Rental agreement

[Vivian1468]

Is it necessary to have guest sign a rental agreement that explains the house rules?  If so, is there a form that guest need to sign prior to booking, at booking, or once they arrive?  I'm hoping that by signing an agreement guest will be more likely to read through the rules and follow them.  Thanks!

[Joan2709 · Accepted solution]

@Vivian1468 

I should have made my post a bit clearer. @Debra300 is correct in that you can require a guest to sign a separate rental agreement if they book through Airbnb, but Airbnb does not allow you to upload that agreement on the platform like Vrbo does: 

Vrbo Rental Agreement

https://help.vrbo.com/articles/How-to-upload-my-rental-agreement

Upload your rental agreement

Rental agreements are optional documents you can add to your listing to expand on your house rules and set expectations with guests.

Requirements:

• If you use a rental agreement, make sure it doesn't conflict with your house rules.
• If you have more than one listing, you should have a unique rental agreement for each property. 
• Your rental agreement must be in PDF format. 

You can always include the rental agreement language under Addl House Rules, but that does get a bit lengthy. Some Hosts on Airbnb email a rental agreement to the guest. 

[Vivian1468]

Thanks Joan2709,  I will look into adding an agreement and sending it to guest as an email.  My goal was to provide the information ahead of booking so that both host and guest don't waste time trying to secure a booking.  So I  added a list of what they would be agreeing to in "Other things to note" under the section "About this place".   I want guest to consider booking only if they can follow these conditions.  I repeated the same agreement list under "house rules".  Appreciate your detailed comment.

[Debra300]

@Vivian1468,

You should think about the logistics and benefits for requiring rental agreements for short-term stays.  Since you have Instant Book enabled that means a guest can make a reservation without leaving enough time to receive, review and respond to the rental agreement before they are scheduled to check-in.  You would have to disable IB to ensure that a guest signs the agreement as part of the pre-booking vetting process.  Also, what are you going to do if a guest doesn't respond to rental agreement message?  Are you willing to cancel their reservation or decline their booking request?  As a host, you don't have many opportunities for penalty-free cancellations, and I don't think failure to sign a rental agreement would qualify: https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/990. 

Lastly, what extra protections does a signed rental agreement provide you?   If the guest breaks a house rule, the rental agreement doesn't increase the likelihood that Airbnb will side with you.  The company is notorious for favoring guests in contiguous situations with hosts, and not interacting or consulting with the host before taking action.  In our situation, we want protection against long-term stay guest trying to claim tenant's rights.

[Vivian1468]

Hello Debra,

Thank you for your detailed explanation.  You had me concerned that my instant book was "on" however after checking, it has always been "off".  If it's off, is there still a penalty if I decline to book them?  How are you able to see what I have selected or was that a general assumption?  So, I gather you  think it's worth the effort to require a signed agreement if the bookings are for long term stay vs. short term.  Is that the general consensus among other airbnb hosts? 

I would like to have guests read the listing and only consider booking if they can follow the house rules, which are mentioned twice in different sections of my listing.  Therefore I selected instant book "Off".  Can I message potential renters that inquire about the booking process (since its off) at that time and ask them to read the house rules and determine if I want to allow the booking?  Would there be a penalty if we never made it completing the booking?  Perhaps I still need to better understand the whole booking process. 

Appreciate your responses.  Cheers.

[Debra300]

@Vivian1468.

Here's a tip, be sure to type "@" in front of another member's ID name so they are notified when you are speaking to them.  When you do this the IDs of the recent thread contributors will appear and you can select whomever you want to tag.  You can also type someone's ID if you want to bring someone into the thread.

First, you should bookmark and become very familiar with the Airbnb Help Center: https://www.airbnb.com/help.  It's written in easy to read language.  Hosts share great information about their experiences and knowledge about hosting on Airbnb, but you should always reference the official policies and processes for yourself, because you are ultimately responsible for knowing this information.  I recommend that you do a search for booking process and received 63 search results.

I must have been looking at another listing when I mentioned that yours has IB enabled.  A person can see your booking preferences only after they click the Reserve button and on the next page it will say Request to book or Confirm and pay.

As a new host, I think it is better to disable IB and take an opportunity to vet potential guests.  I believe your initial response to an inquiry or booking request should ask guests to confirm that they've read all of the listing details and house rules and will agree to abide by them.  It's been my experience that guests say that they've read everything and agree to the house rules, and soon realize after further communication that they hadn't read much of anything.  However, I also believe that requiring short-term guests to sign a rental agreement will likely push them to book elsewhere that is less onerous to book, and there is a large selection available.   Rental agreements are meant to provide protections that a host can have enforced by the judicial system and Airbnb is legally unable to apply penalties for the rules violation.  

There is no penalty for declining booking requests other than potential decreased earnings and lowered standings in search results due to lack of booking activity.

I did look at your listing and think that a more accurate listing category would be entire guest suite instead of private room.  This change will also better support the price you're charging because there are quite a number of listings that offer entire standalone cabins for a rate comparable to yours.

[Vivian1468]

@Debra300.  Thanks for the tip, I was wondering about the @symbol. 

I originally hesitated to label it as entire place because I don't really agree that you're renting the entire place.  In my definition that would include the top level where I am staying.  Also that category mentions no shared spaces however there is a shared laundry room on the lower level.  I didn't want to get disgruntled guest leaving a bad review because they didn't read the full listing explaining in detail the layout and spaces to access.  I would rather they be surprised to realize it is an entire guest suite. I plan to open up the entire cabin with the top floor at a later time once I determine that the lower guest suite is successful.  I do agree that the price is more in line with an entire guest suite and I may decide to offer a discount at some point to get some reviews.  I really appreciate your detailed information and providing me with the links to learn more about the process.  Thank you, cheers.