborated ADR band across two aggregators but a meaningfully lower occupancy rate and a longer average booking lead time to plan around.

There is a real opportunity here for an investor with an actual plan -- one built around each town's specific seasonal patterns, its own booking-lead-time behavior, and its own comparable listings -- rather than a generic 'Downeast Maine is undervalued' pitch that treats the whole region as interchangeable.

The Blueberry Festival window and the broader shoulder season are worth building a specific marketing and pricing plan around for hosts in this corridor, precisely because Downeast Maine's tourism calendar has real, identifiable peaks rather than a flat year-round demand curve. That's a reason to plan seasonally, not a reason to assume every month performs the same.

Put plainly: Machias and Lubec each have a real, data-backed case for a thoughtful investor, but neither case survives being blended into the other, and neither is a blanket 'good investment' claim independent of the specific property, pricing plan, and seasonal strategy behind it. A model built on each town's own average annual revenue, its own occupancy figure, and its own booking-lead-time pattern is a fundamentally more honest starting point than a corridor-wide pitch built to sound impressive rather than to hold up under an actual purchase decision.

Building a Revenue Model Without Guessing

The temptation in a market like this is to reach for the single most impressive number -- Lubec's $259 ADR, or Machias's higher occupancy -- and build a pitch around it. A more honest model starts from the average annual revenue figure for the specific town in question: about $35,800 for Machias on AirDNA, or about $21,152 for Lubec on AirROI, and works backward from there rather than forward from a best-case ADR.

RevPAR is the number that ties ADR and occupancy together into a single comparable figure, and it's worth citing directly rather than letting ADR alone carry the pitch. Machias runs $139 RevPAR against Lubec's $101, a gap that reflects Machias's higher occupancy more than any dramatic difference in nightly rate between the two towns.

An investor comparing a specific Machias property against a specific Lubec property should build two separate simple models -- annual revenue, minus realistic operating costs, against the purchase price and financing terms for that specific property -- rather than one blended Downeast model that tries to represent both towns at once. The towns' own numbers are different enough that a single model can't honestly represent both.

Where actual unit-level data isn't available yet, treating the town-wide average as a conservative planning figure, and adjusting once real booking history exists, is the more defensible approach than assuming a specific property will outperform its town's average from day one. That's especially true in Machias, where the extreme year-over-year listing-count swing makes the market-wide average itself a moving target worth re-checking as fresher data becomes available, rather than a fixed number to lock a purchase model against indefinitely.

Frequently Asked Questions

Should I average Machias and Lubec into one Downeast Maine revenue figure?

No. Machias (AirDNA: ~$35,800 average annual revenue, 58% occupancy, $238 ADR) and Lubec (AirROI: ~$21,152 average annual revenue, 44.0% occupancy, $252 ADR) are separate underwriting lines. Averaging them produces a number that accurately describes neither town.

Which town has higher occupancy, Machias or Lubec?

Machias, on AirDNA's figures, at about 58 percent versus Lubec's roughly 44 percent on AirROI. That gap is large enough that it should be treated as a real difference between the two markets, not statistical noise.

Which town has the higher nightly rate?

Lubec's ADR band, around $252 to $259 across AirROI and Edge/Teeco, sits above Machias's $238 AirDNA figure -- even though Machias runs meaningfully higher occupancy. Higher ADR alone doesn't mean higher annual revenue once occupancy is factored in.

Why is Machias's ADR range so wide?

Cross-provider samples for Machias run from roughly $120 to $348 a night. Given that spread, the safer approach is pricing toward the lower end of the range until a host has unit-level comparable listings, rather than assuming the top of the range is achievable market-wide.

What does the plus 443.1 percent Machias listing growth figure mean?

It's AirDNA's year-over-year change in active Machias listings, and a jump that extreme is more likely to reflect a boundary or coverage change in how the market is measured than actual new supply appearing overnight. Treat it as a data-quality flag and underwrite against real comparable listings rather than the market score alone.

When is peak season in Lubec?

AirROI identifies August as Lubec's strongest month and February as its softest. That seasonal pattern is specific to Lubec and shouldn't be applied to Machias without a separate, Machias-specific seasonality breakdown.

How does Machiasport compare to Lubec and Machias?

A Machiasport table near Lubec's data on AirROI shows about 49 percent occupancy with higher average annual revenue than Lubec's own figure -- a useful contrast point, but not a substitute for either town's own numbers in an actual underwriting model.

How far in advance do Lubec guests typically book?

AirROI's Lubec data shows an average booking lead time of roughly 85 days. That argues for having pricing and listing content finalized well ahead of peak season rather than adjusting reactively once bookings are already coming in.

Is Downeast Maine a good short-term rental investment right now?

It's a real but conditional opportunity, not a blanket claim. Machias and Lubec each have distinct, data-backed cases -- higher occupancy in Machias, a corroborated higher ADR band in Lubec -- but both require pricing conservatively, using town-specific comps, and planning around each town's own seasonal pattern rather than a generic regional pitch.

What's the single biggest underwriting mistake to avoid in this corridor?

Blending Machias and Lubec (or Machiasport) into one number. Each town has its own occupancy, ADR, RevPAR, and seasonal pattern on the available data, and the differences between them are large enough that a blended figure would misstate the market for whichever specific town or property is actually being evaluated.

Work with Crest & Cove Creative

Machias and Lubec sit less than an hour apart, and their short-term rental numbers still don't agree with each other -- which is exactly why they need two separate models, not one. Name the failure mode the guest can check.

Crest & Cove Creative helps independent hosts in Downeast Maine build pricing and marketing plans from each town's own numbers -- Machias, Lubec, or elsewhere in the corridor -- instead of a blended regional guess. Reach out at crestcove.co or call (256) 998-7502.

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