Extra Oven Cleaning

Do you think it’s reasonable to ask for extra payment if I have to scrub the oven out after guests leave? We just had guests check out, and the ENTIRE inside of the oven is covered in burnt grease (walls, bottom, top). I don’t even understand how this happens, and how anyone could just leave it this way! Guests never stop surprising me. Anyhow, it’s taking me a lot of extra time to clean it. Does this count as normal wear and tear? What do you think?

No, I don’t. I think it’s the cost of cleaning and maintaining your property between guests.

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Nope, swings and roundabouts.
How many guests never use the oven?

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No, I don’t think it rates a special charge. Buy a self-cleaning oven and a small shop-vac.
Don’t ask yourself how things happen, you’ll just go nuts trying to figure it out.

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As @Debthecat says, it’s swings and roundabouts. I’d guess that 99% of my guests never use the oven. So cleaning it thoroughly for that one time it needs it doesn’t warrant an extra charge.

Use a steam cleaner. Easy.

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Extra cleaning time has nothing to do with “normal wear and tear”. Normal wear and tear refers to damages, not cleaning.
As all the other responses point out, it balances out. Some guests never use the oven. It’s part and parcel of running a short term rental business.

Nope. I once had guests who used every dish in the place and washed not a one of them. I was over an hour washing dishes. Comes with the job.

It is if it’s a short-term rental, part of the normal cleaning service that guests have paid for.

But it would not be considered normal wear and tear for a tenant. I would charge for it as a landlord but not as a host. But then again, tenants aren’t a charged cleaning fee either.

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Make sure your rates cover these kinds of things. As others have said, if you offer an oven in the rental then you’re just lucky that most people, especially in summer, won’t even use it.

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You misunderstood my point. What I was saying is that “normal wear and tear” is not a phrase that pertains to someone leaving a place dirty, regardless of whether they are short term guests or long term tenants- it refers to damages. And yes, if a long term tenant leaves a place quite dirty, they would often forfeit their security deposit or a portion of it. I certainly kept part or all of the security deposit for some of the long-term tenants I had in Canada, if they left a filthy mess behind, and piles of garbage to be hauled to the dump.

To me, where something crosses the line between a cleanliness issue and damage depends on what is involved in correcting it. If it’s just a matter of more cleaning time and elbow grease, or using some product to get a stain out of a sheet or towel, it falls into the realm of cleaning. But if someone spills something on a carpet, for instance, that requires either hiring a professional with specialized equipment and products, or replacing the carpet because the stain can’t be removed, I’d call that a damage issue.

Ok, so it looks like common consensus says no extra cleaning charge. Ugh, such messy guests :slight_smile: I’m in a weird learning curve because we had to switch our regular STR into a 30+ day STR, so there’s lots of new cleaning that hadn’t been the case before. Always learning…

30 days + isn’t a short term rental.
Hosts who take long term rentals often have a setup where they do a quick cleaning/ linen change once a week to keep things at bay if the guests are slobs, to get an idea if the guests are living like pigs, and it can also make guests more respectful, as they know you or your cleaner will be coming in once a week.

If you choose to do this, it needs to be mentioned in your listing as a requirement for rentals over XX days, not sprung on guests after they have booked, and of course you should work with the guests to arrange a suitable time to do this.

Please leave an honest review of these guests mentioning the extra cleaning time required.

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It comes with the job : ( I had a guest leave the oven a mess plus pots in the fridge. I just digged them on cleanliness and clicked on “would not host again.”

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With a 30+ day STR, I hope you get a monthly lease signed, references, and a security deposit. And I wouldn’t book that through Airbnb.

That’s different than an Airbnb STR to me. In this case, you should be able to deduct something (maybe $25) from the deposit.

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And of course in many jurisdictions a 30 day+ booking confers tenant rights. 30 day stays mean the person is no longer a guest, but a tenant in the eyes of the law.

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Well, whatever the terminology. I think it should probably be called a medium term rental, since I have 3 other long term rentals and this is definitely not the same :slight_smile: Anyhow, yup, I have my cleaner go every two weeks to check things out. Unfortunately, that didn’t affect these guests, as far as being respectful of my house and stuff. It was a bummer too, since my cleaner stripped the sheets, but went to wash them and the guests had their own clothing laundry going. This happened twice, so both times the sheets were put in the laundry hamper. The guests never bothered to wash them, so I was left with 3 sets of sheets per bed at the end of the stay. I’ve never done so much laundry in my life!!! I’m still trying to formulate the review (they were overall nice people to communicate with, but were quite disrespectful of my house).

I have a rental agreement with guests for my 30+ day rental. I’ve been a landlord for 8 years, so I’m pretty comfortable with that part of it, as far as screening guests. I don’t mind using Airbnb for it. It’s pretty common to do so in my area. Once they outlawed normal STRs, many of us shifted to 30+ day rentals, and continued to use Airbnb and VRBO.

The behavior is baffling at times, isn’t it? I just cleaned a batter-covered waffle iron that was back in the cabinet. Holy hell.

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For sure, a 30+ rental, maybe 45 days, isn’t the same as having a tenant who signs, for instance, a one year lease. It’s just that a “short term rental” generally refers to people on vacation or just staying for a week or two. Even Airbnb refers to over 28 days as “long term”.

You are actually better off not letting guests wash sheets and towels, especially renters like this. They will just throw them in a hot wash, not pretreating anything, so they are permanently stained, and only fit for the rag bag.

If people drive to your place, you could actually require that 30 day + guests bring their own sheets and towels.

Alternatively, if a situation happens like this again, where your cleaner can’t get that stuff washed because the machines are full of the guest’s clothing, you could bring those linens home to wash, so you don’t end up with mounds of laundry all at once.

I think you just need to wear it.

If you have the option get yourself a pyrolitic oven, they’re great!

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