I can’t shed enough light on this matter but what I found is that currently Airbnb grabs the lowest price you have set in your next 30 days and use that one as your base price. I’m not sure if this is a BETA testing roll out to every user (or a few subset) but it is what I’m seeing. So for example if only one night of my calendar (for my next 30 days) shows a price that is half my base price then that will be the price shown on my listing when I open it with no travel dates.
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This has always been the case with my listing… since I first started with Air in 2010. I think it is a bit misleading! I think they should add the words “average nightly price” somewhere?
Now, as I said… it’s showing my CURRENT price on the home page, not the low one?!!
Mine is showing $120 which is the minimum price I set In the Smart Pricing thing. Yet I have reduced a few days in June to $119.
Excellent point. Guests are not silly and they will recognise when they are being manipulated. They will also have a budget in mind and will work around that. Surprisingly, if their budget is say $50 per night, chances are they won’t go to $70 - possibly $60. However in my experience, they won’t go much below the $50 as there is a mindset on certain standards and degree of risk they are willing to take.
So if someone offers them a $30 room which sounds too good to be true (ie, without dates being put in and showing the true price) then they will probably not consider this as an option for them.
At least this is how my mind works!
Well, Monica, being honest is never a good idea in the world of business. I wonder how old you are. Most people have learned this, and act accordingly.
Being honest is the ONLY way to be in business. Aside of being a good person and run honest busines providing excellent customer service , it’s quit silly to assume that others are not as smart as you and eventually if not right away lies will be discovered and not only will the busines seize to exist but there are potential legal consequences .
Most people know just that and act accordingly making their profit by not fooling and deceiving anyone.
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Well yes, in a way I agree with you.
Trouble is, who is going to define what “honest” means? In Germany, we have a saying “If there is no plaintiff, there will never be a judge”, not sure if this proverb exists in English, too. But I guess you understand what I am trying to say.
You are probably not too smart to understand the lack of honesty will hit you on the back in a very near future. If you try to cheat your guests the bad reviews you will get will put you out of the game sooner than later.
I went to the link and the price said $50. When I entered dates the price dropped to $30 a night.
But this is what I’ve found with my listing - and maybe this is what the OP means - when I search for places in my area, no dates, 5 people, on the listing page, my nightly rate for 5 people is displayed.
HOWEVER, when I click on my property, and the details come up, it reverts to my base price. I am horrified. If someone is shopping my property, once they put the dates in, the price WILL shoot up - but this is not my doing - it is the airbnb website that is doing this. Because of my pricing structure and because Beyond Pricing has put a premium price on some days my price comes up almost DOUBLE what it showed before entering the dates.
SO I believe the OP has a valid point, but I don’t think it’s hosts gaming the system. I think it’s terrible! If I was a guest shopping for a room I would be incensed!!
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Airbnb is not doing anything unique or different than hotels. The program set up like that if there is no date.a person who travels and booked few times knows that always needs to put at least approximate dates in to see the price at least for the season.
It’s the same thing as asking how much a car cost. Which car? Same here, how much a room cost?. If someone asks me about my room the answer would be: now it’s 50$ but in season it’s a100$.
I think the 2$ price was just a mistake of the host.
System will pick the cheapest price , in this case, base price if there is no dates.
Vast majority of travelers are NOT leaving dates blank to search as this is a massive waste of time. Many units that are listed in my area dont even have an active calendar and no dates are available. Hosts who want to check out other listings leave dates blank (that’s what I do too) but when I travel I always enter dates to do a search. Otherwise I would be searching through hundreds of listings in Miami, Portland, SF, & a few other cities where I uses Air. Why in the world would people want to spend hours to needlessly search through listings that may not even be available?
Actually, I used to work at a very large travel company that shall remain nameless and, yes, people do lots of searching without dates. A majority of people have a general sense of when they are traveling but flexibility as to specific dates. They will book usually depending on when the flights are cheapest.
I’m just pointing that out because I think it’s interesting to understand use cases.
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I some times do this if my travel dates are flexible.
We don’t use variable pricing - basically because we hated being hit with it when we had family and, come school holidays, prices rocket.
We have decided what is a fair rate in our locality and for what we offer and we have stuck with that. We also don’t charge any extras so what people see is what they get. We may loose possible bookings but aren’t complaining.
I looked at the link given above and for tonight it was $1 !!! for the 3 nights minimum it worked out at $24 per night with a $22 service charge.
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Just scrolled through the posts quite quickly so apologies if I missed someone else making this point, Surely the vast majority of travellers are looking for somewhere to stay during their dates of travel?? The number of people thinking hey, let’s go to XYZ at some point in the future and have a look at what’s on offer, surely they are a minority. And they will be the ones that are looking for an exceptional place to stay anyway, so they won’t be purely thinking of the money but about the place. One day I would like to go to… well, all kinds of places.,… I might look at the airbnb listings there to see what are the options but I’ll be looking for a special place to make me happy. If, like most travellers, I have a specific date of travel then I’ll be searching for places available for those dates and therefore will see the real and current prices. With all the crap going on with Airbnb and their infinite amount of glitches and stupid experiments, this thread question seems a bit of a FirstWorldAirbnb dilemma.
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When I search to travel I search a min and max with dates. I would never look at anything for $2 or $20 for that matter. So plenty they are missing out on if doing this. I’d think they were a nut or a scammer and bypass listing completely. As a host I really don’t care who looks at my listing just who books it and I’m often full so first in best dressed.
I can’t think of any large profitable company that acts this way, including Airbnb. Sad but true.
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If this bothers you and others are doing it why don’t you and use it as a marketing tool or a special for guests in months you have slow bookings? Make one night half price and per your research your base price will show up as this? If you can’t beat them join them! Sounds like they are doing everything within the rules and legit renting the room at this low advertised price and if guests put in their dates it will all be made clear before booking? I’d be thrilled getting a room basically free if I booked a few days so don’t assume it’s all negative, sounds like a win for host and traveller and you have the freedom and choice to manage our listing as we wish. We don’t all think the same or do business the same way but we should celebrate our freedom. Some of the messages on here are judgemental and nasty to others and this is uncool and unhelpful.
I’ve been a lot happier since I stopped comparing myself to my neighbors. I’m charging more and the bookings are rolling in. But I think you are right that a number of guests don’t plug in trip dates. I have people messaging me to ask if I can open up blocked days in my calendar. No, it is blocked because I have another guest!
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its just a matter of opinion