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I was having a browse through what’s available locally on Airbnb. Looks to be a lot of new listings here, some quite smart, others less so. While I was doing that, I noticed quite a few older listings were in the low 4.somethings. Then I found this one
Anyone got any lower than 3.83 that can still get booked?
I’m not going to post details of the listing in public, but it just looks like a clean and fresh apartment, albeit in a bit of a shitty area. The reviews are all quite old so maybe they’ve done a refurb.
When I was hunting around for a room in Kirkland, WA for Thanksgiving, I saw one room w/shared bath listing in Kirkland or Redmond with a 3.2 rating and very low priced for the Seattle area, $23/night. From the guest comments, it appeared to be sort of a rooming house for temp programmers. It’s not listed any more.
I’m at the Jersey Shore and it’s very competitive so most hosts try to maintain a 4.8 to 5.00 and are superhosts. However, there is one listing that has a 4.5 and when I looked at her reviews, they were all from last summer and her calendar for this summer is pretty much open. Although Airbnb has not kicked her off the platform, guests are slimply passing her up and booking elsewhere. Her house is really nice but she had a few 4 stars for cleanliness and since she is fairly new, her rating dropped quickly.
What I noticed is all the individual ratings are 4+ but overall is 3+ so this listing must be getting some 3 stars overall. Maybe the host is a complete jerk.
To answer the question I’m sure I’ve seen 3 somethings but I couldn’t tell you when and where.
The problem with this listing is that it marketed as a “lake house” with “XXX feet” (triple digits) of lake shore in the title and lots of lakewater views in the pics. It’s on a seasonal lake, i.e. for much of the year of the year there is only about 2’ of water in that lake.
This could have been all 5 stars if it had been marketed honestly.
This one has the longest history of low reviews in our set.
Wow. What happened here, guys? This listing is about the same age as mine. Last time I looked closely at this one they had 5 stars. They have more reviews and also higher rates now than last summer.
The lowest ones in the set are 2 or 3 that are rated same as the first one, 4.17 but they each just have one 4-star and not enough 5-stars yet to bring up the average. Been there.
I tried to take a quick peek at listings in my area but after scrolling through all those listing for entire place at sub $40 a night and with ratings above 4.7 I got depressed and logged off. Once I reopen I can’t imagine I won’t have to lower my price to get booked. No point in thinking about it now since things could be dramatically changed in 6 weeks.
Prices are very low there, though. I knew that but was just looking and even the whole house deals there are crazy low. But as you have noted, “Get in the car, kids, we’re going on vacation in El P” said nobody, ever.
Pre-covid I would see some of the really outstanding deals had two night minimums or relatively high cleaning fees. So I hope I can still get my bread and butter guest: the pit stop on the way to somewhere else one night guest. Hopefully competitive advantages like being close to the freeway and having same day and late day availability will make my net large enough to catch a few.
You’ve got the perfect setup for your market. If that Motel 6 in Van Horn is still in business, I am confident you can still get your old rates. Your private hotel room setup is way better than anything I ever stayed in on that pitstop.
I looked at several listings with multiple reviews here in May. Like I said, I just stopped rather than gnash my teeth. Gotta look forward, not back. (she said to herself again)
Luxeries If you know you aren’t a great speller, it’s a good idea to put everything through spell check or at least the title. First impressions and all.
In the light of the rating, my hunch is that this is a host who lacks attention to detail.
I’ve seen more than one listing with a high correlation coefficient between misspellings on the listing and low ratings. One of the funniest was “unsuitable bathroom” when they meant “ensuite bathroom.”
I’ve never been an Airbnb guest, but I would be turned off by bad spelling and grammar. It indicates either laziness or ignorance to me. Not everyone is a good speller, and even spell check doesn’t help if you don’t know which word is correct in the context- i.e. there, their and they’re. But if I knew I was a bad speller, or not totally fluent in the language I was writing in, I’d make sure to get someone who was a good speller to check it over before I posted it.
If you know you aren’t a great speller, it’s a good idea to put everything through spell check or at least the title. First impressions and all.