What Lake does

Lake.com is an online vacation rental marketplace focused exclusively on waterfront properties, defined as homes within a 15-minute drive of lakes, rivers, or other large bodies of water. Founded in 2023 and headquartered in New York with operations in Toronto, the platform serves two primary customer segments: family and group travelers seeking curated lakeside stays, and SMB hosts/property managers listing waterfront inventory. By April 2026, Lake.com had scaled to roughly 75,000 properties across more than 10,000 destinations in North America and Europe, covering 1,400+ lakes and 4,000+ national and state parks — inventory growth it attributes to PMS/channel-manager integrations and a 2025 European entry via Interhome.

The platform operates a tiered revenue model. Hosts can list for free under a standard 10% per-booking commission, or upgrade to annual Premium ($199–$499/year, with pricing varying across sources) or Portfolio ($3,999/year) memberships that offer 0% commission on Featured listings and direct-booking tools. Guests pay no platform booking or service fees, a deliberate wedge against Airbnb and Vrbo's typical host commissions and guest fees. Distribution is built on integrations with OwnerRez, BookingPal, Hostaway, and Lodgify, which sync listings, calendars, rates, and reservations in near real time and extend inventory to Google Vacation Rentals and other OTAs. Lake.com publicly positions itself as an AI-driven travel search platform, though disclosed AI capabilities center on recommendation and process automation rather than proprietary models. The company is led by Founder and CEO David Ciccarelli and has raised $2.6 million from the Business Development Bank of Canada as of September 2025.

Name

Lake

Legal name

Lake.com

Website

https://lake.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2023

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Lake.com is a vacation rental marketplace focused exclusively on waterfront properties, serving SMB hosts and family/group travelers with zero guest fees, tiered host memberships, and PMS integrations across North America and Europe.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Vacation Rental Marketplace

NAICS

Other Traveler Accommodation (72119)

SIC

Hotels, Rooming Houses, Camps & Other Lodging Places (7000)

akta.pro primary industry

Beachfront & Lakefront Homes (THAMAAAF)

akta.pro secondary industry

Luxury Beachfront & Waterfront Villas (THAMAEAE)

Keywords

• Waterfront vacation rentals
• Online travel marketplace
• Short-term rental platform
• Vacation rental booking
• Lakefront property listings

Headquarters

HQ city

Toronto

HQ country

Canada

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B and B2C

Offering type

Digital Commerce or Content

Cost components

Technology or R&D, Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Host Platform Fees (Standard): Standard tier charges a 10% platform fee on bookings. Hosts pay as they go per transaction.
2. Premium Membership: Annual subscription tier at $199/year (per hospitalitynet source) or $499/year (per einpresswire source), offering 0% commission on Featured listings with direct-booking tools. Allows hosts to pay upfront to retain more earnings per reservation.
3. Portfolio Membership: Annual subscription tier at $3,999/year offering 0% commission on Featured listings with direct-booking tools. Designed for vacation rental operators and property managers seeking maximum revenue retention and distribution control.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels5 records

Marketing channels6 records

Core offering

Lake.com operates an online two-sided marketplace that connects guests seeking lakefront and waterfront vacation rentals with hosts listing cabins, cottages, and houses within a 15-minute drive of lakes, rivers, and large bodies of water. The platform currently lists 75,000 properties across 10,000+ destinations in North America and Europe, charges no guest booking fees, and monetizes on the host side through a free standard tier with a 10% per-booking platform fee and paid annual Premium ($199-$499/year) and Portfolio ($3,999/year) memberships offering 0% commission on Featured listings.

Product overview

Lake.com is a vacation rental platform focused on waterfront properties, offering lake houses, cabins, and cottages within a 15-minute drive of lakes or large bodies of water. The platform operates as a direct-booking marketplace with tiered membership options: free standard listings (10% commission), Premium membership ($199-499/year), and Portfolio membership ($3,999/year with 0% commission on Featured listings). The platform integrates with property management systems including BookingPal, OwnerRez, Hostaway, and Lodgify, and has expanded into Europe through a partnership with Interhome. Key features include verified properties, secure payment processing, instant booking, 24/7 multilingual support, and AI-driven travel search positioning.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Lake.com Platform Core two-sided online vacation rental marketplace that lets individual travelers (families, groups, couples, solo adventurers) search, filter and book waterfront properties and lets hosts list cabins, houses, and cottages. Currently includes 75,000 properties across 10,000+ destinations in North America and Europe and is offered to guests with no platform booking fee.
• Standard Host Listings Free standard-tier offering for vacation rental hosts to list their waterfront properties on Lake.com with no upfront cost; hosts pay a 10% per-booking platform fee on completed reservations.
• Premium Membership Annual host-side membership tier priced at $199-$499 per year (price varies by source) that gives vacation rental hosts 0% commission on Featured listings and unlocks direct-booking tools for retaining more earnings per reservation.
• Portfolio Membership Annual host-side membership tier priced at $3,999 per year designed for vacation rental operators and property managers seeking maximum revenue retention; offers 0% commission on Featured listings plus direct-booking tools and distribution control across multiple properties.

Quantifiable outcome

• Doubled waterfront vacation rental inventory to 75,000 properties in 90 days
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers1 record

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration5 records

AI capability4 records

Feature3 records

Partnerships

Three partnerships are on record, tiered core.

• BookingPalcoreTechnology or Integration · 24 March 2026Lake.com and BookingPal announced a strategic partnership to broaden distribution for lakeside vacation rentals across major OTAs and metasearch platforms, including Google Vacation Rentals. The integration enables property managers to synchronize rates, availability, content, and reservations in real time between the two platforms. Lake.com addresses a $25 billion market opportunity in the U.S. vacation rental industry.
• OwnerRezcoreTechnology or Integration · 19 January 2026Lake.com integrated with OwnerRez, a vacation rental channel manager and PMS provider founded in 2009 and headquartered in Seattle. The integration enables OwnerRez property managers to sync listings, calendars, and reservations directly with Lake.com's network covering 1,400+ lakes and 4,000+ national and state parks. Listings sync within 30 seconds of connection, with calendar and pricing updates every five minutes. OwnerRez already maintains direct API integrations with Airbnb, Vrbo, and Booking.com.
• InterhomecoreTechnology or Integration · 30 October 2025Lake.com and Interhome announced a strategic partnership to expand Lake.com's European lakeside and waterfront offerings. The collaboration adds more than 40,000 quality-checked holiday homes across 20+ European countries — including Italy, France, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Spain, Croatia, Portugal, and the Netherlands — to Lake.com's platform. This marked Lake.com's entry into the European market.

Scale indicators6 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights6 records

Emerging players

• Hipcamp: Outdoor accommodations marketplace focused on camping, glamping, and nature stays. Adjacent niche-specialization comparable to Lake.com's waterfront focus, with similar SEO-driven destination-page strategy and host acquisition model.
• Glamping Hub: Niche marketplace for unique outdoor accommodations including waterfront cabins and treehouses. Comparable vertical-specialization approach to Lake.com and overlapping host base of small property owners near water.

Direct peers

• Vacasa: Largest North American vacation rental management company with a marketplace. Comparable business model spanning professional management of lakefront/cabin properties and direct host acquisition relevant to Lake.com's Premium/Portfolio tier hosts.
• Vrbo: Vacation rental marketplace (owned by Expedia Group) focused on whole-home rentals, a directly overlapping category with Lake.com. Both target family-oriented travelers and compete for vacation rental hosts in North American destinations.
• Evolve: Vacation rental management and booking platform partnering with property owners. Comparable in serving individual and small-portfolio hosts seeking lower commission than Airbnb/Vrbo — the same value proposition Lake.com uses to attract hosts.
• Plum Guide: Curated vacation rental platform emphasizing quality-verified, design-led stays. Comparable as a curated/vertical alternative to mass OTAs and overlaps with Lake.com's Verified Properties positioning and premium pricing tier.
• Airbnb: Largest global vacation rental marketplace directly competing for the same hosts and guests as Lake.com. Lake.com explicitly positions its zero-fee and waterfront-specialization model against Airbnb's commission structure and generalist inventory.

Broad incumbents

• Marriott Homes & Villas: Premium, professionally-managed vacation rental platform from Marriott Bonvoy. Comparable in curating higher-end whole-home rentals (overlapping with Lake.com's premium listings) and in providing professionally-managed inventory as an alternative to peer-to-peer marketplaces.
• Booking.com: Largest global OTA with a significant vacation rental supply. Distributes Lake.com inventory via the BookingPal channel partnership and represents the dominant alternative booking destination Lake.com competes with for guest attention.
• Google Vacation Rentals: Google's metasearch and direct-booking surface for vacation rentals. Lake.com's BookingPal integration specifically targets Google Vacation Rentals distribution, making it a critical upstream channel and competitive substitute for direct guest acquisition.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/watch?v=fn4NFJ92C_Y
• Xx.com/lakedotcom
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/lakedotcom

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles2 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds1 record

Investors1 record

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Lake