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When we review our guests we are are asked by AirBnB, “Would you recommend this guest to other hosts, yes or no.”
We have a guest staying with us at the moment for 7 nights. I was doubtful about accepting the booking as he had no reviews (only just joined AirBnB last month) and he came from a different source and was staying with us for a different reason from our usual bookings.
We are a tropical beach tourist destination and all of our bookings to date (about 25) have been people from around the world in a holiday mood snorkelling on the reef and visiting the rainforest etc.
We share our house with our AirBnB guests and we have just the one bathroom. We have two rooms available for guests. Currently we have a young German couple staying for 9 nights in one bedroom and this other single male guest in his 50s staying in the other.
In Australia we have what we call FiFo (Fly in, Fly out) workers working in the mines. A typical arrangement will be 2 weeks on and 1 week off. This guest chose to stay with us on his one week off. One of our sons has been a FiFo, also an electrician, so we’re familiar with the FiFo world if I can put it that way.
There is still 3 nights left in his stay so I don’t know how things will eventually pan out. Because of a number of sort of small things I may find it difficult to recommend him in a shared home environment. He doesn’t smile. He leaves the aircon on in his room when he goes out for the day even though that is something that we mention on check-in. Even though he has been asked to use our headphones if watching TV he doesn’t. There is a sort of uneasy feeling in the house when he is around - certainly not the bright happy tropical holiday atmosphere that we like to think we share with our guests. We are superhosts after 5 months with AirBnB.
If I had to review him today, what I would like to be able to do is not recommend him for a shared home environment but recommend him for a stand-alone property like where there are no shared spaces. But we don’t have that option do we? It would be good if we had that choice. ie “Would you recommend this guest in a shared environment?” Yes/No. “Would you recommend this guest in a non-shared environment?” Yes/No
I wasn’t aware that this particular issue has come up before. Leaving our specific issue aside, how about guests who are just uncomfortable to be around in a shared environment who also somehow just don’t know how to relate and respect others’ space but follow all of the specific rules and leave their room in good condition?
The fact that he left the air-conditioning on and didn’t use headphones per your house rules would make me just say no, I would not recommend this guest. In the written review you can say he might be more suited to a private space, but the rule breaking makes me think he’s not suited for either.
I would say… “a hotel would suit this guest better”…
I can’t understand that people book a room in a shared house and don’t want to interact with the host and others in the house… why book there in the first place? if one wants to be alone, go to a hotel…
Yes you’re right. He should be in a hotel or motel. In fact he probably is. He hasn’t turned up for two nights. I sent him a message last night asking if he would be back and his reply, “Not Coming Back Tonight”.
Half of his possessions are still in his room and his camper/trailer is still charging in the carport.
This was the original question that I put to the forum. Since I posted it, the guest would get a ‘no’ on both counts but what if you have a guest that TuMo describes as:
and yet they follow the rules - just not emotionally suited to shared living which is really the essence of AirBnB. But more and more hosts are offering stand-alone apartments and cottages for example so it wouldn’t be fair to discriminate against these guests and hosts in this scenario.