Forty-five percent of American pet owners say they’ve changed, limited or outright canceled travel plans because they couldn’t find suitable accommodations for their animal, and among Gen Z pet owners, that number jumps to 57%, according to a new survey commissioned by PetScreening, the pet-policy platform used by thousands of rental properties nationwide. The findings, based on responses from 1,000 U.S. adults surveyed by Veridata Insights between May 20 and 22, 2026, put a number on something anyone who’s tried to book a hotel with a dog already suspects: pets aren’t a footnote in travel planning anymore. For a growing share of owners, they’re the deciding factor.
The survey found that 71% of Americans identify as pet owners, and among that group, 64% say their pet likely shapes where they go and how they get there, according to PetScreening’s own release of the findings. That’s not a fringe preference anymore. It’s a majority behavior shaping a meaningful share of the travel market.
Bringing the pet, or staying home
Roughly 43% of pet owners say they’d rather bring their animal along than board it or leave it with a sitter, a preference that climbs to 47% among Gen Z owners, per the survey data reported by Short Term Rentalz. That preference runs headlong into a supply problem: plenty of hotels and short-term rentals still don’t accept pets, charge steep fees when they do, or cap the number and size of animals allowed. When owners can’t find something that works, the survey suggests a lot of them don’t compromise on a boarding facility, they just don’t go.
That’s a meaningful shift for an industry that has spent years treating pet policies as a minor amenity line rather than a booking driver. If nearly half of pet owners are willing to shrink, delay or scrap a trip over accommodation gaps, “pet-friendly” stops being a nice-to-have filter on a booking site and starts functioning more like a hard constraint, closer to budget or dates than to a preference for a pool or a view.
The cost of leaving pets behind
For owners who do travel without their pets, the survey found real money changes hands to make that possible. Twenty-five percent of respondents said they’re likely to spend up to $25 a day on pet care while they’re away, and another 24% expect to pay between $26 and $50 a day. Gen Z owners spend even more aggressively on the arrangement: 59% reported spending over $25 a day on pet care when traveling without their animal, and a quarter said they spent at least $50 a day.
Add that up over a week-long trip and pet care alone can run several hundred dollars, on top of whatever the actual vacation costs. That math is presumably part of why so many owners would rather just bring the pet, even when it complicates where they can book.
What it means for the industry
“Pets are part of the family, and they are influencing where people go, how long they stay and whether they travel at all,” PetScreening founder and CEO John Bradford said in the company’s release announcing the findings. That’s a notable statement coming from a company whose business is built on helping rental operators screen and manage pet policies, it’s effectively PetScreening telling its own customer base that turning away pet owners is turning away booked revenue.
The generational gap in the data is hard to ignore. Gen Z pet owners are more likely than the overall sample to prioritize bringing their pet (47% vs. 43%), more likely to have already altered a trip because of accommodation limits (57% vs. 45%), and more willing to spend heavily on pet care when they don’t bring the animal along. As that cohort’s travel spending grows over the next decade, accommodation providers that still treat pet policy as an afterthought are likely to see it show up directly in their booking numbers.
For property owners and hotels weighing whether a pet-friendly policy is worth the cleaning fees and liability, the survey offers a fairly direct answer: nearly half of a very large, very mobile customer base is already making decisions based on it, and the operators still sitting on the fence are simply handing those bookings to someone else.
