What using airbnb as a guest taught this superhost

and i just want to add that I think the tangential discussions on this board are often so interesting!

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It’s a Costco LIFE! :slight_smile:

Actually, the one near me is depressing and very crowded. Huge people pushing huge carts of food. The last time I was there a man had passed out. He was lying flat on his back between lines of carts while people blithely looked on as the paramedics worked on him.

I no longer remember what this thread was about. lol

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It is indeed a favor if they chose to give their money to you instead of someone else.

They’re not “giving” me anything. I’m providing an excellent accommodation and service and guests say that they feel lucky to have found my place. Neither of us are doing the other a favor – it’s mutually beneficial.

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Not a favor at all. They are getting a great deal here without spending the usual fortune that you would on a hotel room in Hawaii. All the hotels charge mandatory resort fees now. Anywhere from $30-40 per night for parking and wi fi.

I think it’s getting into dangerous territory when you start characterizing a guest booking as a favor to you. Yes, they could have booked with someone else, and if they did I would have found someone else in their place.

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Canadian here, I don’t dole out thank you’s as if they were $100 bills. It’s IMO simple good manners to say thank you when people book, when they arrive and when they leave.
As a Canadian, I find I have closer cultural ties with Europe than the USA. I’ve lived in the USA for a few years, have many friends there, but find I have difficulty understanding some of the attitudes from south of the border.
As for Costco, I shop there and can easily incorporate food sold there with my clean eating practices. Broad brush slurs against obese individuals is just as disgusting to me as racist slurs against Asians etc. Obesity is a complex, genetic, environmental disorder that is poorly understood as research is hampered by funding decisions based in such bigotry.

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I thank guests on occasion, like when they have clinched the deal and it’s a big-ee ($2000+). I will have a closing sentence thanking them for selecting my condo and assuring them they will not be disappointed.

Sometimes I will thank a guest at the end of the stay if they have made points with me by giving effusive feedback on arrival or letting me know mid-stay that they are having the best time and love the condo ~ ‘It’s so homely!’ Yes, they say homely rather than homey. (sigh)

Anyway, it makes me feel very appreciative in turn and it’s natural to thank them.

It’s sorta like the flight attendants announcing to the passengers while taxiing to the terminal, “We know you have a choice and we thank you for flying with us.” I know my guests have a choice because there are almost 1,000 condos in the area and if someone chooses mine, heck yeh I’m grateful!

As a rule though, it is more the norm that I don’t issue a thanks. It’s purely subjective.

I must be old-fashioned, but I think saying “thank you” is a basic requirement of human interaction. I say thank you to the stranger who holds the door for me and my baker says “thank you” when I buy a 1€ baguette. Being nice and polite is not servility, it just makes daily life more pleasant.

Needless to say I answer all inquiries by “thank you for your message/reservation”. And it’s not rare that guests say “thank you for letting us stay in your apartment”.

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I always write “Thank you very much for booking with us.” in response to a guest’s reservation. I think that what people were responding to was the suggestion that hosts should be grateful for a booking and should write a personalized thank you including congratulations on events in the guests life. Here is the quote from the post that started the discussion about thanks.

“When someone has chosen your place over all the other listings, thank them. Let them know you appreciate it. I just booked three places in Norway, and in response two of my bookings complete with detailed and friendly greeting said “you can check-in at anytime; we’ll leave the key in the door”. Not thank you, or, it will be nice to meet you, or I wish you a pleasant voyage, or 'how wonderful you’re coming to Norway or congrats on your daughter’s graduation. Nor did they answer my questions about traffic, road conditions, and how that could possibly impact our arrival time. “MEH” is right.”

I believe that there is a line between being polite and gushing. I believe that if you are obsequious the guest will believe that they are doing you a favor in booking with you and they will want extras in order to even the transaction. In fact both sides are benefiting. I also thank purveyors. I don’t get offended if they don’t thank me back. However, do you expect the baker of your baguette to congratulate you on your family’s milestones (daughter’s graduation) and/or do research for you (traffic, road conditions)? This takes time and time is money. In the US it has become common for Yelp reviewers to complain that a restaurant hasn’t given a complimentary course if the reviewer has told the reservation taker that they are celebrating an occasion. In one instance, someone got a discount on his Starbucks drink every day because he said it was his birthday every day. To sum up, I think it’s good for hosts to be polite (within the dictates of their culture, not the guests’ culture), but we need to establish boundarys regarding how much time and/or money we will spend.

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I strive to be gracious without faking it or overdoing it.

Yes, being gracious doesn’t mean you need to grovel. And thanking someone in the checkout line is completely different than thanking someone for booking, when they haven’t even stayed yet. Depending how this thanking is done…I think it can subliminally give a guest the upper hand. So I do agree with Ellen that depending how the thanking is done - can definitely signal to the guest that you are a pushover, and what else can they ask for.

This is one reason I chose not to provide a bottle of wine upon arrival. When I first started out I read about many whole home rentals providing a gift basket, bottle of wine, etc. That’s great for the homes that get $6,000 a week. But I just felt like I would be thanking the guest by providing them a bottle of wine…before the guest proved themselves to be good guests. I feel like when you “thank” someone it is because they have proven themselves to be a good person. I chose to take those funds and provide guests with “better” amenities than my competition. And I felt more comfortable providing movie candy and popcorn for the theater room. Cheaper than a bottle of wine that they might not value at all…because they kind of expect it.

Renting out homes is not the same as selling tacos and handing the guest back his change while saying “thank you please come again.”

Today’s departing guests texted me to say thank you for allowing them to enjoy the cabin for their anniversary. I did of course thank them for choosing the cabin. Today’s incoming guests told my partner it was the best cabin they had stayed at yet - and they hadn’t even walked inside…lol… Let’s hope it continues that way :smile:

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Plus… there is a cheap wine threshold. For some people it’s $20. For others, it’s $10. For me, it’s around $5. :smile: If I leave Flip Flop or Barefoot Cabernet… they will think me CHEAP… and I will be guilty as charged!

Honestly, you could really be insulting someone by leaving a $20 bottle when $40 is more their norm. Also, a lot of folks don’t drink. You just never can tell.

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My opinion exactly. I would never have associated it with servility at all.

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@EllenN @Barthelemy I completely agree with both of you. To be honest, it’s simply instinctive to me to say ‘thank you for choosing my place to stay’ and to personalise all exchanges. It’s not exactly a big deal (unless you’re a multi-property owner, I guess) and is part of the whole deal, surely? I don’t want some faceless anonymous fecks staying in my house so why would guests be happy to stay with some monosyllabic, anonymous, unfriendly host? It works both ways. Being warm, friendly and hospitable doesn’t need to cost anything. There’s no need to provide treats and trinkets, in my opinion. Actually they can end up looking kind of desperate, if I’m honest, as if you’re trying to be something that you’re not (like a fancy hotel) or courting some kind of favour in return. Depending on your listing, of course,I suppose. The thing that the majority of my guests appreciate is my local knowledge, my detailed print-out on how to get around and that they feel welcome. There’s no need for chocolates or anything.

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I saw the tomatoes in glass jars at Costco in Canada just last week. Their Mariana Sauce is delicious and is packed in glass jars. I use that as the base for a home made sauce.

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I booked a room on AirBnB this summer, at a house with multiple rooms listed. She is a Superhost, which helped me feel more comfortable and I specifically looked for “Lock on bedroom door” as this was important to me. She listed that there WAS a lock on the bedroom door. I arrived quite late, and was very disturbed that there was NO lock on my bedroom door and I felt the need to push my suitcase up against the door so I would awaken should someone try to enter my room (also my bedroom door was right next to the only bathroom in the house). I rent out 3 separate rooms in my house and I changed out all the door knobs so that every guest has a lock and key if they wish to lock the door when they leave, most don’t, but it’s available. AND to hit on the AC topic - I live in South Florida and prefer my AC set at 80! I know I’m a freak, but I turn it down to 78 when I have guests here. It has been a problem a few times - one guest turning it down to 68 every time my back was turned and many others turning it down to 70-74 and leaving the house and I return to an icebox! I added to my listing that I keep my AC set at 78 - no surprises, unless of course they do not read the listing. I am putting a lock on my thermostat so people can’t just turn it down - they will need to ask me. And when someone does ask me - I will turn it down to as low as 76 and wrap up in blankets and flannel clothes. The lady that wanted it 68 degrees was very difficult. Her son, who had fabulous reviews, booked the room for her and him - 2 rooms. She freaked out when she arrived because I have 2 dogs, and she wanted them locked up. My listing has pictures of them and clearly states “Must love dogs.” I work from home and she kept yelling from end of the house whenever she wanted something (which was constant), she would either yell my name, her son’s or another guest that was staying here. It was very disruptive to my work. She expected everyone to wait on her hand and foot. She was very passive aggressive asking many rude questions and trying to get a reaction. They had booked for 4 days, and were only here one night, and first thing the next morning I offered her son to return their money if he takes her and leaves. I told him I cannot live in an ice box and he should take her somewhere to where she would be more comfortable. He completely understood and accepted my offer and left. PHEW! He still gave me all 5 stars and a lovely review!

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I do the same Louise, even when I sense that the other party isn’t overly expressive. It just sets a bit of an upbeat tone if you throw in a thank you.

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Cost of leaving goodies out does add up. I leave multiple sets of goodies and replenish them each day. If someone eats 2 bags of popcorn each day, they would essentially be out of popcorn until I replenish it. Otherwise some people would go through a whole box without consideration. Same with the breakfast Biscotti, at $5 a box I am glad to make them happy, but they can eat something else as well. I find if I leave a mix of higher valued items with lower items everyone is happy.

@Carmen, those are excellent lessons! I especially agree with you on #3 – being there to greet a guest. We insist on that. And we’re convinced that’s a big part of the reason we get such great reviews (usually)! Sometimes we want to take a little trip that would fall on a day when a new guest is arriving, but we’ll forego the trip just so we can welcome them – that’s how important we think it is. If we really want to take a trip we’ll just block off some days.

Funny you mentioned toilet paper. When we first started hosting I insisted on doing things better than hotels. And one thing that always annoyed me was the cheap-o toilet paper at all hotels. So we put our nice toilet paper in the guest bathroom – and no one ever said anything about it. But we know how things like that are… they may not say anything but it’s just one more little detail that adds up to a good impression in the end.

So, we kept it up for about a year. But we were starting to get annoyed at how fast it was disappearing. It seemed to be getting worse over time. Then, one afternoon we had a guest checking in – these two women. We checked the bathroom before check-in and there were 4 brand new rolls available – which is how we like it when new guests check in. An hour after they checked in, there were 2 rolls left! We couldn’t believe it. They had just taken two rolls into their room and kept them!

Over time we started to sense that almost every time a foreign guest left, they’d grab a roll and take it with them! There would be 3 rolls in there one minute… a few minutes later a guest leaves and we go look and suddenly only 2 rolls!

Reluctantly I went back to the cheap toilet paper. And four rolls last a week now for four guests! The cheap toilet paper isn’t that much cheaper, but it becomes a lot less expensive when you only have to buy it new once a month instead of once every two weeks! It was really eating into our profits. No complaints to us in person or in the reviews, but I still have a haunting feeling it contributes to a less than stellar impression.

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