CMS Architecture for Property Management

Why property management sites need structured content

Property management and vacation rental sites live or die by their listings. Guests make booking decisions based on photos, amenities, availability, and reviews. A well-structured CMS lets you keep all of this in sync across your website and platforms like Guesty or Hostaway.

Recommended collections

Properties

The core listing collection — every rental unit, vacation home, or managed property:

• Name (PlainText, required) — the property title, e.g., "Oceanfront Villa at Sunset Beach". Used as the primary field.
• Slug (PlainText) — URL-friendly identifier, auto-generated from the name.
• Description (RichText) — detailed property overview with formatting for amenity highlights, neighborhood info, and house rules.
• Short description (PlainText) — one- or two-sentence summary for cards and search results.
• Featured image (Image, required) — hero photo for cards and listing pages.
• Property type (Option) — house, apartment, condo, cabin, villa, studio.
• Bedrooms (Number) — integer count of bedrooms.
• Bathrooms (Number) — supports decimals for half baths (e.g., 2.5).
• Max guests (Number) — maximum occupancy.
• Base price per night (Number) — starting nightly rate in dollars.
• Weekend price (Number) — Friday/Saturday rate if different from base.
• Cleaning fee (Number) — one-time fee per stay.
• Minimum stay (Number) — minimum number of nights.
• Location (Reference) — link to Locations collection.
• Amenities (MultiReference) — link to Amenities collection.
• Status (Option) — active, maintenance, unlisted, archived.
• Check-in time (PlainText) — e.g., "3:00 PM".
• Check-out time (PlainText) — e.g., "11:00 AM".
• External ID (PlainText) — Guesty or Hostaway listing ID for sync. Help text: "The listing ID from your property management platform."
• Featured (Switch) — highlight on homepage or search results.
• Pet friendly (Switch) — filterable boolean.

Amenities

A standalone collection so amenities can be reused across properties and filtered:

• Name (PlainText, required) — e.g., "Pool", "Hot Tub", "WiFi", "Ocean View".
• Icon (Image) — small icon for amenity badges.
• Category (Option) — outdoor, kitchen, entertainment, accessibility, safety, essentials.
• Order (Number) — display priority.

Availability Calendar

A companion collection tied to each property. Each item represents a date range:

• Property (Reference, required) — link back to the property.
• Start date (DateTime, required) — check-in date. Help text: "First available date in this range."
• End date (DateTime, required) — last available date. Help text: "Last available date in this range."
• Status (Option) — available, booked, blocked, maintenance.
• Price override (Number) — seasonal or event pricing for this range.
• Notes (PlainText) — internal notes about the block.

Reviews

Guest reviews linked to specific properties:

• Guest name (PlainText, required)
• Property (Reference, required) — which property was reviewed.
• Rating (Number) — 1-5 star rating.
• Review text (RichText) — the full review body.
• Stay date (DateTime) — when the guest stayed.
• Response (RichText) — property manager's public response.
• Published (Switch) — moderation toggle. Help text: "Only published reviews appear on the website."

Property Photos

A companion collection for property image galleries with sort control:

• Property (Reference, required) — link back to the property.
• Image (Image, required) — the photo.
• Caption (PlainText) — alt text and caption.
• Room (Option) — bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, living area, exterior, pool, view.
• Order (Number) — display order within the gallery.
• Featured (Switch) — use as a cover image alternative.

Locations

Geographic groupings for properties:

• Name (PlainText, required) — e.g., "Malibu", "Lake Tahoe", "Downtown Austin".
• Description (RichText) — area overview with nearby attractions.
• Featured image (Image) — area hero photo.
• Region (Option) — for multi-region filtering.
• Map coordinates (PlainText) — latitude/longitude for embedded maps.

Key relationships

• Properties -> Amenities (multi-reference) — each property links to multiple amenities from a shared pool.
• Properties -> Property Photos (companion collection) — photos reference back to their property. Use a companion collection instead of multi-image when you need captions, room tags, and sort order.
• Properties -> Availability Calendar (companion collection) — date ranges reference back to the property.
• Properties -> Reviews (companion collection) — reviews reference back to the property.
• Properties -> Location (single reference) — each property belongs to one location.

Integration considerations

If you use Guesty or Hostaway to manage bookings, store the external listing ID on each property so Trellis can match records during sync. Availability and pricing data should flow from the property management platform into the Availability Calendar collection, not the other way around — your website is a read-only view of availability.

See Connector: Guesty for setup instructions.

Tips for property management CMS

1. Use companion collections for photos — multi-image fields do not support captions, room tags, or manual sort order. A Property Photos companion collection gives you full control. Read Companion Collections for the pattern.
2. DateTime fields for availability — always use DateTime, not PlainText, for dates. This enables calendar rendering and date-range filtering.
3. Pricing tiers belong on the property — base price, weekend price, and cleaning fee as separate Number fields. Seasonal overrides go in the Availability Calendar.
4. Amenities as references, not multi-select — a standalone Amenities collection lets you add icons, categories, and reorder without editing every property.
5. Review moderation — add a Published boolean so you can moderate reviews before they appear on the site.