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Exactly this. It’s the host’s job to monitor their rental and to be available or have someone available if something comes up. That’s the primary part of the job, managing it with people in it. A lot of hosts think the main part of the job managing it while unoccupied, i.e., finding a place to buy, using capital to buy and furnish it, get it booked up and then all responsibility transfers to the guest. Systems that value capital over labor, ugh.
People say they want freedom from government regulation but they don’t do what needs to be done to prevent it.
Pittsburgh is a no-gun area. Snort. Those towns and cities have the worst gang violence.
Here’s the deal - this could happen at a VRBO or other rental. But putting ABB in the title is just another way to have ABB hosts blamed for everything.
I’ve had 4 conversations this weekend alone about the “cheats” at ABB, how it’s driving up rental prices and creating a shortage of homes in entitled areas for people to purchase because they can’t afford them (they couldn’t even if there weren’t vacation rentals).
Hosts need to fight back and educate people. One lawyer in my town is trying to get ABB banned.
I say ban the large aggregators with 70+ listings. Leave individual homeowners alone. Make the large property managers accountable.
So do a lot of people who post offering their services as co-hosts. I’ve seen a lot of those where they say they will do all the “virtual” work, i.e. deal with the requests and inquiries, message with guests, keep the calendar up to date, write reviews (how you can write a review when you haven’t seen the state the guests left the place in makes no sense- I guess they mean reviews like “Great guests!”) schedule cleaners, etc.
They appear to be entirely clueless about what hosts usually need co-hosts for, which is boots on the ground and that sitting on your ass in front of the computer is the easy part.
As usual I’m left of center. I write reviews like this all the time.
I ask my guests who book under “do own exit cleaning” option to send me pictures of the condo before they leave for their protection if the next guest says it is not clean.
If they use the “pay extra for cleaners” option, the cleaners report back to me. If it’s inordinately dirty & they send me pictures. In all circumstances they send pictures of the condo after they clean.
My current co-host gig includes only correspondence, dealing with in-stay issues (owner provided local resource contacts) & booking request/inquiries. I have no desire to get involved with pricing & finding service providers. I want to do short term (few days to a couple weeks) coverage.
Depends upon the level of co-hosting needed. In my area there is a fine line of service provision that crosses into property management and state regulations require a Real Estate license. I don’t t want to go there.
Those same people who want to do arbitrage (which crosses that line) and want to embrace the YouTube videos of “how I got rich managing other people’s rentals embrace the long term co-host model. They will eventually get burned.
Not long ago I saw a Facebook posting by an Arbitrage host whose listing was shut down for violating local ordinances and the owner was holding her to the lease & requiring monthly rent payments until the lease expired. Well——
Those aren’t the kind of reviews I meant though. You have a good system in place for reporting and assessing how the guests left the place. I was thinking of those property manager types who just leave “Great guests!” for all their guests, as long as they didn’t burn the place down.
Or the hosts who submit reviews before they have even looked at, or had their cleaner or co-host tell them, the state of the place.
And of course, “Great guests!” isn’t a review- it tells me nothing of value.
Me too and
Tissues = Kleenex
All carbonated drinks=coca cola (for me its co-cola)
All sticky notes = post its
All machine made copies = Xeroxes (shows my age)
This is true to some extent. But some savvy hosts are good at ferreting out lies by asking certain questions designed to catch them out and providing info to discourage the booking (like that the host lives on the property or 5 minutes away).
There’s a host in Chicago who has 3 or 4 big houses she manages herself with the help of a co-host. They sleep a lot of people, so they are ripe for parties, and in fact she gets a lot of bachlorette groups, but she seems pretty adept at picking up when someone is BSing her. She’s posted some message exchanges with guests as examples of how they were lying and how she routed out the lies.
I would guess that is every marketer’s pinnacle of success, to have one’s brand name be used as a general term for the item, even if it’s a different brand.
Others I’ve heard:
All plastic wrap- Saran Wrap
All plastic storage containers- Tupperware
All disposable diapers- Pampers
Thanks- learn something new every day. (Yesterday I learned here about “thermal paper”, which I’d never heard of before)
Probably won’t have too much opportunity to drop the term into casual conversation, though.
Actually you said in your original post ‘the neighbours should contact the police or the host’ so that’s what you were implying.
Again hosts should not rely on neighbours to be the eyes and ears for your STR business - it’s up to us as hosts to 1. Vet effectively 2. Monitor remote properties so we shut down parties and other anti social behaviour.
Yes some hosts have good relationships with their neighbours who will flag issues - but it’s not something you should tell neighbours ‘should do’ unless you are paying them to monitor your place.
Airbnb says it’s “working with police” on the shooting case. No arrests so far but they’re doing the unthinkable by banning the renter of the shooting property from Air forever.
That ought to teach them and everyone else. What a bleeding joke.
That’s common for individual owners with one or two listings to operate as an LLC. In my area it makes it easier to get a business bank account & business credit card & debit card so for easy accounting & points building you use resources dedicated for business use only.
Not always allowed! We have a condo that does not allow any sort of outside cameras. (As this is a shared space in the common areas, so not even a ring doorbell is allowed, and honestly that thing would drive me absolutely bonkers with the foot traffic at a condo. And having cameras in the unit would be just weird IMO.
This is truly unfortunate.
Some ways to help negate large parties/gatherings is to include noise monitors in your listing. Once the level of noise reaches a certain level, you will be notified. Additionally, having a security system with web cams outside, would help be further evidence of what’s happening at the property. Both pieces of evidence would help to kick out these violators while working with Airbnb support. This both protects your airbnb and our ability to airbnb in the communities we live.
