I bought a set of these recycling bags for our house, they are easy enough to use that I’m buying a second set for the STR. At my house I have them on the back porch, out of sight, but since it’s our home we know where they are. In the STR I can put them on a blank wall in the kitchen. Not terribly attractive but easy to see and use. My other option is to put them in the entry vestibule, which is at the bottom of a set of stairs. I’m guessing guests won’t use them there. I hate to mess up my pretty space with these, but I guess it’s probably the wisest choice. How do others deal with recycling?
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Those look nice, but our recycling here doesn’t separate – just “recyclables” and styrofoam. We have a marked Recycle Trash can in the kitchenette.
We have to take our own recycling to the dump. As you pull in there are separate receptacles for glass, metal, cardboard and plastic. So if I had it in one container I would have to hand sort it to dump it.
I don’t…at our STR that has a recycle can, guests tend to put stuff in there that they think should be recycled but won’t be. I have to sort it and put it in the trash. PITA.
Our other guest house out at the ranch has a big dumpster. Everything goes in there…(they say they sort it at the dump, but I’ve been told by one of their staff that that’s BS…)
Some people are dedicated to recycling and others either don’t care or have the categories pretty confused. I think if you put it in the vestibule with a trash can in the kitchen with a little sign telling people where to recycle you’ll do as well as you can.
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What Christine said. Plus this: Recyclables vary by city. The best-hearted guests could easily put things in the recycling bin(s) that aren’t recyclable in that area. A PITA for the host.
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Ditto for my condo. I doubt it gets sorted
The other option is to sort & haul items 6 miles away to recycling center. Guests can’t be expected to do that and I manage from a distance so I don’t do anything.
I provide three 13 gallon, (think kitchen size) bagged containers, stationed outside on my lanai (patio/porch/veranda) for recycling needs. Plastic, aluminum, paper, glass, whatever guests produce. I point out this in my initial walk through, it is covered in the physical guidebook.
The majority (75%) of guests don’t give an eff and mix it all up along with their trash.
I try. There is a recycling center two miles away. Judging by my recycle bins content and that of the trash container, guests do not want to be bothered, similar to what I read in this thread.
Poor Mother Earth. 
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Pretty much all of my guests have been good about recycling. But maybe that’s because I home share. And attract nature-loving environmentally aware guests.
Not only by city here, but by area also.
Our barrio has communal bins, much the same as most Spanish cities, and locally we have green ones and yellow one. Green for everything bar plastics, which go in the yellow one. Other areas have multiple containers, glass, cardboard etc, but in the city centre recycling is poorly supported.
However, we do have our own unofficial micro recycling scheme, as in anything that could possibly be considered useful to someone else, is left at the side of the bins.
This past month or so I’ve scored a 2m x 1m sheet of 12mm plywood, with just a tiny bit cut off the end and around 25kg of sand (for mixing up with mortar). There are always wooden pallets, great when you need some small bits of timber.
Our friend found a couple of large woven lampshades and a couple of decent chairs. My biggest regret was leaving the small filing cabinet to pick up on my way back from the shop, four or five minutes later and it was gone!
It does look a bit unsightly at times, but not for long as we have a daily collection around midnight.
As far as guests are concerned, we simply tell them how it is. Some (foreigners usually) are a bit surprised at the lack of recycling facilities, but domestic Spanish guests are used to it.
I used to mark on the map we give guests where the closest proper recycling bins are, but they’re a good ten or fifteen minute walk away and I don’t think anyone actually bothered.
JF
Recycling is not required in my area. We don’t have a trash pick up service, my husband or I drive to the dump every week or so. The main reason I got started is because of my guests. Since it’s small it is really a couples retreat. For the most part I get young couples and they always ask about recycling. When I said they didn’t need to worry about it they always seemed disappointed and I always felt guilty. Now that we’ve had time to get more organized we decided recycling was easy enough if we just were prepared. So I think I’ll put the recycling in the vestibule and hope that the young guests are fine dropping it in on their way in and out.
I have paper/cardboard, plastic, glass, and aluminum stacked reycycling bins next to the washer and dryer in the back porch, and a sign asking guests to recycle above the kitchen garbage can. Most guests are good about it, but I still have to pull out the pizza boxes since greasy paper can’t go into our paper recycling.
Back when I had LTR, my last tenant offered to pay for single bin recycling pickup, but last year I decided to save the extra $20 per month and make a biannual run to the recycling center with a full trailer.
When I reopen, I may have to go to smaller and more wasteful containers for milk, as well as soap/shampoo. I really try to encourage guests to recycle — I even offer recycled paper shopping bags for their grocery trips.
Here were I am (Oz) it’s pretty standard all over so most guests recycle at home, so they do when on holidays as well. We have 3 bins: garbage, recyclables and garden waste. Each is distinctive and as I said, standard across the country. In the AirBnB kitchen, I have two bins, again, garbage and recyclables. Most guests use these correctly - out of habit. And I put the mains bins out (to be collected by the council) when I am there (remote management). Most of my lets are weekly or fortnightly. If guests have put the wrong stuff in the wrong bins its and easy sort.
But I was taken aback one year when I was holidaying there over the holiday season. I had put the bins out to be collected, but a young man with a big trailer came past and dumped both bins contents into the trailer! I asked what he was doing. It seems the Agents we use (that manage the property) organise extra collections so the garbage doesn’t pile up during contiguous bookings. But what about separating the waste? “Nah mate. It all goes to landfill”. Really? I wonder who organised that?
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