Host experiences with Booking.com

And dont forget that in the B.com T & C’s that they are supposed to be the cheapest rate when a guest compares

That’s a very good point. I hadn’t considered that. As I said earlier maybe I need to crank my rates on BDC to take into account the 15% commission I have to pay. Of course then I face the risk of losing the booking completely to a competitor

If that is the case, then you already are less competitive than similar properties, on Airbnb.

I think you need to review your pricing strategy, taking into account the differences in how the OTA’s present them to guests. Before we moved over to the host only service fee with Airbnb, our prices on BDC were always around 13% higher.

JF

I crank my rates on HomeAway to make it more of a match with what the guest sees on Airbnb. And so I end up making about the same. I have a spreadsheet that does this, and also makes adjustments for local hotel rates.Sigh. It’s kind of an unsolvable formula, but I get close.

Is there some sort of app spreadsheet app you use to do this, or do you make your own, @dpfromva ?

Another aspect to VRBO over Air is you have more control and security of knowing your cancellation policy will be protected.

I’ve thought of Booking, but I believe they allow for total cancellation at any time. Is this correct?

Homemade and rather quickly and badly at that!

:rofl: thanks.

At least you tried !

Or you think outside the greedybox and drop the prices on Air and become more competitive there.

It seems you are happy with the amount you are getting from BDC.

I actually lowered my rates on Airbnb so the in hand take was the same as booking.com and got a booking the next day :slight_smile:

Bird dog referral.

Named because bird dogs find the birds for the hunter.
E.g. Airbnb host referral bonus is a bird dog referral fee.

Just sharing because I heard it for first time not long ago.

Maybe so. But making her happy meant I didn’t have to deal with her issues if she could not find a place (admittedly not mine) and have some come back to me. So I got a benefit anyway.

Payment options you can set up in more covenient way - although not as convenient for a hosr as on Airbnb.
There is different problem. You cannot pre-approve your guests. You have no control on who is coming.
Which is even worse when you have your property listed on more than one platform. Yes, there is a synchronization system but in case of booking com it is very poor quality.
I know that because my bookings are easily synchronized and updated between other major platforms - while I can still can’t see them on booking com (when they were carried out on different platform). Then you may end up with double booking and booking com demands you to pay for relocating a customer - which is pay for their fault.