Public Service Announcement : "Treat this home as your own"

Do you have this in your listing? I do not have this phrase or anything remotely like it in my listing. My job requires me to go into people’s home on a regular basis, and this is just way too subjective of a comment! Some people do throw pizza boxes on the floor, leave dishes with food on them on the table, and basically live like slobs. So, asking people to treat your home/guest room/yurt/island, whatever you have, is just not a good idea :slight_smile:

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No chance I would write that. Haha

I’ve seen how messy some of my friends are and their families.

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I see so many listings that say that though! And I just want to write to those hosts and say 'oh goodness take that out!"

I did a home visit today and uh, um, yeah, you’re right.

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Our rental is immaculate. Therefore my own home is a complete mess :slight_smile:

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There is a difference, believe me! A messy home and slovenly are 2 different things! If it wasn’t for ABB guests, I would probably have dust everywhere! One time, my guests cancelled last minute, by their own admission, they didn’t want to come up for a weekend when it was raining, and my cancellation policy was strict, so I got to keep the money and I got to enjoy the whole weekend in a super clean house as I had cleaned it for their visit. It was awesome :slight_smile:

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Same here ! Once in a while my partner and I spend a night in our rental just to enjoy a super clean and tidy place :grin:

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It’s summer and my boys are home from university. My place looks like bombs went off in a baggage claim area because there are suitcases everywhere with clothes spilling out. There are dishes all over the place. The dishwasher gets run every other day. The laundry is going everyday. Quite the change to when they are away. The house is actually clean… But it is way way too quiet.

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This is how I word it in the house rules: This is our home and not just a random rental property — we take very good care of it and we expect our guests to do the same.

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Love that! It’s perfect!

I’ve been in too many disgusting houses to trust guests to treat their own homes respectively. And it isn’t just renters, or my fellow millennials, I’ve seen all generations treat their abode like the inside of a trash cans, and some folks own the home they are trashing! (I admit I don’t host dogs because the messiest housekeepers I know happen to have dogs and let them chew up the furniture and scratch the walls.)

I hear you, jaquo! I take good care of my home, but it can get messy during the week until Sundays, when I clean and pick up clutter. I kind of freak out when guests wander through the two doors between their rental in the basement and my upstairs living space, looking for me or wanting to meet my pets. They haven’t dinged me on cleanliness yet, but I don’t want them seeing the pile of clean laundry on the couch or the stack of dirty dishes in the sink!

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Agree. I don’t want people to behave like they’re at home. I want them to behave like guests, which is what they are.

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CThe first page of our guest handbook is this:

We Live Here

We really want you to be comfortable during your stay­: put your feet up, scramble up some breakfast, watch a movie or take a nap. All we ask is that you remember it is a house we love and our home.

That said, read on …

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Because some of my guests arrive after dark and the door is left unlocked for them (I live somewhere where security is not an issue and I am in the flat upstairs anyway) I email them to “go in and make yourselves at home”. I only state in the rules for them to wash, dry and replace dishes etc but so far all seem to make an effort to clean as well. I think “make yourself at home” means relax and use whatever you find whereas “treat this home as your own” might be taken as a license to leave it in a mess :slight_smile:

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