Two years in, first 1 star

Sorry SPulley but I am with the guest. I would be horrified to hear my hosts ‘disagreeing’, being asked to report when I am coming home and being refused a change of towels.

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For those of us, like K, who have and host dogs and love them being called a bitch is not an insult. :japanese_goblin:

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If I were your guest, i’d be out there watching the ducks and chickens, with a beer in my hand!!

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TLDR other posts.

But if you are a host and you know the garage door creates nuisances to your guest, I would not use the door while the guest is there.

Also the point about towels. If a guest ask for a towel refresh, how hard is it? I mean as hosts, we are taking their money in exchange for the space AND service. I personally would not proactive offer a towel refresh but if that’s what the guest want, they should get it since their stay is more than a couple days.

Airbnb is not really just renting out a space - it is much more about the guest experience. If you’ve hosted two years already, you should know more about that than me.

PS I’m a super host that has only hosted for a year.

First of all, congratulations on telling us the whole story, your short comings included. This allows us to get a good grasp of the situation and indeed, it doesn’t sound like the best experience for guests.

TOWELS We offer new towels every 2-3 nights, although lots of times guests tell us it’s not necessary and they continue using the same towel. Within our price range it’s difficult to offer new towels every day, but in case guests ask us, we will give them a new towel every day anyway.

TEXT MESSAGES TO ENTER We don’t give keys to guests so they have to ring the bell and to leave they can just leave. Having to text message every time and maybe even wait for one of you to show up doesn’t really sound acceptable, not even to me, the big key exception on this forum.

NOISE We live in a relatively open space and there’s only one door between the living room and the guest’s bed. The last time we had a party with friends before opening I was really clear to them: “Friends, tomorrow we are opening for business, this means that although you will always be welcome to visit, you have to leave at 22h30. There will be no exceptions to this rule.” We guarantee quiet hours from 23h00 to 7h00, so we also turn down the volume of the TV to almost zero at 23h00. Just to say, if you host, yes you may have to adapt your ways a little bit.

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In most places that would be true but there is a deck overlooking the sea on the other side of the house and guests tend to hang out there so I have the backyard all to myself.

To be fair, this is one of those situations where guests expect things to be like a hotel, where you don’t have to worry about the damp ones because you get a new one every day.

I provide one bath and one hand and several wash cloths. I also offer beach towels. If they are staying longer than a few days I offer fresh or I give them if the ask.

It’s Hawaii. Not everything is going to dry like the mainland. It’s also an Airbnb and not a hotel.

I wasn’t there and I didn’t see the listing but I wonder if there were adequate places to hang towels. I’ve been in airbnbs with no towel racks or hooks! I had to resort to getting a hanger and hanging my towel from that and then I hung the hanger on the curtain rod.

I’m in the camp of I need a dry towel. Drying with damp towels feels gross to me. That said I don’t recall this ever being a problem, I always had enough dry towels. If I go to an airbnb where I don’t have them and can’t get them I’ll be deducting stars.

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For sure there need to be lots of places to hang towels. I do have that. Even in Hawaii, where it can get humid towels get dry pretty fast.

I suggest to guests that they hang them outside on the line for best results. I provide a line, which guests find to be super helpful.

I’ve never had guests complain or mention anything about towels,
Knock wood.

I would ask for more towels before deducting a star though. Give the host a chance to remedy.

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That’s why I said if I needed more and couldn’t get them I’d deduct a star. Someone posted here this week that she thought one towel per person for a one week stay was enough. Even in a dry climate that’s pushing it. And then they had to nerve to act like the guest was the one that was wrong.

We provide more than that for one night lol! Towels are so easy, but I guess people will abuse it. Once in the 8 years of hosting we had a couple use 12 towels for a two night stay in SoCal. She took every spare towel out of the closet in the room :joy:

All the studies show men interrupt more and take up more airtime. How come we can anthropomorphise the female ducks as quacking more? :sunglasses:

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I concur with others so far. I would probably appreciate a couple of towels to be honest if there was no laundry for a week. And I will agree that I would be really irritated at having to announce my arrival and departure if your listing states private entrance. It’s not the guests job to ferret out info in the reviews or wait to learn of the inconvenience after booking. Some guests book exclusively for privacy and to be left of their own accord. I would add it to your listing. You have been blessed with easy going guests but these issues are bound to upset others in future. In being as transparent as you can up front, you avoid the disappointment.

What I’ve read (which may be pseudo-science), is that human brains are conditioned over thousands of years to respond to certain sorts of noises as warnings, and therefore those kinds of sounds can wake a sleeping human more readily. In this case the quality of the sound is more important than its volume. E.g. a barking dog, though faint, may rouse a sleeping human more readily than, say loud white noise. I, at least, seem to be woken quite readily by barking dogs.

In this context I was using “loud” as a vague qualifier, intended to imply that the hypothetical white noise (however produced, whether by a fan, or air purifier, or a dedicated machine), was loud in comparison to the hypothetical barking. (White noise is a reasonably well-defined term, and yes, it doesn’t usually change in volume.)

That’s an obvious statement, really. It’s how white noise masking works - you have a louder but less annoying sound mask a softer but more annoying one.

No they definitely quack more. Female ducks that is.

Clearly not all species are the same.

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It is possible they need to quack more to lead predators away from their nest or collect their brood. And when they are hangry.

Interesting. I used to be HANGRY, went back on the low carb diet, is better now. Thankfully no quacking.

Honestly, if I were you, I’d just let it go, bc it sounds to me like their complaints are valid/true, as in it’s their truth. They didn’t enjoy their stay and it sounds to me like you are not really considerate of guests and/or dismissive of their complaints, which you should not be if you are running any kind of business.

You say the arguing and people coming in late is “not that loud,” but clearly, they disagree, bc they heard the arguing and heard people constantly coming in and out! Just because YOU don’t think it’s loud doesn’t mean it’s not loud or annoying to them. You’ve gotten used to how things are in your home, but guests haven’t, so you have to think about things from their perspective.

Also, that would be really annoying to have to constantly text someone in order to go in and out of the house all the time. Who wants to do that? You should really get a keypad lock (where guests have a code) for the door so guests can come and go as they please.

Entitled? These people are giving you their money, they’re not just regular houseguests that are staying for free.

Instead of making excuses, learn from this review and try to change/improve some of those things.

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