Kitchen Use

[Nancie5]

I have been an Air Bnb Host for two years now & am a super host with a five-star rating.  We have a two-bedroom separate apartment and provide full use of with cooking options for anyone staying a week or longer; otherwise the kitchen use is limited to the frog, microwave & toaster with a Keurrig for coffee.  Overtime I have a guest staying longer than a week who cooks in our kitchen, my place is always left in very dirty condition, requiring scrubbing, degreasing, bleaching and sometimes even cleaning the walls.  I am thinking of removing our stove completely and just leaving the kitchen available with no cooking privileges.  Thoughts on how that might affect reservations/income?  and should I lower my rate?

[Roberta2]

Hi @Nancie5 

As long as you make very clear in your list that you only have a fridge, microwave and toaster.. saying that, pizza is one of the most common "traveler" foods, so the lack of oven would put some guests off.

If a person is booking for over a week, and come with friends, or specially family, they will expect a kitchen.

It will limit your appeal, for sure. 

Most people book airbnb because of the cooking and the washing facilities, specially longer term (at least that is my experience in London)

[Anonymous]

@Nancie5   Full kitchen use tends to be more important for guests in Entire Home properties than in shared homes. You have a nice kitchen, which looks like an inviting place to cook. With only a microwave, toaster, and....(frog??), your home might lose a lot of its appeal to families and guests staying more than a couple of nights. From the guest perspective, lowering the rates might not be enough to offset the extra costs of having to eat out all the time. 

I notice that your House Rules don't appear to specify any instructions for cleaning, so I wonder if you might get better results by making kitchen use conditional upon agreeing to a cleaning checklist, and backing that up with in-person checkout.  

[Sarah977]

@Nancie5  My guests have full use of the kitchen, not dependent upon the length of their stay. Some of my guests make use of it, and some don't. Many guests have booked specifically because they look for a place with kitchens.

All of my guests have cleaned up after themselves. The worst I've experienced is just some who aren't very attentive dishwashers and I might have to rewash their dishes, which doesn't really fuss me, as it happens seldom.

Of course it's up to you whether or not to allow guests to use your kitchen, but I'd first try what @Anonymous suggested- make a clear checklist of what you expect guests to do re clean-up (it may seem like common sense to us, but sometimes you have to spell out the most obvious things to guests) and also state in your listing that failure to comply with thorough kitchen clean-up will result in loss of kitchen privileges.