When it comes to renting homes and rooms through Airbnb, Florida is king, but even though such rentals are vastly fewer in Fresno, the city is gaining momentum.

In fact, in the third quarter of this year, the number of Airbnbs in Fresno totaled 441, a 119.4% percent increase from the 201 here the same quarter in 2017.

Nationally, among cities with more than 500,000 residents, Fresno ranked second in Airbnb growth rates behind Charlotte, North Carolina, which had a 120.4% growth rate, according to a report put out this week by IPX1031, a Florida-based financial company that specializes in helping clients buy second homes and investment properties.

A previous report put out by the company listed Fresno as 19^th among the best cities in the nation to invest in Airbnb properties, with California’s Moreno Valley ranked No. 1.

In the new report, analysts compared Airbnb rentals this year with 2017 because that was as far back as the data they needed was fully available, said Tricia Harte, a spokeswoman for the company.

The report, put out this week, primarily lists U.S. cities with the highest number of Airbnb properties per capita, determining that Miami Beach, with 7,286 total rentals, had the highest per capita rate, 3,416 rentals for every 50,000 residents.

In fact seven Florida cities were among the top 10 for having the highest per capita rate of Airbnb rentals, while the highest California city on the list, Indio, ranked 15^th with 784 rentals per capita.

Only the top 30 cities in the ranking were listed in the report, so it’s unclear how Fresno and other Valley cities not in the top 30 ranked.

The report also listed cities with the most and least growth of Airbnb rentals, though only cities with populations of 500,000 or more were analyzed. So Fresno was the only Valley city looked at in this category.

But at the request of The Business Journal, IPX1031 analyzed the data on cities with 100,000 or more residents. They found that from the third quarter of 2017 to the third quarter of this year, the number of Airbnb properties in Bakersfield grew from 158 to 343, a 117% increase, and from 95 to 161 in Visalia, a 69% increase.

No other South Valley cities were included in this list, as they have populations below 100,000.

Looking at the three cities’ rankings for most growth at a per capita rate of 50,000 people, Fresno’s ranking drops from second to 65^th place out of 350 cities, while Bakersfield is ranked a close 68^th and Visalia is in 153^rd place.