Unnecessary House Rules

Under the category of “Rules We Never Thought We Would Actually Have to State” here are a few we might have to add to our listing.

  1. Please do not leave the door wide open…all day…while the HVAC is running.
  2. Please do not leave every single light on (both inside and outside) while you are away all day.
  3. Please do not take the towels we provide with you for a rafting/river trip.
  4. Please do not bring glass around or in the pool.
  5. Please do not leave your underage minor children here while you are away.
    (our personal favorite ridiculous rule)
  6. Please do not throw our pets off of the second floor balcony.

How about you? Anything you thought was too obvious to list in your house rules but you’ve learned otherwise?

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#1 and #2:
I knew someone who did this at hotels to get “her money’s worth.”
WTF?

#5
I had someone do this last month, at night, no less. I don’t think it will happen enough to make a rule, at least I hope.

#6
What??!! That would be an instant eviction for me. Did you mention it in the review?

I had to put a label on my new electric kettle explaining that it was electric and not for stove top use. Never thought I’d have to do that, but someone burned the previous kettle to a char.

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I’ve actually made my rules list shorter over the years not longer but yes, people are, erm…idiots.

I’m with GardenGnome at minimum, if #6 happened to me my response might make national news.

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Here’s a huge tip for you: Rules don’t start with “Please”. Once you add the word “please”, it’s optional.

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#1 : This one isn’t as obvious as you think. Some people who have never lived in a house with A/C don’t know how A/C works or how much it costs. This is one I will put in if I decide to keep my listing open during the off-season in Phoenix.
#2: After switching to all LED bulbs, I don’t care as much. I do have 5 ceiling fans though, and they are more important since each one consumes as much electricity as 15 light bulbs. What about leaving the refrigerator door open for hours?
#3 : It might not be that obvious for guests that don’t go rafting to know that it’s likely for towels to get lost or otherwise destroyed. If this is a common problem, then I would recommend providing old towels for that purpose and add that to the rules. It common for hosts near beaches to do this.
#4: If this is a common problem, provide plastic drinking cups for outdoors and add that to the rule. [Edit: I suppose that doesn’t solve the problem of beer bottles.]
#5: You should be more specific. I wouldn’t blink an eye at parents leaving their teenager alone for most of the day. And underage/minor implies anyone under 18 years old in the US.
#6: This is literally criminal and I can’t imagine it actually happened more than once. Putting it in the rules seems weird. It’s like saying “Don’t beat your domestic partner with a baseball bat in the living room.”

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If they threw my pet, I would toss them in a nano-second.
Unacceptable.
Report to police for animal abuse.

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haven’t added it yet but it may be coming soon “Close the shower curtain while showering to prevent flooding the bathroom” I already had to state “Do not to take blankets, couch throws, etc outside”. Oh and “Don’t remove cookware from the house”. :roll_eyes:

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good point. Please makes it a request.

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Good points, and while we would like to we most likely won’t actually add these to our house rules. Just drives you crazy. As far as #5 goes - it is a little different for us since we have a pool and even children in their teens can be a huge risk around a pool.

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And with the glass around the pool - all we have is plastic/acrylic…but guests bring their own sometimes!

I’m horrified! Did someone actually throw your pets off the second floor? If someone did that to one of my fur babies, I would go postal on them and I would probably end up in jail.

OK - yes - someone did actually throw one of our cats (26 years old at the time) off of the second floor deck of our guesthouse. It was quite an ordeal and my #1 priority for the night was to get them off of our property without getting myself killed. It was truly a very scary situation that consumed our entire night. (they didn’t leave until 5:30 a.m.) One thing that compounded the problem was that these guests were local…literally a few miles from our home…and now they know where we live. We had to handle it in such a way that there would be no “retaliation” later. Without question the worst Airbnb experience we’ve had to date.

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This is potentially a fun thread but I’m with everyone who is horrified at the treatment of your cat. I think K9 sums up what would happen if any of my guests did that.

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A rule I had to add and never believed I had to was:

“Please make sure the door is closed and locked when you live.”

I had guests who left the door both open (ajar and one quite wide open) and unlocked. Lights on… that’s kind of current. That’s why I changed all the bulbs in the house with led bulbs and outside I put the ones that turn on and off themselves.

My philosophy is: if something can go wrong, it will (Murphy’s law).

As for the AC I installed one of these thermostats that I can control from my phone and I “correct” the temperature when I see they abuse it. And they are abusing it, setting it up to 85F in winter and 60 in summer.

As for the pets… OMG I’d beat them up and sue them! OMG, I can’t believe what they did to the cat! One of the reason I don’t rent to local people is this: I don’t want them to know where I live. That is horrifying.

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Why on earth??? I hope your old cat was/is ok after that ordeal.

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I once stayed in a 6 star hotel on Mykonos and if you opened the door or window to the outside the ac cut off. They also made you put used toilet paper into a bucket next to the toilet because on the Greek islands everything needs to be shipped off. But the thing that got me was you couldn’t order food or drinks if you were on a sun bed next to the pool which was pretty much what I planned to do for a week. So I left the next day, hpped to a new island, and stayed at a 3 star hotel with fewer rules. I could sit on the balcony with the door open and the AC on but the unit was right next to me and there was a noisy goat next door which was an unattractive vacant block. I kept moving. Now I see people sitting out on my terrace in summer and I am know they have the ac on but if it’s during the day I have solar supplying the electricity. You can’t win. I am more annoyed in winter by people turning the heating up to 25C and walking around in shorts and a singlet.

I put my ACH on a setting so it turns off if it detects no movement so hopefully not running at night or if people go out but I noticed someone had turned that function off.

I should have added “Do not take the BBQ plate to the beach but if you do then clean it and put it back and not leave covered in grease and sand on the lawn”.

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Don’t put wet pool towels on the the French polished antique furniture as it will ruin the finish!

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I am going to be starting up another whole house accommodation with AC and a pool.
My rules are definitely going to be covering the no windows or doors open while Air Con is on and No glass by the pool.
Guests need that reminder. It may not be that obvious to them.