My listing is in Texas and obviously it is very hot, i am attributing that to the drop off in stays during August, any of my fellow Texans experiencing this as well?
I’m in El Paso and my August was busy as usual. However I do have three days off, yesterday, today and tomorrow and that’s a little unusual. I did have part of the this time blocked for a repeat guest who didn’t end up staying so that could have an effect.
What kind of guest you usually attract is more important than the heat I think. Unless you don’t have AC. LOL
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I’m in Austin and have actually been pretty surprised at the number of people who want to be here in August. I’ve been fully booked for the past two weeks.
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I don’t think that the heat has anything to do with it. It’s just after 10am here in South Florida and its 89 degrees. That’s warm.
We’re always fully booked in the summer months (two apartments) but a lot depends on your area. Although we don’t get tourists in the summer months (apart from mad English people who go out in the midday sun…) there are a lot of conferences, exhibitions and events so plenty of people looking for somewhere to stay. Of course, it also depends on how active you are promoting your business.
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I don’t do anything other than actively manage my Airbnb listing. I think it depends on the kind of listing too. If he has a vacation rental, then yes, he needs other channels and methods to promote. If he’s a roadside pit stop or business traveler stay like me then lack of promotion might not be the issue.
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Happy you’re so busy,keep up the good work
Definitely. Traditionally, the tourist season here is late October to the beginning of May. Not only is it warm during the summer, it’s also the rainy season (which also means mosquito season!) Not too long ago, some businesses used to close completely during the summer months because it was costing them money to stay open.
The local authorities encourage and promote conferences and events during the summer which brings a good steady stream of people in but there are so many accommodation options locally that an Airbnb host really needs to actively promote their listings to conference organisers and event planners to make sure that they are fully booked well in advance of the event.
As many of these events are annual, we often get repeat business with the same attendees coming year after year. Many of these people will book a long time in advance, which I like. 
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Whole home, I’ll post my listing when I get back to computer.
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You have the luxury listing made for outdoor entertainment, right? I expect the heat has some effect for some of the reasons for rentals.
Do you keep track of the reasons people rent your listing (Weddings, graduations, etc.)? It could just be an off-season for your typical guests.
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August was slower than July for us but I attributed it to a 3 week period of being shut down for booking between what guests already were scheduled over July and first part of August.
We have guests scheduled this weekend and nothing after that. Not too worried, most of our bookings are 1 to 7 days out.
We only ended up booking 2 long weekends in August including these incoming. But our river has been dry and the river authority said keep out and the river is a big draw. The heat is a factor because besides the river people come to ride their motorcycles and it has been hot and dry all month.
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Oh I remember now. I’d think a place like that would be much more seasonal that I am. Summer party and wedding season is over. And people aren’t booking way in advance if they don’t have to.
This is a place that you will have to put in work to promote yourself if you want to be fully booked as Jaquo advises.
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I’ve done some promotion with local sports teams and have been lucky enough to have some players and coaches stay, thanks for the input
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Being brutally honest, for a grand a night I would expect to be able to eat off of the floor. Why is the cleanliness rating so low?
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honesty is helpful, the cleanliness rating is low for a couple of reason. It was not important to the previous property manager, I switched cleaning group, and I had a disgruntled guest due to a party that was being thrown and they left it low to spite us. In my opinion, the cleanliness is one of the most important metrics for several reasons. I won’t stop trying to make it better!
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It is very important. I spent a lot of time in my younger days in cheap Spanish hostals. I am going to go on and stereotype here: Spaniards are fanatics when they clean. They take the whole room apart. (in my experience) The hostals may have been furnished with threadbare covers and beds that felt like cloth over bare springs … but they were always clean. Clean matters more to me than anything else, whether it is $20 a night or a luxury stay.
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And if I can say so again, looking clean matters more than being clean. So even if it is clean enough for you infant to eat off the floor people will mark you down on cleanliness if it doesn’t look clean. A prime example is wiping a surface and then letting it air dry. That’s great if you are being swabbed down for surgery but on a bathroom sink it looks like smeared, dried dirty water. If you caulk over that moldy bath tile, or have damaged glass in a bathroom window that traps moisture it’s going to look like crap. And if you have a bunch of those things it’s going to give the impression of being not clean.
A big advantage I have is that things in my Airbnb are new and I’ve kept them looking that way using best practices.
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Yep I don’t care how clean that water stained lampshade and marked up baseboard are, they look dirty.
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Sigh…I was cleaning an apartment today that I haven’t done myself in a few weeks. My co-host had let me know that someone stained the brand-new-this-season fiberglass bathtub with (presumably) hair dye about six sets of guests ago. At the time he told me he was able to get most of it out, and we both kind of assumed it would continue to lighten with repeated cleaning - but of course that hasn’t happened.
It’s now a brownish-gray stain (two, actually) that just makes the tub look like it hasn’t been cleaned properly. I have used EVERYTHING to try and remove it, with no luck. Am thinking of touching up the spots with white gelcoat, or even stickers of some sort; I’d rather have white splotches or decals than what is there now. Professionally refinishing the fiberglass is likely to cost as much as the stupid bathtub itself, and isn’t going to happen until next spring, anyway. I’m totally kicking myself for not getting the heavier/more expensive porcelain on steel when I had the opportunity. 
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