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Why did you let them stay? I’m afraid that when hosts break their own rules, then guests think that they can break them too. What if you’d had a back-to-back and had other guests in on the same day?
I’m wondering too what it was that you’d hoped that Airbnb would do?
At a minimum airbnb should have charged their credit card another day. My cleaning people could not start work as planned, they were delayed another day. I was out of town, like 900 miles away, so in 1.5 days I could have been on site telling them to get out. If I was in town, I would have changed my keycode and locked them out. Let them beg me for their stuff.
Who was managing the place for you while you were away? He/she doesn’t sound very efficient. You might want to look elsewhere.
Airbnb refused to charge their card? I forget exactly what the exact figure is but aren’t you supposed to be able to get double the nightly price when people overstay? If Airbnb refused to charge the card, I’d keep at them.
You can do that remotely with a smart lock. If you are going to host remotely or while traveling you need an in town co-host. What if the toilet had backed up? Learn from this event, be glad it wasn’t worse and move on to the next guests.
This. It sounds like you have ample written evidence in Air’s system that they stayed an extra day. Air is obligated to charge the guest accordingly. You are probably getting a neg review regardless so you might as well get the cash …
YOU have to ask them to do that by extending their stay or filing a request for additional payment. Air is NOT going to do that, especially since as far as they are concerned they have checked out.
This is true. You need to approach them with having the guest charged under the “Overstay” policy in the TOS (section 8.22). Start a chat so that you can upload a screenshot of the section in the TOS. It always helps to show them their own policy, SBT.
Perhaps they knew about the 24hr cleaning period, so knew they could get away with it?
I no longer accept locals. There is no reason for a local guest to need to rent a local house except to party.
While I agree that locals are a red flag, there are in fact good reasons, so it’s worth at least inquiring about.
In 3 years I’ve experienced:
All good reviews with no issues.
I agree, there are many good reasons to rent to locals. However, given the new competititve environment I think we should keep it to ourselves. The more hosts stereotype one kind of guest or another, the more bookings for those of us who accept all types.
That’s not really the case. I’ve rented local Airbnb accommodation twice in the last couple of years for various reasons. I’ve also hosted local guests who…
Plus more that I can’t remember. I have one local lady who stays with us every couple of months (with her cats) just to have a break and a change of scene without spending money or planet resources on flights or gas.
At the moment I have a couple in one rental (repeats) who live only about an hour away by car but are self-isolating here rather than at home - a sort of mini-break for them.
And don’t forget the Wedding market
All of those are good reasons to host and I’ve had similar experiences BUT, it’s really hard to screen because people lie, so now I just don’t accept anyone within a 1 hour radius for a short-term rental (like 2 days).
Here is my humble observation. No matter what I have to offer, prospective guests try to weasel me into agreeing to more than I have for them. For example, no pets, they must bring a dog, here is my problem, when you leave for the day what is your plan, to use my gorgeous house as a kennel? For example, I offer my whole house, guest wants me to promise I will be out of town the whole time, and never be on site, well I have several acres of grass to mow, and forbidding me from my own large farm during grass cutting season is unreasonable. For example, I state that I store lawn mowing equipment in the garage, which guests may not access, so guests want me to promise that I will not access my separate entrance garage during their stay. For example, I charge only $79 per day for my whole house, 15% BELOW than market rent, prospective guests want a discount. I AM SICK AND TIRED OF BEING BULLIED ON MY OWN PROPERTY, SO I POLITELY INFORM THESE PROSPECTIVE GUESTS NOT TO COME.
Raise the price and the problem people will go away. That’s waaaay too cheap for a whole house!
I agree- way too cheap. Once you factor in the utilities and other amenities, it’s even less than $79 in your pocket.
I just had a prospective guest try to bully me into accepting a 10% discount, off of $79 per day for my whole single family home, I told her no way. I sent her a breakdown of market rent, showing my calculations that market rent (for a long term tenant) is $99 per day. Then 12 hours later, another guest booked for 2 weeks.
You guys are right, am raising rate to $99 per day.
Why did you bother, I’d simply have ignored them from then on. Cheapskates don’t make good guests, generally speaking.
JF
Quite right, I am ignoring cheapskates from now on. Like I was saying, when a guest wants even more from me than I offered, that is not good.
