Hi!
We just had our first AirBnB guest and the evening was ok, we were exited an d a bit nervous too.
A year ago I stayed for the first time in a family for two weeks in France. I was a bit suspicious beforehand, but it all went great. I became friends with the family, I still talk them once a month. (I speak fluent french and we went together to the theater, had long discussions etc. But in the house I stayed in my room, didn’t cook in the kitchen etc…) If I didn’t have this experience, I would never have even considered to become a host.
Our first guest stayed only one night. She wanted to do her laundry - twice. Otherwise the evening went well. She said she would check out at 12:00 and we told that if she wanted, she could leave at 11:30 at the same time that my husband and children, they would show her the way to the railway station. Excellent! Thank You, that’s a great plan, she answered.
At 11 she ate in the open kitchen/lounge and argued loudly on the phone with her boyfriend to China. At 11:30 my family left: I said to her, that now they are leaving. “Ok, I’ll go in 30 minutes. I won’t be going with them.”
At 12:30 she was still yelling on the phone to her boyfriend, I tried to work on my computer. All her staff and laundry were unpacked, just before 13:00 their loud discussion stopped and I said to her: “I did put your laundry to the guest room.”
“Ok, thanks, where can I heat my chicken? Do you have more plastic bags for my package? How can I clean my shoes?”
I became desperate: will she stay forever? I just thought the work I should have been doing at the moment. Finally she left and gave us excellent evaluations. But I questioned myself: is this for us? I started to google hosting experiences and spend the hole evening making some new house rules with “light cooking” etc.
I gave her good valuations, but felt bad, when I wrote to her, (she said that she would come back in couple of weeks, but we’ll see) that I liked her as a guest, but as I work from home I would appreciate if the next time she would use the phone in the guest room. (Instead of yelling in our lounge for two hours:)).
This really is about finding your own boundaries. I removed the picture from the kitchen from our announcement, (one pan was scratch with the cheese slicer so badly that it was damaged), made the house rules and added the check-out time. I wouldn’t have found these boundaries this quickly if there wasn’t this group with great advise. Thank You all!