I often offer cash pmt for repeat guests, but no other special discounts.
As for perks, I already provide some pretty nice amenities like drinks, snacks, instant oatmeal, homemade muffins etc. We have a homeshare, but each room has a mini frig and microwave. IF a guest shares that they are coming for a special occasion like birthday or anniversary I will have a card and small token gift in the room. We have also had a few couples stop during their honeymoon and I had small bottles of champagne and flowers for them.
I love making each guest feel special!
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I donât offer any fixed discounts at all. Guests who book direct have the same per-night price that is shown on Airbnb but donât have to pay the Airbnb fees, of course.
I donât get discount requests very often because I use IB but when I do get one I have a stock reply ready saying that the nightly cost is carefully calculated and is âexceptional value for money, as you will read in our reviewsâ.
Quite often though Iâve found that people are satisfied with the answer and book anyway.
Excellent answer, 
and as my license and insurance state maximum of two guests, I wouldnât be able to have a couple and the lord too.
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The lord takes up a lot of space. California King Size bed for sure and requires a throne. Youâd have to make some improvements 
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My experience with J.A. Henkels International has been mixed both with cutlery made in Spain and in China, but itâs been a few years and Iâm not familiar with that model line. The handles on yours do look comfortable. My philosophy is to use them for a few months and if you like them a lot, then buy more matching knives in the same model line before they are either discontinued or cost-reduced.
Since the state reopened after what in effect was a seven month shutdown (no income), the numbers of those asking for discounts has gone up 10x* compared to pre-covid. The Walmart crowd figures that we are down, so lets kick 'em one more time.
Most of those asking for discounts are serious low ballers such as the couple who stated, â⌠but having a substantial amount of student debt, weâre price sensitive (our budget is $3,000 for the 41 days.â Thats a 45% discount. Iâll leave the place empty. Heck, I took the opportunity to raise my nightly rate $20 in hopes of keeping the lowballers at bay.
I feel that the reality is the airlines are discounting fares incredibly, so we are seeing a influx of travelers that wouldnât typically travel to Hawaii and are looking to cut all corners. Restaurants are held to 30% max and this entitled crowd wants more discounts. It grinds me.
- I may be off on the 10X⌠that is a guess. I donât recall many/any people pre-covid asking for a reduced price.
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Why on earth do people think some stranger listing a place for rent gives a hoot about their personal financial situation? Do they go into Starbucks and ask for a half-price discount on their latte, telling the barrista that things are tight for them right now?
People who are in financial straights donât go on vacation. If someone wrote that to me, Iâd suggest they stay home and pay off some of their âsubstantial student debtâ rather than indulge themselves in a holiday.
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And during a pandemic!
I AM tempted to get real with these people but wonder if Air would frown on such remarks. <shrug?>
Your financial advice would be as unwelcome and inappropriate as their discount request coupled with âpoor meâ laments. Iâd just let them know that you can book all your available days at full price and wish them luck on finding a rental within their budget.
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Yeah, I was being flippant. Itâs what Iâd be thinking, but I certainly wouldnât write that in an Airbnb message.
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The best advice Iâve seen on this forum was to tell guests that the Airbnb search allows them to filter by price to find accommodations within their budget.
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My remark is addressed to this comment by skai:
They may be joking but just in caseâŚ
Thereâs a lot of anecdotal evidence that many of these guests are on fishing trips. So they probe and move on if they donât get a bite. If one has a good idea in advance of what their policy is you can just put it in a saved message. When you get a discount request send them the canned message and donât waste your time further.
I offer discounts for excellent returning guests or lock their rate in from previous stays. I was booked through most of last year, but if a guest had to cancel due to COVID I offered to let them rebook at the same rate. My rates have gone up substantially since COVID.
If a guest specifically asks for a discount up front, I generally offer $15/night off (my rate is $325/night) and an early check-in or a big discount on an adjacent night to up sell a weekend stay to 3 nights.
We leave snacks and Prosecco or wine for the guest, along with an extra sealed mask for each guest. If I know itâs a special occasion we have a birthday box w/ decorations that we reuse and we buy 2 helium balloons at Dollar General.
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Iâm a big fan of the Kai Knives brand, Wasabi series. Relatively inexpensive â $50-$100 or so per knife, and exception value for the buck. Chef Alton Brown is/was their American spokesman a few years back â may still be. I have two â an 8" Deba style (Japanese âChefâ knife style) and a 6-1/2" Nakiri vegetable knife sort of like a cleaver. Iâm not sure they make the 8" Deba anymore,
The Japanese were working in steel long before the Europeans had figured out how to make steel on a regular basisâŚ
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Thatâs what I do with discount seekers. I go as far as giving them links to other listings that are actually in their price range. More than one person has responded with something like, âbut those arenât as niceâ or âbut your location is betterâ. It is so hard to not respond âduhâ, so I just donât respond at all after that.
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Most of my kitchen knives are Wusthof, because they are easy to care for, but are soft so need frequent sharpening. From them, I have 10 inch and 7 inch santoku slicers, a santoku vegetable knife, a traditional vegetable knife, and a 10 inch chefâs knife.
If I was doing more fancy slicing and presentations, or making lot of sushi, this is on my wish list. It requires more care, but stays very, very sharp:
My ulu was made by a local knifesmith from a 1950s leaf spring from a truck; he also made my custom handforged damascus hunting/skinning knife. My 2 fish filleting knives I bought at the estate sale of a Finnish commercial fisherman.
First on my going-to-the-airport checklist: Making sure my pocket knife, which my grandfather brought with him to Alaska in 1913, is in the tray on my dresser. No way I want to lose that to an airport security bin!
The 2 110 year old carbon steel blades have turned black. They hold an edge so well I usually sharpen them on New Yearsâ Day and they stay razor sharp the entire year.
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That wouldnât wash with me because our apartments are surrounded by cheaper places. So they can get the same location cheaper but if they are real bargain hunters they can get a double room with en suite in the building right next door rather than our one bedroom, separate apartment. 
You way outclass me. All my honeymooners got was a souvenir Arlington County mug from the public library gift shop. $6.
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Firstly I use universal net pricing, meaning I get at least the same payment no matter what booking channel the guest uses. If a channel like booking.com charges me a commission I have already increased the price to cover it. If guests want the convenience of using these platforms they should pay for the convenience. It takes a guest time to search through the search engine pages to find my site, when they do they should be rewarded by a cheaper price that excluded the commission. I add 2.5% to Airbnb prices to cover the difference between the fee Airbnb charges me on payments and what my bank charges.
Our mountain resort accommodation with 3 large bedrooms is comfortable for 8 to 10 guests depending on mix of couples and singles and length of stay. We do not charge by number of guests for direct bookings but do charge for more than 6 guests on Airbnb to discourage the groups who should book 2 houses or a 4 or 5 bedroom house from booking us on the various platforms particularly Airbnb. Direct bookings tend to be smaller groups for longer stays, no need to charge per person.
We add an extra 5% on Airbnb prices only because Airbnb guests are more likely to to leave the house less tidy, overstay by an hour or so stc. We also add an extra $5 per booking to Airbnb prices for my time because on average Airbnb guests are more work to deal on booking. Donât read instructions, ask more silly questions, harder to communicate with than all other booking channels. So our prices on Airbnb are 20% to 50% more expensive that our own website depending on the number of guests and length of stay.
After guests depart we email the guest a loyalty voucher for a 10% return visit discount for an unlimited number return visits for them or their friends in the next 12 months so long as they book direct. We point out that it will be a total of at least 30% cheaper than re-booking through Airbnb. We want to reward guests for being loyal to us not to the Airbnb platform.
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That looks like a quality knife. My current set is very similar. VG-10 steel with a proper heat treat makes an excellent kitchen knife, but you wonât be able to do touch-ups on a honing steel like average kitchen knives, youâll need a ceramic rod or fine diamond rod.