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We’ve raised our prices, in part due to the huge amount of extra cleaning that we are doing, and we’re still getting booked though perhaps our occupancy rate is dropping. We prefer to host fewer stay at a higher price because it means less work for around the same pay. What has been really surprising is that since COVID we’ve hosted our highest paying stays ever since we started.
What all guests since COVID have in common is that they needed super fast WIFI for work. I think we are seeing a shift in terms of working from home attitudes and this is having an effect on the type of person we host.
I agree with the sentiment above that the listing probably requires a raising of prices, a re-writing of the description, instillation of Ring or CCTV as well as better filtering of guests to improve the quality of these guests.
Wow, maybe you should raise your prices and attract a better clientele. I have had less than 1% “crap guests” . I have had a few that were messier than others, I have had a few small items go missing but overall my guests are very good.
@mapuche, I have had the exact same problem as you have… and I live upstairs, and have cameras, in NYC.
Nearly every inquiry/booking I get is from a local since March. Almost every booking/inquiry I receive is for a same day check-in, or next day. Each and every one of them wants to bring extra guests(no, 2 max), and smoke or host a “little get-together” in the backyard (first items of my house rules NO!). To be clear, no locals ever read my house rules. Ever.
But I have a solution, albeit flawed; I now require “Advanced Notice” of two days, and do not allow instant booking within that time frame. I have gone from 12 “bad” inquiries a week to one REAL booking a week. FYI, I used to have a 90%, nearly fully booked apartment, pre-pandemic.
Our Airbnb is a large funky five bedroom antique-filled house in the woods in Pennsylvania (Brewhouse Mountain - largest beer-can collection in the world.) When we first reopened in beginning of July, our first two guests gave us poor reviews - one was scathing - and complained that the house was dark, musty and not what they expected. (We clearly describe the place as filled with beer cans and feature lots of photos - so, what would you expect?) Anyway, I was panicking, thinking this was the new normal and guests were going to be far more demanding. However, since then, we’ve been fully booked and every review has been stellar. People seem really grateful to have a funky place to go hang out in the woods with their “Bubble” of friends and family. They’ve also been terrific at cleaning up after themselves. So, go figure.
All our guests have been from out of town. They have been mostly young men or a young couples. Before Covid the guests were well travelled and polite. These new guests have 0 reviews and almost all of them say this is their first time in LA. We have cameras and a long term guest family in the front unit but we are in another state right now so it doesn’t really help. It just informs us what is happening.
Thanks for the advice. Most of these new guests have never travelled before and do not even understand how to use self check in. We’ve been blessed to find a long term tenant who will start a one year lease in September and we will only make $100 less per month than we did with AirBnb. We have cameras, we have a detailed welcome guide, we have had excellent reviews until Covid. We’ll see what happens after the long term tenancy if we will return to STR. Good luck with your listing.
Oh yeah, I am sure I made everyone who visits my city a total jerk. It’s funny because lately I’ve been seeing all the houses packed and the majority are dealing with the same issues I dealt with - blatant rule violations… It’s not me, it’s the renters. The rules are always clearly posted and explained in advance too. These people always think they are above the rules.
I know some hosts thrive on the model of last minutes bookings, but it’s not for me. I’m still using IB, but with a minimum of 7 days notice. I change it to 3 days if I’ve had a cancellation. Within that window guests can still send a request to book.
I think it may have something to do with airfares being so low and people have no jobs to go to and have the time to travel for the first time. Many of these guests have never been to Los Angeles, some of them have never flown before so it may be people who are just reckless and make bad decisions anyway.
Yes we have cameras, we only accept guests with verified ID. We did file a request for reimbursement on one guest. The housekeeper was irate over the amount of garbage, the soiled and missing linens, the cigaret butts and the huge mess they left in the laundry room. It also prompted a call from our other long term guest it was so bad. It caused the housekeeper to be late on her next assignment because she had to spend so much time cleaning our unit. We did lower our rates and started accepting guests with zero reviews but we’ve done that before Covid and had wonderful guests. Just not worth it anymore. Thanks for your advice though. Maybe if we do this again we’ll enact those procedures.
We are in the mountains. Our guests are definitely tougher on the home now! They are staying in versus using the home as a base camp to explore.
We added a hot tub -for us - but I believe it has really increased demand. We have raised our rates and minimum stay. We may decrease max number of guests as well. I feel the hot tub has changed the demographic of our guests. We used to get hikers and families. Now we get extremes- from couples celebrating an event to heavy party types who aren’t having parties but are blowing off steam.
We aren’t happy about the change. I will be better prepared next year as I had no idea how busy it would get!
I don’t prefer them either. I will take them with a very inflated price sometimes, usually after a last-minute cancellation. But they are nerve-wracking for some reason, I’m not sure why.
Right now, I am trying to book tonight and/or tomorrow night for a guest that had to cancel 2 days ago. I will feel bad if I don’t re-book them for her, but I dread the weird requests (already had one that I had to deter). There’s only 5 places left in the area, I have the best price (it’s only a studio) even though I raised it quite high and I’m the only pet friendly place except for a dump that is $900/night. I think it will book but not because they like my place, but because it’s the only good one available and that doesn’t make for the best guest/host combo, IMO. This is when I get requests that aren’t appropriate for my listing, like cats and kids and too many people, etc.
I do at least make it where they can’t IB at the last minute. It puts me in the position of declining but on this particular listing I have 100% acceptance rate so am willing to decline if needed.
This is the last straw. A guest with zero reviews checked in then wanted a refund because the STR is on a property with another house in the front. The description clearly states there are 2 houses on the lot and the STR is the house in the back. That is available to read before a guest even books. When they arrive we send photos showing the front house with an explanation that they have to pass it, go through the gate and go to the unit upstairs on the of the garage. The photos are very clear that the unit is in the back of the backyard. We went through mediation with AirBnb and agreed to return one night (she booked 2 nights) even though we do not have to return anything since she had already checked in. We agreed to one night on the condition she does not review us and AirBnb agreed. Well she posted a bad review anyway. Now we decided not to return anything and we are quitting AirBnb for good. We thought about coming back after Covid is resolved but no, this is so not worth it anymore. We’re getting a USC professor on a one year lease who’ll be paying all utilities and cleaning her own house. We will be losing about $100/month and all the problems associated with STR. Not a bad deal.
Sounds like she thought she was getting a house where she could throw a party or something else she didn’t want the owner to know about or why care there are two houses on the property.
Our thoughts exactly. Only why book if she knew there 2 houses on the lot? Or was she so stupid that she didn’t even read the description? This is what I mean by the precipitous fall in guest quality. Thank you for your input.
Really? Even still? Are you IB these day? When we re-open our intention is to either not use IB until the craziness is over, or IB with all settings enabled. Still not sure which we’ll pick.
