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I don’t have a thermostat in my STR but when I send check in message I tell them the temp I heat to and say they are welcome to have me turn up or down. I have an app so it’s very easy to set up.
Also, when I set the temperature, I look at where the guest is coming from and make it warmer for guests coming from the South.
In the summer, I turn on the A/C about 1 hour before their arrival and turn on ceiling fans.
I can’t imaging arriving at a place without the heat turned up in the winter. I would have requested a free night. That was not OK and makes dedicated hosts like us look bad.
Sometimes it’s the last guests trying to be nice. In the checkout instructions we do ask they turn the heat down to 68, but I’ve wandered in for a walkthru and see it set to 60! I tend to set it to 72 for guests coming in that day.
My philosophy is that anything you ask guests to do (set your thermostat, etc) that can be controlled remotely or automated, makes for a better guest experience and will certainly reduce complaints. “Guests do not work for you”…
My thinking is, as a host do what you want, but disclose, disclose, disclose if you do anything that a hotel would not do.
If I have to pump my own water from the hydrant outside, fine, but just tell me before I book!
I made a complaint to an AirBnB stay over the summer. I “won,” ABB customer service was great, I got the $100 I wanted, but the problem is, the stress affects your holiday.
With this Christmas rental, I did think to message the host and ask if the oven worked. I wanted to bake my special holiday coffee cake. Host was a little amazed that I asked. But when I got there, the oven was grossly dirty, with spilled food piled slightly on the oven floor. I didn’t want to stink up the house and make the oven harder to clean later, so I didn’t bake my coffee cake. That plus a odorous kitchen sponge that I replaced with one from the grocery store got host 4* for cleanliness.
@HostAirbnbVRBO You’re very kind! But there is a serious issue here—as a guest it sucks when you have to complain to a host. Because most will be very defensive. And it sucks even more if you have to call ABB, although in my experience they are super nice. This was/is a 4.9* property, I wasn’t slumming.
I think most guests are very reluctant to ding hosts for deficiencies. It’s kinda like grade inflation–teachers don’t want to hold their students back. Which means even a 4.8* property probably has a history of problems that you wouldn’t find in a decent hotel.
I’ve found problems in decent* hotels. I’m probably not nearly as well traveled as you but since Airbnb became an option I’m staying in Airbnb over 50% of the time and I find them to be no more problematic and less expensive. However, finding one that isn’t problematic is 100x more difficult than booking a hotel.
*Affinia, now Sonesta in NYC
*Hyatt Regency
*others whose brands I don’t recall
Totally true. Some also prefer the transaction to be done impersonally - they never meet their guests.
I bang on so often about greeting guests when they arrive and how it can prevent a lot of issues but the house tour is equally important.
I always point out the AC control during the house tour saying “I’ve set it to 77 which is what I have in my place but feel free to change it”.
During the final walkthrough I turn on the lamps, the ceiling fans, the AC and a TV music channel. That way, it’s a great first impression for guests but if anything stops working, they at least know that these things were working when they arrived.
Aww that’s too bad. I hope that if you ever have a reason to come to Sydney, you’ll consider booking our apartment and we’ll convince you otherwise! Honestly, I care so much that it probably drives some of the guests crazy.
But yeah what a crappy experience that was for you to arrive to a 45 F house – you’re right, it should absolutely be disclosed in the listing. That’s COLD, especially when you’re arriving after dark!
I learned a couple of lessons this year regarding the “quality, value, price” question as both a host and a guest. We are decades long users of OTAs, but will never again ignore the odd negative review in favor of a lower price just because the listing was so “pretty”. The agency had clearly invested in professional photos and listing advice, and I rationalized away the few odd review comments because we only needed “a place to sleep”. Big mistake.
As a host, I recently lowered my rate and raised my max capacity to what it was a few years ago in the hopes of getting a holiday booking. I don’t usually book during the holidays but was hoping to recoup some of the money we had spent on upgrades. Noting the recent increase in the number of STRs in our area, I thought I needed a more competitive rate. Within minutes of the holiday booking I was taken back to the bad old days. I hadn’t had the displeasure of the issues that were immediately brought up in several years (almost hourly messages, requests for price adjustments, request to waive the pet fee & add more guests). It was directly related to what can only be the economic impact of my reduced rate related to the quality of guest, there is no other way to put it. I’m sorry if that bothers you. These kinds of requests stopped happening when I raised my rates and reduced my max capacity. The reserving guest was very, very sweet. Nonetheless, for the first time in my hosting career, I had to check, “Will not host again.” I will describe just one of the issues with this group of mostly adults: Every single white bath and hand towel was left filthy after use. I’ve had this happen when a teenager or two lied about showering to their mom. I’ve never had a whole houseful of grown men and women, dressed to the nines and celebrating their first family reunion since the pandemic, take showers and dry themselves off yet leave body filth from the top to the bottom of every single towel. I allow two towels per guest plus a couple of spares, plus some rag towels for emergency spills, plus hand towels. Every. Single. Item. Clearly not household dirt, but body fluids, clear outlines of body parts, etc. [don’t worry, I ditched the worst of them.] It’s a large place. About 40 items. Cost of doing business, sure. They’re sanitized and white, again. Yes. Lower the price, again. No.
@SleepingCoyote Thank you. I was a little concerned about how it would come across. I do need to add that when my rates were lower the quality issues that I mention were consistently present. They virtually disappeared when I raised the rates. The feeling of deja vu was acute when this occurred.
We also own duplexes for LTT and if they rent it out short term for Airbnb etc it violates their lease and would be evicted. I’m sure most other landlords have the same policies in place - so it’s weird Airbnb would even go for this marketing play.
What you are not understanding about me and KKC saying we have low rates comparatively and that low prices do not equate to low quality of guests, is that it is relative- there is a big difference between lowering one’s prices to what is too low a price for what you offer, and having a simple place, priced at what I feeI I still make a worthwhile profit from, that suits guests who don’t need all the bells and whistles.
Also, there is a difference in an entire place listing that sleeps a lot of people, with an off-site host, and homeshares, or units attached to the host’s home. Guests tend to behave differently in those circumstances.
The “quality, value, price” parameters is not the saying I am familiar with. Quality and price is what determines value. The saying I am familiar with, and what makes more sense, is that customers of any business can expect only two out of 3 things- price, service, and quality. So if you get great service and quality, you can’t expect that to come at bargain basement prices, etc.
What bothers me is the systemic demeaning of people with less money.
A non Airbnb example is the “Wal-mart people” meme. There could be 1000 people in a Walmart that look ordinary but it’s only the 5 wierdos who get their picture taken and posted on the internet. Someone could sucessfully host 10 people at a price point but feel they need to raise prices when they get 1 particular kind of guest. Confirmation bias is real.
I’m guilty too and trying not to judge others who equate low prices with bad guests because I’m guilty too. There’s the trashiest of white trash, trumpy trash, everything but the double wide a couple of houses down from me. I am so sick of them and my negative feelings towards them and tendency to assign their characteristics to other similar people is strong.
Yes, exactly. And also, the assumption that just because guests aren’t budgeting for high-priced accommodation, that means they are poor or “cheap”. People pick and choose what they spend their money on. Perhaps they are fine with relatively simple accommodation, and prefer to spend more money on nice dinners out, or purchasing unique things they can’t get where they live. Or attending a concert that had a high ticket price. Perhaps they like to do a lot of travelling, seeing and experiencing new places, so the majority of their travel budget goes towards transportation.
I have hosted a university professor, a union rep, a marine biololgist, a house designer, therapists, the owner of a successful Airbnb cleaning company, etc. None of these people were poor, yet they chose my private room, shared kitchen listing, when I’m sure they could have afforded an entire apartment listing.
And relatively inexpensive and underpriced are not the same thing. If I charged $15/night instead of $30, that would be underpriced and perhaps I’d attract bottom-feeder poor quality guests, I don’t know. I could also probably charge more than I do (several guests have told me that), but I get great guests at my price point, and feel I am fairly compensated, so while raising the price may earn me more profit, it isn’t going to attract better guests.
Hosts just need to find the price point that works for their listing, but that doesn’t translate to “low prices attract poor quality guests”.
Our former ABB property manager gave us some useful advice when we first started. She said, don’t assume that because a guest is poor or rich that it determines how they behave. She said some lower income people are enjoying a special vacation they have saved up for and accordingly treat the house with respect. Meanwhile, she told me a story about an entitled CEO who stayed at one place she managed and to entertain his son, brought in sand from the beach to let him play with it in the bathtub O_O. Caused costly plumbing issues.
You’re very kind! But there is a serious issue here—as a guest it sucks when you have to complain to a host. Because most will be very defensive. And it sucks even more if you have to call ABB, although in my experience they are super nice. This was/is a 4.9* property, I wasn’t slumming.