Block dates OR put ridiculous price?

I like to prepare people for the worst… This is what I tell my real estate clients. I am not a general contractor, I am owner builder acting as my own general. I think I will be taking the test after this because I have the experience required after building two houses.

RR

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Most of my contractors have over promised and under delivered. It took me five months of waiting because not one landscaper would tell me (what I suspect is the truth) “Your job is too small and its our busiest season so we will keep moving bigger jobs ahead of you.” Or “we couldn’t possibly do this job until September at the earliest.” Instead they would give me a quote then ghost me or tell me xx more days/weeks. So I’d fire them and get another estimate. I did that 3 times.

I was going to reply again to you @KKC but then I got this: Lol

Consider replying to more people

You’ve already replied 3 times to @KKC in this particular topic.

Have you considered replying to other people in the discussion, too? A great discussion involves many voices and perspectives.

If you’d like to continue your conversation with this particular user at length, send them a personal message.

I guess we are being rude.

RR

You must be the only person who has ever paid attention to those guidelines. I suppose this could be a PM thread but then people get upset that you’re using personal messages.

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I got that once, and I realized I was being baited by an argumentative person into replying to them and continuing the argument. So I just stopped.

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Oh boy, sounds like one of my coworkers… :scream:

I have seen some hosts changed the minimum stay to make it impossible to book those dates. I thought it was a pretty good idea.

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Ah! Yes. Any idea how it affects availability later?

@GutHend could you add a fourth room to add this to your test?

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My hubby and I went to Mexico the 1st week in Nov so we blocked that week. As we were travelling home we got a reservation for that same day. We have been full the rest of the month as well. So I didn’t experience the issues of taking some time away thankfully.

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You’d wish ! I’d wish ! :grin::smile::wink:

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Hello, I have been an avid reader for a very long time and a lurker (member) for over a year. This is my first post. This is one of many many interesting topics but I really want to be able to follow this thread specifically. We haven’t activated yet on any platform but will be doing very soon. We are going to be going through the same thing (construction) and all these tips and information will be particularly useful to check out and be aware of. Ironically, construction is the reason we are trying short terms rentals. We have a long term rental that we stressed eventual construction going on in the other parts of the building to prospective tenants. With STR we can block time for the particular nosiest and messiest (demo) and most inconvenient (switch over new water/sewer/electrical). We are our own general as well. This will be interesting.
I guess it is finally time to post my introduction but in case anyone reading doesn’t see it - I would like to thank so many of the contributors. I have learned SOOOOOO much from this forum and been so very amused by it at times as well.

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This is interesting.So if I get booking from my facebook page and I block the dates manually I get punished and affects search ranking?

Punished is the wrong word. What Airbnb wants to do, understandably, is show search results featuring hosts who really, really, really want to host. They don’t want to show properties that might not be available. That’s common sense.

So if a host has blocked off time, that’s an indication - and remember that the search is only a dumb computer program - that the host is a) taking in guests from somewhere else b) having maintenance or repair work done or even c) wants a break from hosting. In any of these scenarios, the dumb computer figures ‘this isn’t a 100% dedicated Airbnb host’. So the listing slips down the pile a little.

Then it takes a little while for the computer to realise when your listing is open again. It’s not that a real live person is thinking ‘aha, punish this person’ it’s just a computer algorithm and nothing to worry about.

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Wow I’ve never seen this before :slight_smile:

HHHHHHH

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Interesting…we blocked off one of our properties for renovation (3 weeks) and had no issues getting our bookings stats back once we re-opened the dates. Would be interested in seeing how this turns out as we considering renovation in another one of our properties. We block during the slow period (jan-feb) so that it doesn’t impact income as much as it would during high season.

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I have guests complain over the most minor building noises from the neighbours, e.g. a piece of steel cut into 5 pieces that took a couple of minutes was worthy of a complaint and a poor review. The other day my neighbour was installing metal gates to get some privacy from my guests and the guests said the noise was so “horrendous” that they had to leave and come back when they thought it would be over. The neighbour said the noise was horrible but only lasted for 10 minutes.

I think it’s unreasonable that I am meant to be responsible for the odd banging/noise from the neighbours, especially when they are stuck living next to my Airbnbs and the guests are often noisy!

So good luck!!

I wonder how we can communicate this to them. We have our own family in our guest bedroom for Thanksgiving and Christmas and we definitely take some vacation time. And sometimes we get the flu! It seems obvious to me that we need to block those dates. I can’t imagine why we would be penalized for that. It doesn’t make sense to me.

I’ve not heard this to be true. If it is, it does not seem to affect us since we are effectively the only Airbnb in town and we’re always at the top of the list when I look. If it is true, that seems very punitive of Airbnb. It only seems responsible for an Airbnb host to block dates that are not available. Unless they are ignoring the “home” in “home-sharing.”

I’m only going by what others often write on this forum: If they block a few weeks, they need several weeks to get back to their normal level of bookings.

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Well, that’s quite unfortunate.