Hello, my wife and I are planning on listing 2 houses on Airbnb and other platforms so since we are new we would like to ask some questions. I created this thread in hope of getting some suggestions from the hosting community
- My wife will be listing the property and be the Host since she is also more into social media compared to me, but I am more of the tech guy and will have more free time to reply to messages and generally manage the listings. So what is the best way to start ? Wife hosting and me co-hosting ? Wife hosting and me using wife’s account to manage ? Property management software ? Will it be very hard to have multiple accounts (Airbnb,Booking, etc…) for 2 houses and logging into each one of them to reply to messages?
- If we have 2 bedrooms, one with a double bed and one with 2 single beds and a couple books the place, what should we do with the single beds bedroom? Lock the door ?
Welcome to the world of hosting. My husband and I love it.
- Re host/co-host: I don’t think it matters. My husband and I both handle our Airbnb, although he does more of the bed-changing and laundry, and I do a lot more of the communications. He and I are both listed as hosts, like this (not our names, obviously): First name: Rebecca & John. Last name: Ford & Smith. The only downside to setting up an account like that is when you call Airbnb for help. If they ask for your account name, it’s complicated to get them to understand that both names are two people’s names, if you see what I mean. So you could list one of you as the host and one as the co-host, if that seems simpler. By the way, assuming your locations are close, I can’t imagine that you’d need property management software. I’ve never used property management software, so I’m no expert there.
- Are you asking what to do if one room books and the other doesn’t? First, this question assumes that the guests would know they weren’t booking both rooms. If so, simple answer: Put digital locks on both rooms’ doors (as well as a digital lock on the front door). We’ve never had to lock an empty room, but then we’re resident hosts. If you’re not going to be resident hosts, by all means lock any door you don’t want guests to enter.
- I see you’re going to list two houses. May I suggest that you start with one, even if it’s just for a few weeks? We started first with one bed/bath and then listed the second bed/bath (all in our house) a few weeks later. Gave us a chance to get used to the process a bit.
who is going to handle the money and messages should be host, the other co-host.
There are 3 accounts that can be associated with a listing: Listing Admin, Primary Host, and Co-host.
The listing admin account controls where the payouts go. All of a listing’s reviews will always belong to the listing admin. The listing admin account cannot be changed for a listing (You would have to re-create the listing to change it) and the listing will lose all reviews. The Listing Admin can also be the Primary Host or a Co-host .
You and your wife can share an Airbnb account, but this may not be a good idea if you both also use Airbnb as guests and you travel separately. Nothing prevents you from having two separate accounts and sharing the login credentials with each other to administer the listing. Also, your profile photo can always show both of you.
In my case, I am listing admin and primary host and my wife is a co-host. My wife occasionally travels as an Airbnb guest without me.
My hands are full enough with Airbnb, but many hosts here list on Airbnb, VRBO, BDC, etc. and I’m sure they can help you avoid the pitfalls. I recommend you choose one listing service to start with and get comfortable with hosting and with the service before adding another.
Depends on how you want to price it. If you want to charge more for the use of the extra room, then you’ll want to create multiple synced listings (one listing with one bedroom and one with two bedrooms). Then you lock the door when someone books the one-bedroom listing. You can also charge per guest over some minimum, but don’t assume that charging per guest equates to charging for extra rooms since “a couple” still might want to sleep in separate rooms.
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This posts covers it all! Nicely done.
@VanDenTzan, I have a one queen bedroom, 2 twin bedroom suite. We get a lot of 2-person bookings who take both rooms. The price is the same whether one or four people book and I keep both rooms open; they can use as much or as little of the space as they like.
Mostly, I didn’t want to question people on their sleeping arrangements. Booked for two, I see, are you sleeping together?
Some people use more bedding (towels, AC, heat, snacks), some less. It evens out.
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