Highly rated host

Anyone have any info on airs new “highly rated host” moniker? In air for Chicago, these have been popping up where it normally would show on a listing if they were a superhost. Note, none that I saw are also superhosts. This one host in particular, has two listings. One listing has 11 five star reviews, and the other listing is brand new with zero reviews yet. What gives?

Also, when you click on ANY hosts profile, it will give the number of reviews and then #183.
For example…
67 reviews &#183
Any ideas on what this is supposed to mean?

I’ve got hundreds of 5 star reviews, but will never achieve superhost status. At this point, AirBnB is only allowing superhost status for hosts who haven’t cancelled a booking in the past year (among other easy to achieve requirements). Personally, I think the only useful thing about superhost status is the shortened wait time on the ABB helpline. I now see superhosts as pushovers. A full-time PM company will never achieve superhost status as we are constantly canceling and shifting guests around for whatever reason.

I have called ABB on this, poked, prodded them, and have some answers. You can cancel a guest on ABB without repercussions if you choose the ‘I am not comfortable hosting this guest’ up to 3x/year, and then that’s it, you need to call it in from there. Such a hassle. I generate tens of thousands of dollars per year for them, the least they can do is give me a stupid little badge next to my name.

How does superhost status affect me? Hardly. I don’t have it, and I am always at the top of searches in my area. I just have great customer service. That’s it. I have about 50x 5 star reviews than all other reviews combined. People see that and think, ok this business knows what it’s doing.

The best reviews you can get will say “great value”, or “exactly as described”. Most guests don’t give a damn whether their host was a super nice guy or something. They want accuracy, and value in their listing. That will generate a 5 star review 90% of the time.

If you are running integrated calendars across listing platforms I can’t see why you would have to constantly cancel and shift guests around.

This sounds more to do with how you choose to run your business, then anything else.

Interesting way to introduce yourself to the forum by insulting some of the hosts who use it by calling them a pushover for being a superhost.

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Are these designations in the place of superho?

I think it just means this new listing is safer to book as the host is highly rated on other listings

I haven’t seen this and I don’t know what the number after the number of reviews. Maybe that’s just on the app?

Soon all hosts are going to have to have an average of 4.7 stars. Reading what Mike said it makes me think maybe it’s for hosts who aren’t Superhosts (perhaps they cancel on people or don’t host enough trips per year) but are otherwise “highly rated.”

Karma, that might make sense, however, this one highly rated host has two listings. One with 11 reviews, and one with zero. 11 total reviews and air is handing out highly rated host monikers. Tis a joke… (this is all on the app. Not sure about on a regular computer).

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That would be a broken special character in HTML. Someone isn’t testing on their dev servers.

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I think ABB posts different phrases about listings here and there to dress it up a little. I don’t think this host did anything particularly special to get this.

I must receive some very odd guests, perhaps from another planet; they seem to like the fact that I’m added value through being helpful, fun, informative, accurate, and neither cancel or shift them around for whatever reason.

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Maybe your demographic? I don’t even see my guests unless they request something from me. That’s when I talk with them and learn about them.

Most of my guests are here to visit our college, go to the hospital, or are traveling families looking to kick back on a long cross-country roadtrip.

I host hundreds of trips last year, and met about 10 guests. Most of my comments are about customer service, accuracy of listing, and value of their stay.

No, not a particular demographic by any measure, just inter-planetary it would seem. They clearly like to meet a human being though.

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Ok well since you seem to have this figured out Joan, I can stop commenting, since my advice is useless.

But wouldn’t aliens be a demographic as well?

My belief is that if a guest is renting an entire apartment, then meeting the host in person is not a priority and probablly they would prefer not to. (As all advice/help is easily given and received via messenger).

However, if renting a room in someones house, it’s nice to meet them in person.

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Unicode Decimal Code &#183. It is a mid dot ie “·”.

“An interpunct ( · ), also known as an interpoint, middle dot, middot, and centered dot or centred dot, is a punctuation mark consisting of a vertically centered dot used for interword separation in ancient Latin script. (Word-separating spaces did not appear until some time between A.D. 600 and 800.)”

You·learn·a·lot·on·this·forum.

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I really enjoyed meeting my hosts at the three whole listings I stayed at last year.

Personal recommendations are brought to life and I enjoyed hearing about their families and what they like about living in an area.

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I am only me, and by no means a reference, but I would NEVER EVER stay in a place where I don’t get to meet anyone. In most places I wouldn’t even be interested in a separate unit, regardless if someone checks me in. That is just simply not my way of traveling.

Are you just shifting them from one apartment to another, or are you canceling to give priority to guests who want to stay longer?

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This is after all what Airbnb started out as, a personalised people meeting people business, global family. Not anonymous multi property listing hosting as it has partly become now. May as well just book a hotel. I love meeting my guests, it’s part of the reason I do Airbnb. And I’ve made many friends. Without that it’d all be rather bland.

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Does your PM company by any chance run those accommodation touts that wait for you on the dockside of the Greek islands when the ferry comes in? Always interesting to see the difference between the place they are holding a photo of up and the place you actually get.

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