TAMPA (970 WFLA) -- Baseball has been very good to AirBNB hosts in Florida.
The home sharing app released figures showing a spike in rentals during March in spring training cities across the state, and strong signs that people heading south for the Grapefruit League made the difference.
The most striking case came from Dunedin, where the Toronto Blue Jays train. Overall AirBNB visits more than doubled, with Ontario as the number one point of origin. Visits from Ontario alone increased 1,860 percent compared to the previous month. About 100 Dunedin homeowners made a total $263,000 during the month.
"The state that was most representative of AirBNB guests (in March) in Bradenton was Pennsylvania, and that doesn't normally happen," said AirBNB spokesman Ben Breit.
In Tampa, host city for the New York Yankees, AirBNB hosts saw a 32 percent increase compared with a month earlier. New York was the number one origin state, and visitors from there increased 33 percent.
Even cities that host Florida teams benefit. AirBNB says Florida was the number one origin state for visitors to Port Charlotte in March. That city hosts the Tampa Bay Rays spring training.
AirBNB says its hosts made around $12,000,000 during March across Florida's Grapefruit League cities.