My husband and I have listed 2 private rooms in our home and have our first guests this weekend. The house is large and there’s a lot of shared space. We can’t decide if we should be super available and hang out in the shared space, or try to clear out of the way. Any tips on how to judge this?
I find that most people want privacy but it’s impossible to say for any individual. You don’t have to go out of your way. The guest will let you know if they need something.
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Decide where you want the guests in your reception space. Access to your kitchen and people doing big cook ups (a big fat no from me)? Access to your dining room? I don’t allow guests in my living room. Most people want privacy anyway and it’s important for hosts to prevent burnout. I use the app as a form of communication when needed. I couldn’t be doing with people tracking me down in my own home.
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Thank you. I think we need to balance our excitement with the long term expectations of ourselves and the process.
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I looked very briefly at your listings last night and your home is fantastic and a gorgeous setting. Because they are shared rooms in your home you may get more folks who want some interaction. In my listing they have a separate entrance and don’t come into my part of the house. But occasionally I get a feel for a guest and I’ll invite them to my part of the house for a beer or the pet the dogs (I board dogs in my home and have 3 of my own). At your place you could sit out on the deck the first night when guests arrive or just make the offer and see how they respond.
You’ve found this forum at the right time, before you have any problems, not after. We can be hard on folks but when you need help we are worth it. 
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Thanks for checking out the listing @KKC. We are having a hard time determining price. Private rooms in the area go for less, but we think we have a special place so bumped up the price. Airbnb keeps telling us to lower it but I don’t want to set a precedent.
DON’T lower the price at Airbnb’s suggestion, they are ridiculously low.
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Ditto x 100. You believe that you have a special place so trust your beliefs. There’s an Airbnb right next to us that is about one third of the price. We get far more bookings 
People don’t buy just on price.
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Hi @Tiamat, your place looks amazing! I have rented two rooms in my home, although much more modest than yours, and have some advice to share.
Firstly, I wonder about having 3 listings for the different set-ups. That’s going to get very confusing and a big potential for error, I think. When someone books one of the rooms you will need to immediately block off the calendar in the two-bedroom listing, unless I’ve misunderstood?
Also, will you be renting the rooms to separate sets of guests, ie, unrelated to each other? I’m guessing yes, but it’s not entirely clear from the listing that people will be sharing the common areas with other guests. I would advise making that clear in the text. When I had two rooms, I would tell upcoming guests who they would be sharing the space with, eg. John and Mary will be here for three nights during your stay, they are from Peru and here for a weekend holiday. I was once told off by another host for doing this because they considered it to be a breach of privacy. They might have a point but it worked really well for me. I’d seen too many negative reviews of places that said ‘we weren’t aware that we’d be sharing space with other guests’.
And now for the big one…! I think you are giving guests FAR too much access to rooms in your house. Seriously reconsider!! A group of 4 guests WILL take over the entire place and, unless you have your own private sitting room and dining area, you will be holed up in your bedroom eating a take-away off your lap and wondering how the hell did this happen.
They don’t need a bar lounge, a living room and a dining room. And what is the breakfast area, is that separate? Please please, save your favourite spaces for yourself!
Finally, and I hope this doesn’t sound too harsh, but I would honestly tone down the text in your profile. It’s too wide-eyed and bushy-tailed and a great big wolf guest will be smacking their lips over how much of you they can devour.
PS. Sorry I didn’t actually answer the questions that you asked but I got really worried for you and how things might end up
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Good luck! I remember the excitement of the beginning. Head’s up…when you are “new” you get a boost in search and you think “wow” i’m gonna be rich (a hint of sarcasm here.) Then the views drop and you wonder what happened? Your listing didn’t disappear, just the algorithm changed…don’t worry.
You’ll see that everyone will find what works for them and it’s not all the same as no two places are the same, no two hosts are the same. That was the beauty of this. At our place, we get nearly all first-time Airbnb guests and they are also nervous and unsure, so communicate, communicate, communicate. We’ve enjoyed the guests we’ve had and @KKC is right, use this forum…read all the threads here and the basic ones on the Airbnb community site, which is where I got a lot of the “how to’s” initially. Enjoy yourself and I think the guests will too.
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You do indeed have a special place so that’s fair. I’d book just for that wonderful deck area. One thing, you don’t offer breakfast? Is there any reason why not?
Unless you’re desperate to serve breakfast I would recommend self service breakfast for the guests. Do you have somewhere you could put a guest fridge (say under counter size) for their milk, fruit, butter, juice etc.?
I agree guests could totally overrun your home. Please keep some space for yourselves! Do you have a guest visitor rule? I don’t think you want guests entertaining in your home. Give guests an inch and they’ll take a mile.
I agree! I was going by the profile info and how it was a dream to have their own b&b etc. so it seems a bit odd that breakfast wasn’t a part of that. Plus it’s not cheap, I would probably expect some kind of breakfast at that price. Actually, I think it would cut down on the impression that they have the run of the place if breakfast was provided. I don’t like those gifs that people are so fond of but will make an exception in this case
Scratch that, it’s too irritating! Essentially “I have a bad feeling about this”
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Wow, such great feedback. I appreciate the positive along with the warnings. I’m so glad to have found the forum early on. We are updating our listings with some of the suggestions here. Points taken.
Question about offering breakfast… we didn’t do that because we both work full time jobs and don’t have time to do it reliably. However a self serve breakfast sounds like a great option. If I add breakfast to the amenities, will people expect a full breakfast and be disappointed if all we have is yogurt, granola and muffins? I don’t want to set the wrong expectations.
You just need to be clear what your breakfast is that’s all. Continental breakfast. Toast would be easy, even slices of ham and cheese. As I say provide their own fridge so they’re not rifling through your stuff.
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Welcome to the forum,Tiamat, AKA The University of Hosting. People have given you some cracking advice already but here’s my experience, for what it’s worth. I think I have a similar set up to yourself; large house, lots of space, two listings, one of which is two bedrooms and J&J bathroom.
You will find guests give you non verbal signals of how involved with them they want you to be. Some will treat you like the hired staff, with disdain, others will want you at their beck and call, and you can’t wait for them to go out! In between are people who are interested in you and your recommendations about where you live, are friendly without being intrusive, bring gifts and respect your home.
I heartily endorse not allowing guests access to all your common areas. We have a separate dining room for guest use, with tea/coffee etc and a fridge for their sole use and I ask in our HR that guests do not to wander into our private spaces. The day is long enough without loss of quality time with each other.
From the start, we settled on providing continental breakfast as Jess suggests; Mr Joan said I would not be a nice person to meet first thing in the morning if I cooked. I’ve a group of Australians here later this week, coming for my heavily reviewed "scrummy"breakfasts, and a recent guest added to her parents’ compliments with “so pretty too”. I have everything prepped and in the fridge the night before and lay the table, which encourages folk to go to bed, rather than sitting up late!!! Ham, salami, whatever is available, together with a selection of local cheeses, granola, yogurt and fruit from the local market. I buy bread rolls from a local bakery that freeze well, and defrost in half an hour. The only thing I really need to to do in the morning is bake croissants from frozen and I’ve burnt more than a few, when caught up chatting. My screen smashed i-pod is now a timer! And yes, I think Magwitch is quite right when she says that breakfast cuts down on guests feeling they have the run of the place. It adds a sense of my being in control somehow.
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If you specify then there will be no problems. And be consistent
I just stayed for 2 weeks in Tuscany with lovely lady . First 2 days she has Italian breakfast as she explained : pastry,coffee and fruit. After that it went downhill . The third day there were no pastries or milk. Then we ran out of coffee . I went by myself and bought all breakfast items for the whole family . I was ok with it and didn’t make a bit deal out of it,but another guest complained to me right away that it was advertised with breakfast and she doesn’t offer or leave breakfast items for him.
So I started making breakfast for him every morning such as coffee, eggs and toast.
I see alot of hosts in my travels who are inconsistent with breakfasts.
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Most guests will be happy with whatever you state on your listing. Some people will always expect the moon even though they didn’t read any of the details before booking.
There’s also some experimentation involved to learn what works best for your market. My first season I offered self-serve breakfast but found almost all my guests enjoy going to brunch. There was a lot of unused food spoiling before I could eat it, so I took breakfast off the amenities list. I leave some mason jars full of cereal along with oatmeal packs. Rather than spending the money on breakfast, I put it toward a bottle of local wine.
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