Hello
I am going to start Airbnb in my annex very soon.
Should we accept a guest who has no previous record/feedback on the Airbnb website?
Regards
Iram
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You will be a new host…… why you anyone pick you with no reviews……?
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I have accepted many guests without reviews and they have been fine. I don’t have instant booking so guests have to send a request to book. One can get a feel for the guest just from what they write in the request. Wishing you the best Airbnb experience.
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It’s foolish not to accept requests from people with no reviews. People have to start somewhere; just like you have to start somewhere as a Host. Have you ever been an AirBnb Guest? If not, why not? I’ve always had good experiences with first timers, as you can help educate them on the right way to interact with other Hosts – like reminding them about the Review process and how important it is to both them and us.
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I do accept guests with no reviews, however only after they answer a few questions and pass the sniff test. Usually something along the lines of:
“what do you plant to do on your trip” or “are you coming to town for an event”, etc.
Their answers should give you a feel for the person and if you think you can trust them with your property. Of course if they mention anything about a group or birthday night, etc. I always probe deeper and mention the party policy and make sure they explicitly say they will not have a party at the property.
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Many of my Airbnb guests are new and have no reviews. Neither do new hosts. As @KenH says, if you’re new and have no reviews, why would anyone book with you?
Looking forward to the time when Airbnb does away with that system and puts everyone on IB.
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For every guest (or Host) who has reviews there was a time before when they had none.
A guest might also wonder if they should book with a Host without reviews, to which I would refer them to the above statement.
HOWEVER, I have also read on this forum that new Hosts are often targeted by scammers. So, while I think you should accept a guest without reviews, two steps seem sensible to me whether a new Host or not:
- As @Justarock suggests, ask them some questions to increase your comfort with them. I would avoid intrusive questions and keep them to the salient facts of the listing. For example, for the listing for which I am co-Host, I might write (edit appropriately):
Thank you for your interest in my property.
The dates you requested are available for two guests checking in at 4 pm or later on [fill], checking out by 10 am on [fill].
Please confirm that you understand that the salient house rules include (see the listing for all):
o No smoking inside or outside,
o No animals,
o Shoes not to be worn inside,
o No children under age 12,
o Maximum occupancy, whether overnight or not, is six and, unless otherwise agreed to in advance and on this platform, limited to registered guests,
o No parties or events,
o The person making the reservation must stay throughout the stay.
Note: Per the listing, cameras record the exterior of the property. [Not sure whether to add this here; we don’t.]
Please do not hesitate to let us know if there is anything we can do to make your stay here more enjoyable. We want your stay here to be comfortable, pleasant, peaceful. Please tell us how we can partner with you to make this happen. For example, are there events or activities that you’d like us to research or recommend? [No charge]
If you have not installed the Airbnb app on your phone, we recommend that you do so, and enable notifications. You’ll find the app a convenient way to communicate and hold information about your stay.
You’ll find our guidebook at short code start
[guidebook]short code end to [fill] (and the area) on the site and the app.
Please confirm your understanding and let me know your questions so that your booking can be confirmed.
We look forward to the possibility of hosting you!
- Take a time-stamped video of the listing just before the guest’s check-in time. Make it thorough. SHOW, for example, that the appliances are working, the beds and the entire listing clean, the toilet flushing, the thermostat reflecting the temperature, etc. Err on the side of recording more.
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Hope this is joking…as an in home host I do not want to go with IB.
Just had a request from a woman with a 5 year old - NOT a kid friendly house.
My schedule is chaotic at this time of year - I might miss an IB booking.
Unfortunately, I fear this may eventually end up being another “improvement.”
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I have taken many bookings from first time Airbnb users, in my case it’s a big house, usually hosting several generations for big family get togethers, so I get requests way ahead of the stay, 3 night miniimum
I don’t accept instant book from guests who have no reviews, but after a small amount of online conversation I usually accept. Scammers tend to stick out like sore thumb, eg a couple with 1 child wanting to book for 1 night, asking for a price reduction…usually a stolen profile
As you have an annexe I’m assuming your space is quite small? Maybe just one bedroom? In which case you might be more of a target for bad guests than I am, but with a bit of conversation to alert you to any red flags beforehand you should be fine, especially as you live right next door
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@Care So if hosts didn’t accept guests with no reviews, how would guests ever get accepted in the first place to get their first review?
Newbie guests may need a bit more questioning before accepting their bookings, more explanation of how it all works, more clarification of expectations both yours and theirs, but that is part of being a host.
As someone else here mentioned, communication is key in getting guests who will be a good fit for you and your listing. As is writing up your listing so as to attract those kind of guests.
If you get a request from a newbie guest whose account is brand new (some guests aren’t new to the platform, they may have joined years ago and yet have no reviews- there can be various innocent reasons for that) who has written nothing on their profile and has no reviews, you can message them saying something like “Hi XX, Thank you for your request. I see you are new to Airbnb and have no reviews yet nor have you filled out any information about yourself on your profile. Can you tell me…and also have you thoroughly read the listing info, clicking through to read the house rules, (etc). I see you have booked for 1 guest, so will it just be you travelling, or will there be more people staying? Looking forward to your reply.”
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Not only that but it would be a strange business plan to discourage new customers 
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I don’t for Instant Book now but I did in the past. Since I have over 600 5 star reviews, I feel I earned the right to be picky. However, someone with no reviews can request to book and I can’t recall anyone that I’ve turned down.
As a new host you should be anxious to get as many reviews and bookings as you can in your new host boost period so you shouldn’t be picky. If someone instant books and they seem like a disaster waiting to happen you have 3 penalty free bookings. The vast majority of your guests will be fine.
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I accept guests with no reviews and newbies. I do ask very specific questions when they book (disclosed in the listing) and I feel like it helps to weed out the bad actors. Also, I’m an affordable STR but if you go too low, you do tend to get problematic guests.
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Thank you all, for taking the time off, to answer my question. i guess i was getting anxious, but the answers were helpful.
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that was super helpful.
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I don’t have any issues with taking newbies but have also always required them to Request instead of Instant Book; however, I’m not sure that it matters any longer with the new IB settings.
I’ve received 3 IBs in the last 2 weeks and none of them have any reviews. They all have “1 trip” but no reviews. I’m sure there are many reasons that someone doesn’t receive a review but it raises more questions in my mind than I’d have with an actual newbie.
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Just a note that I just got an instant book from a guest who has no reviews although I had instant book requirements enabled. When I looked into it I realized that the requirement is worded, “guest has completed a stay without incident or bad reviews.” I always thought it was that the guest actually had positive reviews so I don’t know if that changed or if I have always just assumed.
So I can see that my guest has a history of one trip with no review. Hopefully his previous host didn’t just decide not to review a bad guest.
Anyways, to the point of the original question - I do take new guests all the time. I would be eliminating half my market if I didn’t. I’ve had one bad experience in 4 years. But I also live here and I have a maximum of 2 guests so that helps.
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Yes, they changed it maybe 6-8 months ago.
I suppose it’s possible that they just stayed or are currently staying (does “1 trip” appear when they start a booking or complete it? You could figure that out the next time you book an Airbnb by seeing at what point that Trip number changes) at another Airbnb but the 14 day review period isn’t over yet?
I prefer them over guests who have been on the platform for a long time and have lots of reviews.
But I host both types, as I accept anyone willing to pay me.
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Yes, in November. We were already booked for Nov and Dec at that point and then had our calendar closed Jan-Mar for a direct book guest so I hadn’t come across it IRL yet. When I opened the calendar we got 3 bookings right away, all IB, all with “1 trip” and no reviews.
I suppose but it would seem an extreme coincidence for 3 different guests. Looking at their profiles one of them joined in 2013, one in 2018 and one in 2020. That doesn’t really point to them all 3 them all of a sudden booking two trips in a row.
I can’t see my trip number. I can’t see anyone’s trip number that has at least one review. There’s either a number for trips or a number for reviews, but not both.
What strikes me as strange is the primary way to know whether or not someone has “negative history” would be from a host giving them a review with low stars and/or “wouldn’t host again”, so I’m not really sure what they’re basing the negative history bit on. Of course, you can’t have a negative history if you don’t have any history at all 
Anyhoo, I think the setting is not useful in any manner now. There’s no discernible difference between a guest who has never booked an airbnb vs a guest who has booked an airbnb but didn’t receive a review. If anything, the one that didn’t receive a review is more suspicious, e.g. perhaps the host was operating on “if you can’t say something nice then don’t say anything at all” or the guest got an unflattering review then threw a fit to have it removed.
It’s not super important to me either way but it was interesting to be bombarded with it all at once. Airbnb stated that increased inclusion/decreased discrimination and easier booking for POC was the reason for the change, so of course all 3 of these guests are the same older white women that are exactly like most of my guests. It certainly didn’t diversify anything for me.
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