Second enquiry - this one sounds more promising

1

Hello everyone,

I’ve got a second enquiry just now. I woke up at 2 am, and the enquiry had been sent at
1.40 am. Thanks to @dcmooney and @jaquo’s kind tutoring, I know to sound more friendly this time. :slight_smile: The request read as follows:

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Hi Faheem,

My name is Cameron and I am an American university student that will interning at Impact Guru (near Roxy Cinema) for the months of June and July. Would you be interested in renting out your space out for the summer?

Please let me know if you are interested,

Cameron

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So,

I currently have my space listed for 30 days or less. Will be able to approve him without changing that?

His page lists one review, but for some reason I can’t access it. What am I doing wrong?

I thought of writing:

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Hi Cameron,

Thanks for your inquiry. It would be great to have you stay. Yes, the space is available for the relevant period. Can you give me a few more details about your upcoming trip and your travel plans? Will you be occupying the room alone? Are you coming directly from the US? Please do make sure you are Ok with all the details mentioned in my listing (is that redundant?). In particular, note that there is a two person guest limit. Thanks.

<anything else I should ask?>

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I also want to check the following applies:

For all long-term reservations (28 nights or more), the Long Term policy is automatically applied:

Long Term: first month down payment, 30-day notice for lease termination. Automatically applied to all reservations of 28 nights or more.

2

That may be a bit much to post online about a potential guest.

Now, with that out of the way, it doesn’t look like a bad inquiry. You will just want to draw up a leasing agreement for that period of stay with a defined end date and legal redress for overstay.

3

Hmm, this forum doesn’t give me a way to delete this message.

Yikes. No idea how to do that. Is that standard procedure? And do I need to say so up front?

4

I will send you a link in the private messaging system.

5

Thanks, appreciate it. Identifying information removed per your instructions…

6

As for that single review, it is possible that someone has left him a review and he has not yet written one in reply, so they are still in the 14-day waiting period to post it.

7

I see. That’s the most likely explanation, then? And does my response sound Ok?

8

@faheem - it sounds excellent. Any decent guest will understand that you want to be sure about them, especially for such a long rental. You might be able to get a standard lease agreement online if you Google?

I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you :slight_smile:

1 Like
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Hi @jaquo,

So you think a lease agreement is a good idea as well, then?

10

What’s the correct procedure to override a one month limit in order to allow the quest to book? Temporarily remove the limit? Extend an invitation from my end?

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Hi Faheem,

I’ve never rented through Airbnb for longer than about three weeks so I’m not sure what the procedure is there. Hopefully someone else can help you with that. But before we listed on Airbnb we would always use a standard lease that we’d downloaded from the internet. We had it checked over by a local lawyer who said it was fine for our needs.

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Ok, thanks @jaquo. I appreciate the good wishes. :slight_smile:

1 Like
13

Faheem, this sounds great. As does your reply. One of our first bookings was a PhD student and he was a fantastic addition to our family for 2 months.

One host recently said they would go ‘month-to-month’ - to make sure it was a good fit - but I can’t see someone coming to Mumbai for an internship not knowing that housing was somewhat secure.

Write to the guy! See how he responds back!

Let us know what happens.

2 Likes
14

Hi @dcmooney,

Yes, grad students typically make good renters.

I wouldn’t do that to anyone coming from another continent. That would be nuts.

I wrote back, roughly 2 hours after I heard from him. I haven’t heard anything yet. Of course, I may not. I imagine in this line of business, a lot of inquiries fall through.

I didn’t say anything about going month to month. It was similar to what I wrote at the beginning of this thread, except I asked him for exact days of stay. And added a para telling him he could google me, and roughly what he would find. Though in 2016 telling someone they can google you feels somewhat redundant. :slightly_smiling:

I still need to figure out the best way to let him book for 2 months (assuming that happens) given that I have a month restriction on length of stays. I suppose one way would be to temporarily lift the length limit. Another alternative would be this special offer thing, though I would rather let him book it himself.

1 Like
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On special offer, he really is still booking himself.

Yes, lifting the restriction sounds like the best way.

Good luck!

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Update: I got another inquiry at 1.30 pm IST today, for 4 days in June starting the 10th. I’d prefer to have the chap who asked about staying for 2 months, so I wrote to him again asking about his status. I haven’t heard from him since I originally replied to him. I’m currently waiting a bit to see if he will get back to me. The system says I have 24 hours to reply to the 4 days guest. Of course, I’d like to reply as early as possible.

How do people handle these sorts of conflicts? Do you just take people on a first come first served basis? The fact that I have a 1 month restriction has certainly complicated things, but I think that the restriction does serve a purpose. I’m fine with some people staying for longer than 2 months, but I’d like to handle it on a case by case basis. If I say longer stays are Ok, and then people try to book then, and I decline them, presumably the system would not like that.

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My thought is - yes, first-come, first-serve. I’ve had many inquiries that never booked; I never hear from them again. It’s kind of you to contact the 2 month guy to give him a chance, but you may lose this new booking while you wait.

2 Likes
18

I’ve had the same as @dcmooney . Some guests enquire but don’t book. I had it recently. A guy wanted to book for a month. The same day someone wanted to book for a couple of days within the four week period the first chap requested. I took the couple of days. The surrounding days soon filled up.

Mind you, I prefer shorter stays though.

1 Like
19

Thanks @dcmooney and @jaquo,

That’s very helpful. I guess I’ll go ahead with the 4 day chap. Thanks for the advice.

                                                                                            Regards, Faheem Mitha
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Hi @jaquo

Shorter stays are generally good. But the American college student sounded like a good call. Mind you, you can never be sure what you are going to get.