I'm Mitch, the founder and developer behind HostHive.
I want to tell you about something I just shipped — and why it feels like the natural next step for everything we've built since 2023.
Tax Prep Has Always Been Part of the Plan
Since day one, HostHive has been about organizing the chaos of hosting.
Transactions imported from your bank. Every expense categorized. Every dollar assigned to a property. Income tracked alongside costs so you actually know what each property makes.
If you've been using HostHive all year, you've already been doing tax prep without realizing it.
Every time you approved a transaction and assigned it to a category and property — that was tax prep.
Every time you logged a cleaning expense or a repair — that was tax prep.
The data has been there. Organized. Ready.
But there was still a gap.
The Last Mile
Even with everything organized, tax season still meant work.
Export the data. Reorganize it for your accountant. Answer questions about personal use days. Dig up acquisition dates. Reconcile what Airbnb says they paid versus what you recorded.
The bones were there. But you still had to assemble them.
I kept thinking: why should this take more than one click?
One Button. One PDF. One Email.
That's what Tax Prep is now.
Go to Finance → Tax Prep. Select your tax year. Click "Download Tax Packet."
You get a single PDF with everything your accountant needs:
- •Per-property income and expenses — already broken down by Schedule E line items
- •Personal use days — calculated automatically from stays you flagged, plus manual adjustments
- •1099-K reconciliation — platform-reported income versus what you recorded
- •Property acquisition details — purchase date, cost basis, land vs. improvements for depreciation
- •Transaction appendix — every expense, categorized, with receipt indicators
Print it. Email it. Done.
No spreadsheets. No back-and-forth. No "can you clarify this?" emails.
Your accountant gets exactly what they need, organized exactly how the IRS expects it.
The Work Happens All Year
Here's what I love about this.
If you've been using HostHive — really using it — you've already done the work.
Approved transactions? Check. Assigned to properties? Check. Categorized expenses? Check. Flagged personal use stays? Check.
Tax Prep just collects what you've already organized and packages it.
The button isn't doing the work. You did the work. All year. Five minutes at a time.
The button just proves it.
Personal Use Tracking
This was the piece that didn't exist before.
The IRS has a rule: if you use your rental property for more than 14 days — or more than 10% of the days you rented it out — your deductions get limited.
Simple rule. Hard to track. Most hosts estimate.
Not anymore.
When you create an appointment in HostHive, there's now a checkbox: "Personal use (not a guest stay)."
Thanksgiving at the cabin? Check the box. Parents visiting the beach house? Check the box. Weekend doing repairs yourself? Check the box.
HostHive calculates the days. Per property. Per year. Shows you a breakdown. Includes it in your tax packet.
When your accountant asks about personal use days, you don't say "I think it was around 10 days."
You say "HostHive says 12 days. Here's the breakdown."
Schedule E. Handled.
Your categories now map directly to Schedule E line items.
Cleaning → Line 7 (Cleaning and maintenance) Utilities → Line 17 (Utilities) Repairs → Line 14 (Repairs) Platform fees → Line 8 (Commissions)
Your accountant sees expenses pre-organized exactly how the IRS expects them.
No more translating. No more reformatting. It's already done.
What This Means
HostHive started as a way to coordinate turnovers.
Then it became a way to manage your team.
Then finances.
Then guest experience.
Now it's the last step: taxes.
Work all year in one system. When April comes, press a button. Send an email.
That's it. That's the whole workflow.
Available Now
Tax Prep is live for all HostHive users.
Finance → Tax Prep → Download.
If you've been organizing your finances in HostHive all year, this is your payoff.
If you're new — start now. Next tax season, you'll thank yourself.
Thanks for being part of this.
— Mitch mb@hosthive.io Founder & Developer, HostHive