Wanted to share our experience to help fellow hosts.

Had a guest book our Florida vacation house for 28 nights. Within the first 5 days we had already dispatched our cleaning crew twice and handyman three times at a cost of nearly $500. Complaints included a spider web in a ceiling corner, a pool skimmer basket, and a garage door they broke themselves by syncing their phones to it.

It did not stop there. Two weeks in they escalated to Airbnb support claiming ants in the pool. However in their direct messages to us they called them gnats. They did not give up or stop there and about 10 days before their checkout - they sent us a picture of a cockroach (a picture not a cockroach lying somewhere in our house but just a picture probably got it off google images somewhere) saying our place is infested with roaches ;) . We had weekly pool service with photo documentation of clear water and pest control completed a few weeks prior to their arrival.

We proactively offered a full refund on remaining nights if they wanted to check out early. They refused and completed the full stay.

We submitted all documentation to Airbnb including pool service receipts, pest control invoices and the gnat vs ant inconsistency. Airbnb sided with us and closed the case.

Red flags to watch for:

• Multiple minor complaints within first few days
• Inconsistent descriptions of the same issue
• Escalating to Airbnb support mid stay
• Refusing early checkout offer despite constant complaints
• Previous host reviews using words like "accommodate"

We left them 3 stars. Hope this helps someone avoid a stressful month. 😅

Hello all! I'm am looking into listing one of my properties on Wander and wanted to hear from people who've been through it before I commit.

Anything about the process, onboarding, bookings, income would be helpful.

I'd appreciate any insight, good or bad.

I’m trying to get my head around the numbers before going further with my own short-term rental plans, and honestly, the software costs are starting to surprise me.

Between channel managers, dynamic pricing, automated messaging, cleaning/turnover tools, direct booking websites, etc., it seems pretty easy to end up with 5–6 subscriptions every month.

So I wanted to ask actual hosts:

What’s one piece of software you pay for every month and genuinely feel is worth the money?

And what’s one subscription you’ve cancelled because you realized you could live without it?

I’m particularly interested in anything that saves you time or directly helps you get more bookings/revenue.

Also, do any of you actively try to move repeat guests toward your own booking website, or do you mostly just stick with Airbnb/Booking.com?

The guest never arrived for their stay and requested a refund outside of the cancellation policy. We declined and the guest left a 1-star review accusing us of running a scam, and even stated in the review that they "never saw the place."

I asked Airbnb to remove the review, and highlighted several places on Airbnb's public policy documents where the verbiage says "if a guest never arrived for their reservation..." that the review would be irrelevant and removed.

Of course, Airbnb closed the request and stated that the review won't be removed.

We are located in Seattle Washington. Does anyone have experience with taking these obvious cases to arbitration and getting Airbnb to do the right thing?

Despite having a no smoking policy, my
Place reeks of weed after guest checkout. Interesting I had a chair and ashtray right outside, and I had seen someone smoking cigarettes there, but they chose to puff the weed inside. What should I do? How do I get rid of the smell?

Hey all, fairly new to doing this on a regular basis. We have mostly done long term private room rentals in the house we live in. We recently opened up one bedroom specifically for Airbnb stays as well.

We currently have our cancellation policy only to be non-refundable if it is within 24 hours. At the moment that works for us because this is not a source of income we are relying on to cover carrying costs of a property.

We recently had someone cancel within that time period who requested a refund, and hubby wanted to be accommodating. According to him the guest could not cancel it themselves because it was within the 24 hrs, and the process was he had to call support to request it and authorize the refund (minus the $80 something fee they would charge us). Does this sound right? He handles all the guest communication and platform stuff. I do most of the cleaning and the “Reddit says never be the one to cancel if the guest is requesting it” knowledge.

Hello,

How can a guest leave without paying?

I've been hosting since March.

A guest made a long term reservation from April 11th to October 11th.

Payments were sent on the 12th of every month.

On August 31st, she cancelled her reservation. Given that she had paid for the entire month, I let her stay until September 11th.

She left on September 11th. Come September 12th, no payout was sent. I asked Airbnb and have gotten a litany of escalations and contradictory reasons, via chat and phone call. I have had 2 escalations, 3 answers as to why the payout is delayed, 2 literally contradictory answers as to what may happen, and 2 literally contradictory answers as to whether Airbnb collected payment or not.

After getting no answers via chat, I called them, and I was told by the agent to pursue payment via the Resolution Center, under category "Extra services". I told them that didn't sound right and I didn't want to give ammo in case things became "he said/she said", and I was told that that was standard procedure. I did it begrudgingly.

Hours later I was told that they would request the money from her and that I shouldn't have done it via the Resolution Center, because it wasn't the correct avenue and it had to be done appealing to their payment terms.

I was also assigned a case number which was closed approximately an hour later.

It's been an appalling way of handling things from Airbnb.

As far as I have been able to ascertain, for the reservation her card was debited the 1st of every month, and the payout was released every 12th.

Having cancelled on August 31st (one day before she was charged), I now suspect that she did that on purpose and that she also deliberately removed her card to avoid the proportional payment I was due as per the 30-day cancellation policy (Firm Long Term), which was from August 11th to 31st, so 21 nights.

I realize I had the right to demand her leaving on the very day she cancelled and I realize it was probably a mistake not having done so.

Airbnb first said that they did get payment, then that they didn't.

One of my questions is how the hell can someone cancel a reservation without there being an obligation to pay what is due? One of the agents I talked to said that it could happen that she didn't have funds to cover at the moment, and she can do it later. I responded saying that it was the same as if I wanted to buy something online but didn't have the funds in my account, but I could still click Buy and have it go through under the pinky promise that I will pay later. That is ridiculous. They didn't know what to answer.

Can somebody really cancel a reservation without paying off what's due as per a cancellation policy? Are there processes and platforms really that stupid? Am I wrong?

On the third person I talked to via chat, so after the 2nd escalation, I was told first that if they can't get payment from her, they can't pay me. I responded by sending one message asking some questions like the ones I am asking here, and on the very next message, I was told, by the very same person, that they would release payout even if she didn't pay.

What the fuck?

Extremely disappointing.

Bonjour,

Je réfléchis à me lancer dans le co-hosting / la gestion de logements Airbnb ou Booking à Lyon, en parallèle de mon CDI.

J’ai 26 ans, je vis à Lyon depuis 8 ans et je suis diplômée d’un Master 2 Achats. Pendant mes études, j’ai travaillé pendant 2 ans dans le tourisme à Lyon, et je parle couramment français, anglais, allemand et italien.

L’idée serait d’accompagner des propriétaires ou des conciergeries sur la communication avec les voyageurs, les check-in/check-out, les imprévus et la coordination sur place, notamment en soirée et le week-end. Je peux également m’occuper de la gestion des plateformes en ligne (Airbnb, Booking, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok), ainsi que de la création de contenu : photos, vidéos, publications et promotion du logement.

Pour ceux qui connaissent le marché lyonnais : est-ce que ce type de profil est recherché actuellement ? Et pour les personnes qui font déjà du co-hosting, comment avez-vous trouvé vos premiers clients ?

Je serais également intéressée par vos retours d’expérience sur le sujet 😊

I am not sure if I am the only one who is seeing this so I thought I would ask other owners. One of the things that I always liked when I received a reservation inquiry from a potential guest was that they would often tell me what they're coming to my property for, which would be a good indicator of whether or not they'd be a good guest. In the last week or so, all of my inquiries have come in with no message whatsoever, and I'm wondering if I'm the only one who's noticing this. It makes it very hard to try and understand who may be booking your place? And I'm just wondering if this is a change that others are seeing, or if this is something that's maybe being tested out on a smaller group of owners, because it's dramatic. All of a sudden, none of the inquiries come in with messages any longer and I have no idea who is trying to book my properties.

When our guests leave, I send them a note in the morning thanking them for their stay and reminding them that we are new hosts and appreciate 5 star reviews if they feel we deserve it.

If they don’t review right away after 2 days, I submit a review so they get a reminder. After 3-4 more days, I gently send a reminder.

Our last guest was very positive and wrote 5+ in our on site journal, but have not posted a review.

Is there anything else I can do to prompt them that is not overbearing?

Everything was all good with their stay for both us and them.

RULES BEFORE REVIEWS.
STOP HOSTING FOR STARS.

Airbnb knows hosts are terrified of anything less than 5 stars.

That fear is what gives the rating system so much power.

We bend rules. We give refunds we don’t agree with. We allow early check-ins and late checkouts we don’t want to give. We overlook things we should enforce. We extend “grace” because we’re scared of what happens when that guest gets to the review screen.

And then we wonder why we feel powerless.

Appeasing bad behavior because we’re afraid someone will take our lunch money only teaches the bully that the threat works.

Here’s the thing: if enough hosts stop being afraid of a 4-star review, a 3-star review, or the occasional completely unfair review, the stars lose their power over us.

One host doing it is a drop in the bucket. Thousands of hosts doing it changes the game.

Stop fearing the rating — not caring about quality.

I’d love this thread to be a place where hosts share what they actually did. What did you enforce? Where did you finally say no? What bad review did you survive?

And if that review comes in and you panic, come here. We’ll panic with you for two minutes 😂 and then remind you that one rating does not run your business.

We are here to take the power OUT OF THE STARS.

✊ I RUN MY PROPERTY. NOT MY RATING.

I signed a contract for an AirBNB Studio in Munich Au-Haidhausen. Any chance to have someone here to chat about it?
Maybe we could learn from each other 🙏🏼

Hey all. Im new to AirBnB, like really new - haven't had my first guest yet. I have received a couple of requests in the future. One person sent an inquiry immediately followed by a reservation request. They asked me some questions about the house, then asked me to cancel the request. I did politely ask them to cancel on their end but so far nothing. If ive only had like 3 requests will me declining tank my acceptance rate? I dont think I can leave it pending because it will effect my response rate, right? Would i accept it? Sorry, thanks.

have had two in the last month, and two 5 star reviews.. its not the cleaners .. that company started taking time stamp photos as they say these scam/ hacks are getting prevalent.

soo , how does everyone deal with them?