How to review "needy" guest?

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Welp, it turns out that with my listing in Austin, TX I was living in a host dream world! Out of 300+ guests we’ve had (we sleep 10 and often will get groups of 8-10) only 1 stay was particularly troublesome.

Anyway, we recently launched a new listing in southern CA and our limited experience with this listing is proving much different! Over this past weekend I had a particularly needy guest. As in, the amount of questions/texts from this guest were more than my entire last summer guests combined. Many of her questions were answered in my welcome email or guide book including, but not limited to:

“We have 5 cars, what do we do with the 5th?” (we can only have 4 in the driveway for fire safety, but have a 2 car garage – both things mentioned in our welcome note)
“Actually we have 6 cars what do we do?” (after I answered the first)
“Where are the BBQ grill tools?” (They’re just put away in the kitchen - if you looked in every cabinet you could have found them pretty quickly)
“How do we heat the spa?” (spelled out in our welcome guide with photos)
“How do we let Ubers onto the property?” (It’s explained in my welcome note that we have a button inside the house for the gate)
“I can see pool floaties in your [locked] shed, how do we get in there?”
“We ran out of paper towels, are there more?” (This was 24 hours after check-in and they already went through a whole roll)

She tried arguing with me on two occasions - one regarding spa heating “every other house includes it” (which is not true, I actually have a spreadsheet of all of the homes in our area with this information, lol) and even with the paper towels - they went through an entire roll in less than 24 hours and she tried telling me the previous roll was ‘partially used’ (which wasn’t true, my cleaner actually forgot to put a roll out so I grabbed a new one from the closet).

None of her questions were tough questions, and she was quite nice overall, but the amount of questions gave me anxiety all weekend. They also left the house a bit messy - cleaner had to re-wash everything in the dishwasher, they left food on the cabinets and on the floor, spilled drinks outside and didn’t bother to wash down with a hose, etc. I don’t think she’s necessarily a bad guest, but I wouldn’t want to host her again, and I don’t think she’s a great self-sufficient vacation rental traveler. I’m not a huge fan of the “better suited for a hotel” comment, because it can mean so many things. Any ideas? Or should I just keep my review short and sweet?

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Maybe something like “This guest’s lack of self-sufficiency wasn’t a good fit for my rental and I wouldn’t host this family again. They didn’t seem satisfied with the amenities offered. 4/5 stars on cleanliness.”

I wouldn’t go in much detail because this would probably just be a typical expected stay for some hosts. I’m not sure your anxiety level is relevant to other hosts.

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I agree. I was just mentioning that to make the point that this was not an enjoyable guest to host.

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How about “If guest had taken the time to read the house manual, there would have been less texting.”

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I also included that thought at first but I think host snarkiness is best expressed here and not on the Airbnb platform where any future guest can see it with a little digging. And if a guest complained I wouldn’t put it past Airbnb to delete the review or put a demerit on our record.

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I like what @Ritz3 said. I also would like to see the fact she was needy and messy. SO if you combine both above suggestions it would be perfect.

Based on what you said I wouldn’t want to host her either. If you keep it short and sweet she will do the same thing with the new hosts.

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There is, of course, the sentiment that the guest is on vacation and shouldn’t have to read anything. That is what the host is for.

“Guest called us numerous times about where to find things, etc. This information is easily found in x, y and z, or opening a few drawers.”

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I really feel for you. This person is living in a dream world if she thinks all listings come with pool and spa heating included. This is CALIFORNIA for goodness sake where utilities are sky rocket prices.

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Yes! I hardly blink in Austin, TX cause utilities are like 1/4 the price (for a bigger house)! But it really is so different in CA. Plus, in our case, we are on propane (because we’re out in a rural area) which is even more expensive.

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It helps us when you can put cases in context. Didn’t you already have a thread about this propane using guest? Opinions might change if more of the story is known.

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Lol, nope this was a new one :wink: This one actually did end up paying the deposit but tried fighting me on it. From my first guest, I learned to lock everything up, so you literally couldn’t turn it on until I granted access.

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Okay, thanks for the clarification. It’s only twice but it’s already happened twice. You need guests who aren’t a problem on this issue. Maybe just raise the price for all?