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You should never rely on Airbnb, or any other OTA, or even prayers to get bookings for you.
Especially in Florida (I am in South Florida) there are very many STR options for visitors - STRs such as Airbnb, hotels, B & Bs, motels, RV parks etc.
I find that to keep our two rentals booked year round can be time consuming unless you have a good system worked out.
Networking is one of the most important - I have several hotels and STRs that routinely send guests to me, as well as theatres, businesses, event organisers and so on.
Another great way to get action is via social media.
I’m working hard on it! I don’t rely on any one thing, believe me. I have an Instagram page and I have some marketing strategies lined up with a few businesses in town. As for prayers, it was just a joke, but it can’t hurt I’m brand spanking new! I’ll let you all know how things are going in a few months. It takes time.
Be sure to require one or more cleanings during the four week stay. Once a week to ten nights seems about right. You’ll have a chance to get it and see how they are treating your home, and can clean if they aren’t keeping it clean.
If they refuse, don’t rent to them.
And a head’s up - scammers feed on greed and desperation. A long booking is really attractive if you don’t have a lot of nights booked or haven’t been in business long and the scammers know that. It might be prudent to tell these folks to book for two weeks, and after a week, if it all goes well, you’ll let them extend the stay.
If guests are staying for eight days or more, they get a mid-stay cleaning. It’s in the guise of ‘new towels and bedding’.
The purpose though, as you say, is to make sure that the place isn’t going to need hours and hours of cleaning once the guests have gone.
I find that the most common thing I have to mention to guests once I’ve been in and changed the linens and cleaned is that leaving any food out encourages ants and other insects.
This is because of the climate here and it’s not something that guests from other climates would think about. Even a few crumbs and cause havoc!
These cleaning sessions mid-stay are essential, especially for hosts who have mostly back to back guests.
Putting it in House Rules is the kind of thing that leads to hosts having those endless house rules lists covering all manner of minutia.
Putting food away and wiping counters in areas where ants and other insects are prevalent is just something I would leave a note about and put in the house manual. And a mention in the listing ad itself.
I think “House Rules” should be reserved for major things, not used to try to micromanage every aspect of a guest’s behavior.
I have actually withdrawn the pre-approval ( I haven’t heard back from the guest as of yet ) although, I have sent a response with hopes that we can work out the details. I was overly zealous when I clicked “send pre-approval “. All these “firsts” can be overwhelming. So glad you are all so helpful
I don’t know if there is any correlation between new host boost and new listing boost but having just opened my second listing in May my “new” listing status only appeared on my ad until I had 3 reviews posted. I watched several other new listings in my area, both new hosts and like mine, new listings with experienced hosts, and it appeared 3 posted reviews was the magic number for both.
When I first started 8 years ago, it was about a month as you stated here. And as always, this is another point Airbnb does not share actual info on. It does appear to be shortened and as has been said, it is critical when starting out to acquire as many reviews as possible and long term stays (greater than a week) should be avoided by newbies.
Let us know how this plays out! I have only been an ABB host for about a year and just recently opened up a second listing allowing people to book for a month at a time, but I require booking requests (no instant book for long-term stays) and I explicitly say in my ‘house rules’ that guests must have a 5* rating with at least 5 stays on Airbnb. I recently got a couple of bookings. I was excited, because that’s a solid month of booking, but I admit I’m still a little apprehensive, even knowing that these are both people with great track records. Keeping my fingers crossed!
Hi all, here’s the update…It looks like it was a scam! After I made clear that I would only allow a 28 day booking and no 3rd party booking, I never heard back. The following day, I received another inquiry, different name and different medical condition but again, asking if I would accept a 32 day booking for a “friend” undergoing chemotherapy. I decided to respond with “I’m sorry but I cannot accommodate those dates.” After that, I heard nothing and proceeded to report both inquiries to Airbnb. If they were legit, I believe I would have received a response. After all the advice on this forum and trusting my gut after two in a row, I think I have dodged a bullet, as they say. Thanks again for all the good advice!
Good for you.
I signed up on VRBO for a short time and got weird messaging from someone that wanted to book, for how long who knows. They wanted to send a check. No thanks. Because of that and only one booking, I let go of VRBO.
I’m brand spanking new! I’ll let you all know how things are going in a few months. It takes time.
