Price plays a crucial role in customers’ accommodation choices and the long-term success of the industry. Therefore, helping hosts set appropriate prices is essential. While existing research primarily focuses on identifying and classifying factors that influence pricing, limited attention has been given to the formation of pricing mechanisms. This study applies signaling theory to examine the impact of user-generated signals on pricing and explores the moderating role of reputation signals. Using a dataset of 470,000 online reviews from 2,836 listings, this study employs ordinary least squares and quantile regression analysis. The results indicate that a higher number of reviews generally leads to lower prices, whereas higher overall ratings result in higher prices. Furthermore, listings with a “Superhost” badge and platform certifications can mitigate the negative impact of a high number of reviews on price while enhancing the positive influence of overall ratings. In addition, reputation signals enable hosts to adjust their pricing strategies more effectively by offsetting the downward pricing pressure traditionally associated with large review volumes and by amplifying the positive influence of higher ratings. This helps change the prevailing stereotype that more reviews imply lower pricing, while also discouraging hosts from deliberately lowering prices to attract additional reviews.
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li et al. (2026) studied this question.
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