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I started out with 11 am checkout and 3 pm check in but quickly discovered that was not feasible. I now do 10 am checkout and 4 pm check in. I grant late check outs, early check ins, as circumstances allow.
I also quit doing same day turnovers. I’m old and slow (LOL) and lost my wonderful cleaning assistant and it was too much stress. The AirBnB is a big historic house—it takes a lot of time to clean.
+1 to Deb.
in Australia the standard is 10am checkout, 2pm check-in. My smaller cottage (just 2 rooms + bathroom) i give them a complimentary late checkout of 11am, cos it’s a fast turnover, and I can get started on the others first.
I know in other parts of the world the standard is 11am/3pm.
Thanks for all the answers. My check in/check out time works for me. I guess I brought up the discussion because its surprising to me to see more and more Airbnb’s with a 10AM check out time. Homeshare hosting is understandable that it would be all over the place.
I’m a host but I also use Airbnb’s as a guest a couple times a year. Having to be checked out by 10AM, often with extensive checkout instructions, pretty much makes the morning about packing and cleaning up, no time to cook up a breakfast and clean up, etc.
I fully admit I’m being a little curmudgeonly about the whole thing. Before my days as an Airbnb host I owned a housecleaning business so I’m intimately familiar with how long it takes to clean and turn over a house, including large ones. It often feels to me that the 10AM check out time is designed so that cleaning teams can clean multiple properties in one day and I guess that just kind of grates on me because that is making the guest be the solution to an operational challenge, rather than leaving a day between bookings.
In general, it seems like that to me, too. But I have read posts from hosts who live in super touristy towns with tons of rentals where there are only so many cleaners to go around, and bookings are quite seasonal. The available cleaners cram in as many cleanings in a day as they can, as that is their time of year to make money, and even if you left a night between bookings, and wanted them to clean for 4 hours, you wouldn’t be able to find anyone to do that.
True, true. I suppose at the end of the day we are all just doing to best with what we’ve got/what we can realistically commit to.
I just need to remember to check carefully for the check out time since 10AM is becoming more common.
I’m just looking at the economics of the whole process. I’m not against cleaners getting as many cleaning in a day they can book. It keeps their prices reasonable, since the price of the cleaning is passed on to the guest, they don’t have to pay as much for cleaning.
As for leaving a night in between bookings, if your average booking is 3 nights, then leaving a night in between would mean the price of the booking would have to go up 25%. Again, would the guest pay 25% more just so they could check out in and out at noon? Maybe. You’d just have to find those guests.
Only if you were trying to make up for the unbooked night. Not everyone is intent on making as much money as possible. I have had a 3 night minimum and 1 night blocked between bookings since I started hosting and it suits me fine. I would rather have less stress, in terms of rushing to clean, or having issues with guests asking for early or late check-outs than another night’s fee, and it would never occur to me to up the nightly price so that guests were actually shouldering the cost of my desire not to be rushed or stressed.
The great thing (and also sometimes the terrible thing) about Airbnb is that every listing and host is different. The reverse of what you said can also be true. Why should I be the solution to the guest’s “operational challenge?” I should only do that if I need to do it to be competitive. If I’m in a fly destination where people party late and fly out late I better have a later check out. In fact, I can leave a day between bookings and have a 2pm check out and have a big competitive advantage.
But if I don’t want to do it due to operational challenges or just don’t want to for my own idiosyncratic reasons, then I easily can with Airbnb. Guests simply move on to another listing with the check out time they want, I have my policy as I want and we are both happy.
That’s all very true. I guess the market speaks and if it’s not hurting a hosts bookings then why not?
I’m assuming since you are still hosting that whatever you make is worth it to you. For some people, dropping their income by 25% would mean they are losing money. As lovely as guests are, I’m not sure that many people are willing to lose money to host folks.
Every year, when doing taxes, taking everything into account, our profit margins aren’t above what we would make selling the homes and putting the money in our investment portfolio. Where we are making money is being able to hold on to the properties while they increase in value.
Due to changes in family dynamics (Grandbabies!!!) and how the Florida summers seem to be getting harder and harder to handle, I’m looking to become one of those snowbirds we’ve been catering to, and will be selling our rentals at the end of the present bookings. Ours book out a year ahead, and so a few months ago we locked bookings for next summer and beyond.
Well, of course dropping one’s income by 25% means you are losing money. But if you never counted on that income in the first place, you aren’t losing anything.
Also, what I was trying to convey is that running a business in a way that causes one stress is also a cost, as it can take a toll on your mental and physical health.
Some hosts who continued hosting through Covid and had to leave a night unbooked to clean and air the place out decided to keep the one night unbooked going forward, realizing how much less stressful it made their hosting life.
But of course, some hosts like you can’t financially afford to do that.
I’m confused how you got that out of my response, but sure, if that makes you feel good I’ll pretend I can’t afford it.
Makes me feel good? I was understanding you to say your profit margins aren’t high enough to make str worthwhile compared to selling. So it would stand to reason to me, that lowering the profit margin even further by blocking nights between bookings isn’t something you would want to do. I wasn’t trying to imply that you were in financial straits.
I have a 10 am checkout and 3 pm check-in and here’s why it works for me. I always ask guests when they expect to ARRIVE Bozeman. If it means a check-in at 3 or later, no worries. If they are arriving EARLIER tell them to text me on arrival and I can let them know if there is an early check-in possible. We get a lot of guests who fly in/out of our little burg, Bozeman. There are a LOT of very early morning flights OUT of Bozeman so guests often are gone by 5:30 am so the 10 am checkout is irrelevant. I always ask the night before “Any comments, concerns, suggestions about the Suite?” and, if I know we are not time pressed to clean the Suite “Does the 10am checkout time work for you?”. There are times when we have a late checkin that day and people have a early afternoon flight. Itell them they need to be out by 10 (or 11) so the cleaner can work but they can leave their bags in the downstairs secure area while they while away the afternoon in town before heading to the airport. It takes a bit more time and attention to interaction but has worked great so far. The 10 am/ 3pm works for me because it gives me flexibility to work with the guests individual travel plans.
Thanks for sharing your perspective… I imagine most guests have the same perspective i.e. they simply do not care for the host’s operational challenges or laws of economics or physics. I am not complaining about it… it’s a fact that all of us hosts need to account for.
Perhaps this is where some explanation to guests about late check out and early check in might sink in if explained in the manner that Charmed59 has explained.
In my case, no. I left a day between stays, I would have to raise rates to make the same amount.
Most guests who come to my airbnb are trying to save money compared to booking a hotel. What I offer in terms of space is close to a hotel room. I am not under any illusion that I offer a better product that hotels… I get bookings because it’s a nice enough studio with a price lower than a hotel. People who offer full houses with multiple bedrooms, yard, private pool, etc. are not directly competing with hotels, so they may be able to get by with higher rates, but I don’t think that is the case.
Even a host who had a cleaning business thinks this way, so I’m not surprised most guests think this way. Guests think: I will book a 5 night vacation, flight will get in at 9 am, departure flight is 7 pm so I can maximize my stay while booking only 5 nights. I will simply harass the host to give me 10 AM check in and 5 PM check out. I will be cheap and not book the night before or after. My infant needs to take a nap, so if the host does not allow me early check-in, they don’t understand the concept of hospitality. Oh and since there is a $40 cleaning fee, I will not do my dishes… what am I paying cleaning fees for?
It’s my opinion that 10AM is too early. However, that doesn’t mean I think hosts should have to offer whatever check in/check out the guest demands and to represent what I’ve said here that way feels like quite a stretch. In my opinion 11AM or after is fair game. I concede that plenty of other hosts here feel differently and they have their reasons plus it’s within their rights to make their check in/check out what they want. But please don’t turn what I’ve said here into something it’s not.
One advantage (for MY airbnb) is that 10am checkout makes my airbnb a bad choice for guests who are more ‘touristy’ than I prefer - we are set up as a business ‘hotel’ style with no cooking, eating in the private room, etc. Our guests usually leave in the am around 8:30 or 9 during their stay. Weekdays, no issues, but we always get guests who want weekends and want a ‘late checkout’. They are usually the most trouble, will ‘camp out’ in the room, and many times are slow to leave.
YMMV, but for us, in our area, and our airbnb, guests who want to be in the room all morning means extra cleanup etc. Give me a businessperson who has a schedule any time…
Just a note if someone hasn’t offered this already. I have a 10 am check out and 4 pm check in. I would much prefer to have 11 - 4, but because of the location of my cabin and the fact that it’s in the middle of a national forest with river access, I have to allow more time. All that said, I can’t remember a time when I didn’t write the guests early to tell them that the cabin is ready for them and they can check in anytime. In fact, if the night before isn’t booked, I’ll write them the day before and tell them to check in anytime on their arrival day. So while the check in and out times aren’t ideal, I have the chance to make them feel like we’ve really hustled to get the cabin ready for them. It can go a long way in making them valued!
I’m 11 AM check out and 3 PM check in. My unit is just a 1 bedroom so I can clean and do laundry in that window. I’ve hosted maybe 250 stays and thankfully have only had one time it was tight. The guests really wanted any early check in. I said I had a turnover and couldn’t accommodate it. They were there at 2:50 and I still had laundry in the dryer!
I’ve noticed more guests leaving 5-10 minutes after 11 lately.
The only occasion when I would use the check-in time is if I needed the guests out for my convenience. I recently had a couple who were very slow doing everything and who eventually left each of their 3 days about noon! They have booked for later in the year and thanked me for my patience. I do my own cleaning etc and have a very flexible in and out schedule.