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We had two one-night guests last night. The husband talked nonstop. He was nice and fairly interesting, but unstoppable, and apparently incapable of finishing a thought. The wife was also nice. She’s slightly less talkative, but she buzzes around like a hummingbird, taking things out and putting them back before using them, and then having to take them out again. She was in constant motion for the two hours before they finally went to bed about 1 a.m.
It really wasn’t their fault that two of the wife’s relatives dropped in unannounced at 12:30 a.m. They didn’t know the relatives were coming—although, strangely, they had given the relatives their Airbnb address. And they did decline the relatives’ request for a few hands of euchre before turning them away at the door. (It about scared the crap out of me to see strangers on our front porch at that hour, when my husband was already asleep in bed. I had refused to let the strangers in and instead called the guest husband to the door, since they asked for him.)
Anyway, our guests seemed hungry for interaction with me, their host. They also talked most of the night in their room. In our bedroom, my husband and I could hear them whenever one of us awoke. Our other guest couldn’t hear them from her bedroom.
I suppose that means they violated our official “quiet hours.”
However, part of what they were buzzing about was a recent car accident that totaled their car.
I would chalk up their loquaciousness to the car accident and the fact that they drank an entire 2-liter of Mountain Dew when they arrived, about 11 p.m. But the wife assured me that the caffeine would calm them down.
I can’t seem to decide if I should just review them as good guests (which they were—clean, pleasant) or somehow mention their over-the-top need to chat with us (I should say “at us”) and with each other. I don’t want to be petty. They had just totaled their car. And when they were going to be late checking out, they properly asked us through Airbnb to extend an hour, which we did.
Excuse my verbosity. I feel like I’m still in their whirlwind!
This is a tough one. For the vast majority of hosts this won’t be an issue at all. For many shared home listings like yours it will be an issue. Many hosts who share their homes put things in the listing like “no kitchen use” or “prefer guests who are out all day.” The clear problem that has nothing to do with their personality is giving out the address and having people come to a shared listing in the middle of the night.
“Guests were clean and communicated well but scared the daylights out of me when relatives showed up at my home in the middle of the night to visit. It’s not a rule violation to have guests here but the situation was uncomfortable for us. I wouldn’t be able to host this family again but they would be fine in a stand alone listing.”
Mountain Dew has more caffeine than coffee!! And I’d ding them on house rules and communication. Who TF shows up at an Air home at 12:30am unannounced and unwelcome?
@KenH is the bomb reviewing these types. I do like @KKC’s take.
I’ve never heard that expression before - ‘talk paint off a barn’. Love it.
The guests sounds mildly bonkers but if that’s what they’re like then we can’t really review their personalities. But I know how annoying it can be - I had once with a very loud and very irritating laugh. And she was often amused. And the more wine she drank, the more amused she became. But I figured that there are worse sounds…
The people turning up at that hour is ridiculous though. I’d definitely mention that in the review. Not necessarily harshly, if they were good guests and if they seemed to be surprised themselves at the visit, but future in-home hosts would more than likely want to know.
The biggest bright spot in the melee of guest chattery is this: After a few weeks of no new reservations, we’ve now gotten two in the last two days. Callooh, callay!
As an in-home host, the chattiness wouldn’t bother me, and I wouldn’t feel it needed to be mentioned in a review, because that’s just their personality and because I am quite able to say to guests that I’d love to sit and chat with them some more, but that I have things I have to attend to. I actually prefer the chattier guests to the ones who skulk around silently and have poor social skills.
This doesn’t seem odd to me. We have a lot of guests who stay to visit local family and they have family members come and pick them up all of the time.
However, their families members have not
And that would bother me too. But I have a couple of family members (in-laws to be exact) that might do this and it would not be my fault as you can only control some types of family members so much. I’d hate to get a bad review because of my wholly inappropriate maybe-asperger’s but maybe-jackass brother in law but could see him doing something just as stupid. However, I would have apologized and explained it to you and so you would probably feel differently anyways.
Talk Paint off a Barn or Talk Bark off a Tree…I’ve used them both, haha, as well as Sell Ice to Eskimos. I had a guest for THREE DAYS who chirped at me every minute she saw me and I swear the husband ran for the hills so he could get peace and quiet. I couldn’t wait for them to leave.
My own sister was a talker, so I don’t hold that against anyone, really, they just can’t help it. I would not mention it in a review or judge what they drink, or don’t drink, as it didn’t break any rules. If you believe your guests, they didn’t ask for the relatives to show up, they just did.
If I’d just totaled my car, I’d probably be “off” and worried/talking it through. I’d go with your review that says they left your place in good shape.
You could remind them privately that in a shared house, late hours, guests and conversation is/can be disruptive. They probably know that, too, but seriously, at that point if I’d just totaled a car I’d be seeing $$$$ and worrying about the costs so I wouldn’t cancel a paid reservation and book a hotel.
I think it really depends on whether you believe they totaled the car. For me that is a huge extenuating circumstance out of their control.
