Only 1 guest in the week.. am I being impatient?

Hi guys.
New to hosting and the forum!

We listed our place about a week ago and so far have had 1 guest through for 4 nights… which we were very happy with.
However since he booked, we have not had anymore enquiries. I’m literally sitting by the phone sometimes waiting for the Airbnb alert!

Can anyone suggest anything to make our listing stand out more? We haven’t got professional photos yet as we are waiting on some artwork… however I think our price seems right at the moment. Could it simply be that we don’t have reviews… or that I am being impatient?

Any advice would be great!

Are you kidding, this place looks fabulous! It’s just the time of year probably. More bookings will come! (Know nothing about the prices there, and assume you are in line with your pricing?) Otherwise, wow. It’s GREAT! :slight_smile:

Thanks for the confidence boost! It will look much nicer too when we get the art work in (and also that bed is not what we plan on having in their… we ordered a nicer/newer one which is a few weeks away).

I think we got our hopes up because our current guest booked with no reviews, only 1 photo was up and within a day… then a pre-approval 1 day later.

Think I need to relax a bit and give it time!

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Cheers mate! Relax… it takes a while to build yourself up in the search rankings. I bet as the holidays draw near you’ll get some guests booking up that cool pad for New Years!

If still no bookings through the new year, try lowering the price just to attract attention. When I am slow, I lower by $10 per night and it really works. :slight_smile:

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Does $10 really make a difference?! I dropped it to under $200 (AUD) and took away the 2 night restriction on weekends so hopefully that will get it happening.

We have new years prices on there… however they are extremely overpriced for 2 reasons:

  1. We ideally want to use it NYE for ourselves as it has an amazing view of the river where the fireworks will be
  2. If someone wants to pay the exorbitant prices we have… we will let them!

I think… in some markets it does make a difference. It might drop it down to a different search level. I don’t have any restrictions for minimum stay. That really helped me book up quickly at the beginning… But then lots of turnover is only profitable if you are doing your own cleaning. Even though they can stay one night, most realize it is not a good value (and sometimes I tell them it isn’t a good value) so I get lots coming for two or three nights.

The beauty of the Air calendar is that you can easily tinker with it. :smile:

It is really hard waiting between bookings - but it will get easier over time. At first I would get quite despondent if I went a week with no inquiries. I still don’t like it, but I’m learning to go with the flow.

Could you provide an airbed so you can host up to 4, with them making up the airbed in the living room? Not a lot of people travel in groups of two - I mean, they do, but you may increase your exposure if you can increase your guest count to 4.

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I did think about the airbed. I was thinking of buying a rollaway bed and if they request more guests, I can put it in the room for them. Would they expect you to have to make the bed for them? It would be a bit of an eyesore walking into the apartment with a rollaway right in the middle of the room?

good point.

I think, put it in your add - ‘self-service (rollaway, air) bed available when booking is for four guests’ then explain later what ‘self-service’ means.

Hi there

Agree with Kona, start up is nerve wracking but as long as the pricing is in line with others then it will happen.

I did reduce my price as an opening special plus once I had reviews my apt bookings just took off.

Has gone quiet a bit now but living in FNQ the wet season is about to start so I am happy for a break.

Hi Kate & Lachlan, your place looks great and welcome to Airbnb hosting. Wish all the best.
If you could add a few more photos of rooms would be great. Doesnt hurt to invest $150~$300 to hire a non-Airbnb hired photographer as well. Lastly,your Duvet Cover, eventually that color & design will get damaged with blood stains, wine stains, lube stains, etc… and will take a long time to wash off… Happy Hosting!

if you go to your dashboard and scroll down you will find a views to requests graph. that’ll give you an idea if your ad is being seen but not requested. if you have tons of views and no requests you’ll want to tweak your listing or drop your prices until you get more reviews. also, did you do a search to see where you show up on the listings? if you’re not on the first page yet you’ll get fewer requests.