Durham: A guide to short-term rentals

The city of Duke University was once home to a tobacco monopoly, and its old buildings have become the centerpiece of a revitalized downtown. A short-term rental is the best way to explore all that Durham has to offer.

Kasa's short-term rentals in Durham

With short-term rentals in the city’s most exciting neighborhoods, Kasa offers comfortable and convenient accommodations no matter what brings you to Durham or where you need to go.

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    Discover Durham

    After booking your short-term rental in Durham, here's everything you need to know for your trip.

    Durham is part of North Carolina’s famed Research Triangle, which includes Raleigh and Chapel Hill. These three cities are home to Duke University, North Carolina State University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, respectively, and the region is known for being one of the country’s most dynamic education, research, and medical centers.

    Before European colonization, the Eno and Occoneechi tribes farmed in the area that now encompasses Durham. In 1701, when the English explorer John Lawson passed through the region, he called it “the flower of the Carolinas” because of its beauty. In the antebellum period, the area was primarily agricultural, and it hosted vast plantations worked by large numbers of enslaved Africans.

    In the 19th century, a railroad station was built in what is now Durham by necessity: the trains were wood-burning and needed to refuel between Raleigh and Hillsborough. The station was built on land donated by a Dr. Bartlett Durham, thus the city’s name, and in 1853 a post office arrived, which is considered the city’s official founding.

    Through the end of the Civil War, Durham was miniscule. General Sherman occupied Raleigh, North Carolina’s nearby state capital, and the last sizable Confederate army was in Greensboro when General Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox, Virginia. The general of that army, Joseph E. Johnston, negotiated surrender at a small farm in Durham called Bennett Place.

    After the Civil War, Durham boomed thanks to tobacco, an industry that rapidly expanded in the area, and Durham’s vibrant Black community centered around Parrish Street, which was nicknamed “Black Wall Street.” The city is also home to North Carolina Central University, the first publicly supported liberal arts college for African-Americans in the country. During the Civil Rights movement, Durham was a major locus of protest, with explosive sit-ins and visits from Martin Luther King Jr.

    Today, the tobacco facilities that once dominated the city’s downtown have been repurposed, and there are great short-term rental options near Durham’s exciting restaurants, shops, museums, music, and entertainment.