Just like Super Bowl LII, Super Bowl XXVI maxed out the metro’s inventory of hotel rooms. Locals listed their properties with area realtors and visitors bureaus.
With Twin Cities hotels packed for Super Bowl weekend, football fans are paying top dollar to stay at private homes in the metro.
Short-term rental websites like Airbnb have made this easier than ever — the company said Wednesday that 6,700 Twin Cities homeowners have listed their properties on the site. But enterprising Minnesotans also cashed in when the big game came to the Metrodome in 1992. Just like Super Bowl LII, Super Bowl XXVI maxed out the metro’s inventory of hotel and motel rooms.
With the internet still in its infancy, locals listed their properties with area realtors and visitors bureaus. The Greater Minneapolis Convention and Visitors Association even suggested homeowners take out newspaper ads in Washington, D. C., and Buffalo, N.Y., whose teams squared off in the 1992 game.
Weekly rates varied, according to a December 1991 article in the Pioneer Press — from $1,000 for a downtown loft, to $20,000 for a house on Lake of the Isles.
For $240 each, a pair of Buffalo Bills fans from Canada spent three nights at the Minneapolis home of Georgia and Ron Youngquist. And in true “Minnesota Nice” fashion, the couple even made their guests breakfast each day and shuttled them around the city.
“We tried to keep it reasonable,” Georgia Youngquist told the Pioneer Press at the time. “Somebody said to us, ‘Why don’t you sock it to them,’ but I’m really doing it more for the hospitality.”
While most people interviewed by the paper seemed to be of a similar mind, others saw renting out their home as a way to escape the city while the Super Bowl circus was in town.
“I just hope to make enough money to take a vacation and get out of here,” one Minneapolis woman said. Related Articles
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