Minimum stay requirement

I just switched to 2 days minimum after a conversation with a friend of mine who told me that I am nuts to do this much bed changing and cleaning. Most of my stays were 1 day, and she is right in a busy season thats all i did with 2 rooms. She advised to put at least 2 days and see what happens. She even told me that i will have higher occupancy if i raise the minimum . Thats with the private rooms.
Also i manage my daughter’s house. I have 4 reservation for July and the rest of June. 3 of them only 2 days and weekends. One is one week. My friend thinks that i need to put at least 5 days minimum because this is whats happening when they only reserve weekends and the rest of the week is empty. But i don even receive weekly inquires,almost never. These are the ones i get for 2-4 days.

Looking forward for the answers

I have 1 day for my private rooms. I’ve been pretty much fully booked. I get between 1-4 night stays. Takes about 5 minutes to clean and change bed. Then a couple mins effort putting sheets in washing machine and hanging them up. Not much work at all really. The rest of the house i do as things are needed. Very minimal effort.

It depends greatly on where you are located and what your usual guests are coming there for. Is your place close to the airport so it’s usually peeps needing one night before a flight out, or is it a tourist destination?
Mine is a tourist destination, it’s a private room/bathroom with shared common spaces. Sometimes, I offer one night stays, but in the summer I usually change it to 2 day minimum. I have a max stay of 4 days, because I don’t think I can tolerate people in my home longer than that. However, I recently had a conversation with someone who used to work for ABB, and she said that not listing a weekly rate/discount can restrict you from showing up in results when peeps go searching. I’m OK with that.

1 Like

I have a one day minimum, and sometimes get inquiries but I try to discourage them as it is not a good value by the time they have paid the room, cleaning and tax. Sounds like with your situation, a two-day would be a smart idea.

2 Likes

Its both, it is close to airport but also close to beach. And hard rock casino, many things to do in the area.
Now, prices dropped a lot for the summer. I dont know what happening but hotels near Airport have the same price as my room. So, people who need layover stay in hotels.

1 Like

Why not increasing your cleaning price and lowering your price?

I just got booked for 2 nights! Ahh, may be thats the way to go. Its not hard for me to clean, but of course the less the better. The main point my friend had is that i am loosing out on longer bookings. She also does not know how i do with last minutes. Its too stressful for her having guests checking in the same day. She likes longer term like a week

1 Like

I dont have cleaning fee. Its impossible to even more lower my price:)

We had no minimum stay the last years, and changed to a 3 nights minimum stay this year. Even if there are a few less bookings, we earn at least the same like before. Most guests are staying between 3-5 days. This means less cleaning, washing etc. The guests are also different. We had a lot of guests staying just one night here, because it was cheap. The guests we have now are here because they choose our place for a holiay. They are mostly very nice and unproblematic guests. All in all I enjoy hosting much better now. Last season I got really tired because of the one night guests.

Why not putting cleaning fees and lowering a little your price?
This way if you are making more expensive for people to stay one night but around same price if it’s more than 2 nights

1 Like

O thanks, thats what i wanted to hear:)
This winter was hard for me too, it was non stop cruise people who arrived either early before check in time or at night after flight. I think one nighters i got also were looking for bargain only, and then complained that its expensive taxi.
I will try 2 nights first and see how it goes. Also it will illiminate those who just come for dates (had few of those):slight_smile:

I guess i can do that, but since my one nighters usually looking just that one night and bargain it will be pretty pointless to put cleaning fees there as they wont book anyway.
I think i made a mistake with the separate house putting a min. of 2 night. Now 3 weekends booked and the rest cant book for longer term. LIve and learn

I rent my beloved vacation home. I have to make it worth my while to not be there. A One nighter would never cut it. For a long time I had a three night minimum, but I realized I wasn’t showing up in a lot of searches, so I changed it but a lot of my guests are getting out of NYC for a long weekend so I frequently get 3 nighters.

I go back and forth with min stays all the time. I have noticed that when I have a 1-night min, our listing views double, and bookings for typically slower days go up (mon, tue).

While cleaning the space every day can be a real pain, I remind myself that it only takes an hour, so I just made $150-$200 for that hour. Not bad…

I do have a 2-3 night min all winter though as that’s when I am super busy with work (ski related industry). Plus our un-maintained road leading to the house can be a nightmare for single night visitors.

One night stays are sometimes great especially when they arrive late and leave early. Sure you can sleep in this bed and take a shower for $200. No problem!

Ours is a separate apartment and I have a one night minimum. But it’s only happened once or twice this year. ($175 including the cleaning fee). Because we’re in a tourist area, I’m hoping that they will come back for longer as one night only gave them a taster of this fabulous location :slight_smile:

1 Like

Yes it’s not bad for 1 hour of work. Mine is 50$. , but still I don’t mean ne cleaning. My main concern is occupancy rate. Mine on average us 60% but that includes 100% winter which leaves summer to little. And summer here is 9 months

Everyone’s situation is different I see. I will give it a try for a week and see if it works to go with 2 days min

Ah lucky!

:cry: summer here is four weeks at best! Lol

2 Likes

The only way lots of turnover turns into profitability is if you have a cleaning fee.

so how does it work? Should i reduce daily rate and add cleaning fee, or just add cleaning fee like 20$?