Built by a host.
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I'm a software engineer and vacation rental host. Before starting DirectBookings, I spent years building large-scale systems at companies like EPAM Systems and Amazon Web Services (AWS) — working on cloud infrastructure, distributed systems, and products used by millions.

When I started hosting my own rental property, I hit the same wall every host knows: Airbnb takes 15.5% of every booking, hides your guest data, and you're one policy change away from losing your listing. I wanted my own booking website — but the existing tools were either overengineered enterprise software (Guesty, Hostaway) designed for property managers with 50+ units, or they were basic WordPress plugins that broke every update.

Nothing existed for the independent host with 1-10 properties who just wants: a professional booking website, Stripe payments, calendar sync with Airbnb, and automated check-in. Simple. Reliable. Affordable.

So I built it. With the engineering discipline from AWS (reliability, scalability, security) and the user empathy of someone who actually runs a rental property. Every feature in DirectBookings exists because I needed it as a host — not because a product manager thought it would look good in a demo.

DirectBookings is intentionally focused. No bloated channel managers. No enterprise dashboards with 47 tabs. Just the tools independent hosts need to accept direct bookings, own their guest relationships, and stop paying 15.5% on every reservation.