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Hi, I have kind of an unusual situation I’m wondering if anyone has encountered before. A guest claiming to be a traveling nurse from an hour away from my home contacted me several weeks ago. She said she wanted to stay at my place every Tuesday and Wednesday for the entire month of February. She said she wanted to go through the app for the first visit and pay cash for the rest. I told her I was not comfortable with that and she needed to book through Airbnb. She booked through Airbnb to stay February 7th to February 8th. Last week, on January 31st, She texted me requesting check-in instructions saying that she was on her way. I said the reservation is for next Tuesday February 7th why would you be coming today? She said oops my mistake and said she was turning around to go home. She messaged me this morning and said she was coming at 3:00 p.m. I should have clarified that yes 3:00 p.m. tomorrow the 7th. I gave her check and instructions and she showed up. Today. I said your reservation is for tomorrow February 7th. It is not today. She said she would go check and went out to her car and drove off. She has since messaged me saying she’s at a hotel.
I got on the phone with Airbnb to request clarification. I told her if she wants to stay two nights, she needs to book and pay for two nights. She said that the app won’t let her do that. I said she needs to call customer support to get help. I am waiting to hear what they say in return. But I am starting to wonder if this woman doesn’t know what day it is or something and whether it’s safe to even have her in my home. If she is that confused about the days of the week and claims to be a traveling nurse. It just seems very strange. Has anyone experienced something like this? I will just wait and see what Airbnb customer service can do.
I believe you can adjust the dates from your end and send to her to accept the changes. As for the confusion in dates, it might be that she’s stressed. Did you google her name to confirm she’s a nurse?
That is an excellent idea however I only have her first name so I have no idea what her profession is. Someone tried booking with me the other day who didn’t even have a verified ID. I think Airbnb is completely lax about who they allow to join the platform and make reservations. I will ask her to supply an ID when she shows up again.
Hi again, Airbnb supplied her full name so I searched the state nurse registry and she is an actively licensed nurse so that’s good. I also ran a criminal background search.on my state and nothing showed up. So at least her reason for traveling is legit. I’m just confused as to why she’s having such a hard time with the reservation dates. It’s possible she has a condition of some kind and I don’t want to judge that.
Of course, nothing showed up. If she has a current nursing license then her background has already been run. Fingerprints and all. It’s why I prefer to rent to people with licenses, I don’t have to bother with a background check. I just confirm there license.
I am confused, why do you check their licence? Why do you prefer to rent to people with licenses. I’m not being daft…i have just no idea why you are checking a nursing licence? I am from Canada and I am a Registered Nurse.
I normally never check someone’s license unless something suspicious happens and the fact that this person could not seem to get their dates straight made me question their reason for needing to come here. It’s very odd that they were so unsure about reality of what today’s date is compared to when the reservation is. Since her story is that she’s coming as a registered nurse to do some work, I wanted to make sure. I never check credentials. Just when something happens that makes it not sit right in my gut which is not very often. I believe that most people are honest and good but I am reluctant to share space in my home with someone who is not.
I have not heard of that. Sounds suspicious. I just had someone ask for a receipt saying they’d stayed with me in addition to whatever receipts they get from Airbnb. I’m confused about that.
First, I just want to be clear that I’m talking about monthly tenants, not my Airbnb guests.
It’s because it’s easier and more reliable for me and cheaper and less hassle for the potential tenant than if I do my own background checks. And I don’t have any need to do a background check on, for example, a nurse with a license in my state because I also have a healthcare license and know how extensive the background checks are that they had to pass to get their license. And it’s a far more thorough check than I’m capable of performing. E.g. RN license = nothing in their background I need to know about.
I totally understand that. There does seem to be something off about her. I was only saying that if she has a current RN license that it’s even better than running a background check. It doesn’t mean that there isn’t anything wrong with her. It only means that if it’s something you could find on a background check it would’ve already been found. Hopefully, she’s just tired. The behavior is odd and to think she’s administering medication, eek.
Ok, Nurses can be slobs too, just because they have a valid nursing license doesn’t mean they would make a good tenant. Wouldn’t it be more reliable if you could ask for references from previous landlords.
They can fart and snore too but since they’re renting entire apartments it’s pretty low on my list of concerns
No, it’s a notoriously unreliable way to screen tenants and not very common anymore. Besides my best tenants tend to be 23-25 so a lot of them don’t even have previous landlords.
I’m not flying high and loose with this. I’ve been doing it for a long time and have developed a solid system that works for me. Screening is a relatively minor part of it. To me, it’s more important to pick a suitable tenant, have a solid lease and keep it as month-to-month, collect a large security deposit and know how to evict someone in your sleep.
And It’s not that I will accept someone as a tenant just because they have a professional license. It is only that when someone is the right tenant and they also have a professional license I don’t bother doing a background check. I’ve turned down at least 8 people in the last week who all had professional licenses - cause nurses surely can be sloppy but they can be crazy and mean too, lol (just like anyone else).
I think it would be safe to assume she was confused with the dates because of stress. There’s a shortage of nurses so hospitals assign to nurses so many patients plus they work 12 hour days. In addition, they work with patients and patient’s family members that are not always very kind. Also they have to deal with difficult doctors. They’re truly heroes with little recognition.
Pf course the fact that there is a huge fraud thing where “nurses” bought their degrees for about 15k (about 20% passed the certification thing, whatever that’s called) and they are still out there. I can not 100% trust even if they’re certified because they may have not finished all their classes or clinicals
I only care that I can confirm their license in the database because if they were issued a license in my state then they most definitely had a background check that included fingerprints for the FBI database, a much more thorough check than I can possibly do. And the only reason I care at all is that it just means that I don’t need to bother running one too.
I’m worried that if they lie and cheat to play with people’s lives & health that they could easily bring many more issues. The background check only deals with concretes so it is helpful but at the moment I do question nurses integrity & honesty. Although some of the 2800 have been caught & beginning in the system that may start to show up on the background check.
I’m just saying that we cannot assume that she’s just tired because she’s a nurse working long hours; she legitimately may be unhinged & you cannot ignore that possibility for the time being.
Besides, with all that said, my grandmother was a nurse & switched pain meds with saline for over 20 years.
