Binge eater just left

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A gentleman stayed for five days in a small room in our shared home. When he checked out, I noticed that the garbage in my kitchen was filled to the brim; upon entering his room, I saw that the garbage can in the room was filled as well as a paper bag, filled with junk food, wrappers, cookie bags, etc… I saw on the way out he was carrying three paper bags as well.

I had one like this before, except the one before basically ordered takeout five or six times a day.

This gentleman was fairly clean, except he disobeyed my MAJOR house rule of no food outside of the kitchen (which was signed off by him by acknowledging our welcoming message and also on the ‘read me first’ page in his room) and was bringing his wash towels into the room - not a house rule, but spelled out in his welcoming package (I noticed that if people leave the towels in their room for a few few days, it does not help with the atmosphere in the room).

Not sure if he was purging because the toilet area was fairly clean.

He re-booked 16 days from now for another week. Apparently, he goes to work in the morning, comes back at night and basically eats his way through the night.

What do I do? I’m always here on this forum saying to leave an honest review and he broke a major house rule of ours. However, outside of this stuff, it was fairly clean.

Do I wait until day 14, give him a terrible review and then cancel his booking - at expense to me? Do I contact him after the two week period is over and be strong about no food in the room? Do I just eave him extra garbage bags, etc. in the room and just assume it’s gonna happen again?

My heart goes out to people who live like this, but on the other hand, I worry about my place. Also, I’m wondering what the repercussions of “catching him in the act” by discussing this issue with him will be.

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I would not think that you could get someone that eats that way to only use the kitchen. I know it breaks your rules and if it’s too uncomfortable you might not want to accept a 2nd reservation.

You could leave an honest review about not following the no eating in bedroom, but don’t think mentioning the “binge” would be appropriate.

Good luck, sounds tricky.

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I’m not sure it merits a ‘terrible’ review. He broke one of your house rules but otherwise was fairly clean and presumably wasn’t noisy, destructive or rude enough for you to mention here. Sounds like he was an ok guest generally apart from this one thing. I think if it bothers you enough to not want him back you could send a personal message commenting that the no food in bedrooms is a non negotiable house rule and that maybe your place is not the best fit for him because of that. You could offer to ensure he is fully refunded if he decides to cancel the next booking to encourage him to do so. I would not mention anything about his personal habits in a public review.

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I have a no food in the bedrooms rule because of the bush block location and there are ants, cockroaches, flies and at times vermin outside so when the guest eats at the table downstairs I can keep an eye on hygiene. An issue is if a guest is leaving food around the bedroom hosts are not expected to enter the room without an emergency cause, so you do not have jurisdiction over the hygiene factor. I like what Lizards wrote and would not host a person again if he broke the house rules. I also do not charge a cleaning fee so do not anticipate red wine or coffee stains appearing on white sheets and bedding, nor broken shards of wine glass on the bedroom floor or ants crawling in from the external roof area looking for food, all this has happened hence my rule. Does the review step where the question is would you host again is answered no, does not preclude that guest from booking your listing again? Im not sure how that functions.

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Those of us who live where ants, cockroaches, etc. are endemic may have an easier time with the “no food in bedroom” rule.

As a homeshare host who lives in the tropics, I find that mentioning to guests that if they have food in their bedroom it will instantly attract ants and cockroaches and it’s best to keep food in the dining and kitchen areas usually does the trick.

I am not big on “rules”- I find that giving guests a logical explanation as to why they should or shouldn’t do something works much better than a list of rules. Most people don’t relish the idea of having a bedroom full of ants.

That said, I still occasionally find evidence of guests having had food in their bedroom- like empty cookie or candy wrappers in the bedroom garbage. I don’t regard it as a huge deal and would never mention it in a review unless there were food stains all over the bedding. I always leave one night between bookings anyway, so if I find some ants in the room, I have time to deal with it before another guest arrives.

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