If you consider money to be more important than ethical behavior, then I guess you made the right decision.
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If you read my other responses you’d know my entire stance though. Snipping just that bit and drawing an inference isn’t exactly accurate.
However, if you ask me, I would do it differently i. e try not to miss out her booking. But I’ll still book January. Fact!
Wow - so now everyone who would run their business is now subject to your personal view on ethics?
Would you willingly engage in business with a company or person who is engaged in such “unethical practices and behavior”?
Please do illustrate and explain why we are unethical. Thanks!
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I think you should not have been upset that a guest did not accept your offer of three nights instead of four with a two-week notice. The guest had to go find another property and go through the search all over again.
Oh - a sale isn’t an “act of god”. It’s an act of a realtor.
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Well, I would have offered to pay for a comparable place for 4 nights for that guest if I had forgotten about their booking, rather than offer them my place that was only available for 3 nights.
I read all your responses.
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Honestly? I would have loved to see you in this exact situation. One thing I know is people talk a big game when it isn’t exactly their situation.
I offered what I sell. Stays. I sell nightly stays. Stays i offered were worth more than what she paid for 3x over. I’d say ethically I made her a good offer.
If your morals are based on what u say they are, mine are different. U really have no right gate-keeping ethics. No one died and made you Queen of ethics.
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I was not upset. Not in the least.
I actually felt I made a reasonable offer. Key word: Reasonable. It was up to her to accept or reject it. She rejected it. Outcome, Booking cancelled without recurse. Both parties go their separate ways. Many days are for the guest, one day for the host. I have lost money on this platform. Quite a few times.
Yes, our ethics are obviously quite different. I wouldn’t be gloating about the fact that I grossed $8000 on a listing after it was advertised for sale, and then feel okay about offering a 4-nighter guest I forgot about a 3 night booking, 2 weeks before arrival.
Your original question was whether the guest was asking for too much under the circumstances. The circumstances being that you neglected to note her reservation until 2 weeks before her arrival. That you would even pose that question says a lot.
Just because I state my opinion here doesn’t mean I think I’m the queen of ethics. Touched a nerve, did I?
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Dear Ms High and mighty, circumstances also include the following which you have decided to neglect seeing as they do not fuel your need to sit on a moral high horse:
1 - Family handed us accommodation to run this STR because they NEEDED THE MONEY SHORT TERM.
2 - Date of sale was NOT DETERMINED upfront
3 - A few guests were affected & in fact some of them were notified with a shorter duration than 2 weeks in same January & moved on.
4 - AirBnB’s hosting policy actually covers this scenario.
5 - We missed her booking and did not want to leave her hanging. Being human we offered what we could at the time. It was not suitable for her and we let the parent company of our business handle.
Hope this clarifies your current state of tunnel vision. I am guessing it won’t though. I sense an incessant need you have to look down morally in satisfaction. My question was "Did the guest ask for too much?’
You could have said “I do not think she did for XYZ reason” but Noooooo… You need to place yourself up there as the savior and everyone else as the villain and nope, again, YOU ARE NOT THE GATE KEEPER OF BUSINESS ETHICS.
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Nope. You messed up, plain and simple.
If a host cancelled on me, two weeks before arrival, I’d be seriously pissed off. The reasons why are irrelevant to the guest, the crux is that a guest found themselves in the position that they had no accommodation for their upcoming trip.
Do you really? I don’t think you do.
JF
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You are entitled to your opinion.
Doesn’t cost a penny.
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Just to add to the conversation I don’t think it’s reasonable to offer a guest three nights, when you had accepted their booking for a four night stay and wanted them to change to another place for three nights only. What did you expect them to do for the fourth night??? pack up their belongings pay for and move somewhere else for the final night? @BlaQMarbleHost
It’s irrelevant that the three nights you offered cost more than the original four. You were not offering them like for like. You were offering them one less night and lots of inconvenience.
As a side note, I am really surprised Airbnb accepted your cancellations under exceptional circumstances. As you knew that the house was being sold so could have pulled it off the market at an earlier stage, rather than let guests booking, knowing you may have to cancel.
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I don’t think guests should use hosts as their private trip insurance. Nor do I think hosts should use guests as their backup in case a house does not sell. I think both sides should go into it trusting the other to fulfill their obligation.
If a guest decides last minute to cancel on a strict cancellation policy property they end up paying the host for their stay.
In this case the guest paid the host’s booking company for the stay. The booking company had been holding this money for over a month. I think the booking company and the host have the obligation to make it whole for the guest. In this case it would not be giving them three days instead of four for the same price elsewhere but getting them accommodations for the same time period in the same location that is as good or better than what they booked at no additional cost. We don’t know if AirBnb provided that. We do know there is at least one host out there still taking money from guests that feels they can use other people’s money as their own personal financial backup.
STR is a weird Wild West sort of situation. If this were a LTR the landlord would have the responsibility to tell their renters when the house was going on the market with plenty of time for them to find other accommodations. In a hotel situation the guest would be told in advance, usually before they even paid any money, if their stay could not be accommodated and then transfer them to another hotel.
If more hosts used their soon to be sold homes as STR, figuring they could just cancel if it did indeed sell, the STR market would lose it’s luster, and guests would opt for other choices since they would essentially be gambling money on accommodations they may or may not get.
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This is exactly how BDC operate, and they have been criticised by some on here for that policy. I think it focuses the host into providing the guest with what they booked, and for when they booked it. Failure to provide (i.e. cancelling a guest) is looked upon most disfavorably by BDC unless it is due to circumstances entirely beyond the hosts control.
JF
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Home was run as an STR for 3 months and some change. Owners weren’t sure when exactly they would put it up for sale.
Booking in question was a late January booking made in November. Now unless I am God, I could never have been able to deduce all this. Just clarifying situation so u understand.
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Maybe, as an alternative, you could have kept her money, and found and paid for a “comparable” place for 4 nights, and paiid for any difference out of your pocket.
Plus toss in a $25 gift card as an apology.
Otherwise, unless there are no other accommodations available in the area to be found 2 weeks later then she has plenty of time to find and make alternative arrangements.
If it were the next day, I would see things differently but 2 weeks is plenty of notice to find something else in Loganville or
ATL in Feb / March
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The OP did not say the guest would pay extra -the OP was offering the more expensive property for the cheaper price.
While I appreciate your offering the 3 nights in a more expensive place, I agree with the guest - I wanted 4 nights and only getting 3.
That being said, in this case I would not have offered the other place, just put it on Air to find her new accommodations unless I could offer 4 nights.
It’s a bummer, but it is 2 week notice and Air does step in and help.
Yeah, you messed up. Bet that won’t happen again! 
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Very reasonable response
I applaud you being candid. Did we mess up? Hell yes. Everyone’s in a hurry to poiny that out without even proffering a possible solution. We did. Secondly, we didn’t have her money ‘yet’.
Now imagine i booked a place for her out of pocket like some suggested, and she accepted it, then canceled on that… Guess who would have burned their candle from both ends? Yes. U guessed it. I appreciate your honest opinion. Refreshing.
You are the one who asked for these opinions. You are only upset because they don’t match yours.
No.
Obviously.
This is not the guest’s problem, this is your problem. My answer would be completely different if your listing said “This home is up for sale, if it is sold before your stay we will cancel your stay with no recompense. Please book with this in mind.” That would have been honest and fair, but I suspect that is not what happened.
Yep. I’m done beating this horse. 
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Lol. Not upset. You’re the second person stating that. For the record, I am not upset.
When people decide to take the high moral ground when sharing an opinion, my job is to send them crashing. I have had to deal with religious folk all my life and this is similar. A few people on here have let me know I messed up but didn’t drag any faux morality into it. Dig? I am fine with people not agreeing with me darling. Absolutely.