Reviews

[Elisabeth40]

Over the past 6 years of hosting I mentioned a pattern and would love to hear your opinion on it.

My long airbnb hosting journey showed me, that the majority of the guests who use airbnb for the first time, are very angry people and demanding.

Most of them have no feeling for the value of things. I asked myself why? And I finally came to a personal conclusion that this problem is a lack of experience with using airbnb. Out of my observation I see that the first time users lack on empathy and have an imagination about how they want you and your home to be.  There is a lack of tolerance and acceptance. I feel like the guest needs time to understand the concept of airbnb and accept indifferences and learn to value the nice opportunities. Till now I never declined on guests, who don't have reviews, who never used airbnb before, but today I think, I am scared of people who come off, as they would know it better, how you need to be. 

I would love to open a petition  to restrict new guests, who have no experience in airbnb to be able to give hosts reviews for the first 5 bookings at different places. Because I am tired to give people chances and be demolished by they lack of understanding and their aggressive entitlement. I feel like a guests who wants to profit from this community and the value must gain/ learn certain understanding and feeling before they get weaponized with reviews. I do think I am an experienced host, but I am more and more scared to host guests who never attended any airbnb places before, because I do not want to risk my value to someone who lacks respect towards all my work and my personal experience. Hosting is more as just giving your guest a place to stay. I am very accurate in what I sell people here, I do get upset about people who cannot read listing description and house rules and dictate and judge me how my personal space and my persona needs to be. I am definitely tired of people who do not have understanding for values and effort. I also think it's wrong to give reviews on the first place you ever used in your life through airbnb, if you as a guest have no comparison at all.  

[Elisabeth40]

I actually was never super host, I do even believe, there are so many places here which are way better than mine and deserve more to hold the super host status. @Gary-And-Rose0 I must admit, it is intriguing to achieve a status of a super host, but it makes you at the same time sick to hold it. I do wish to be perfect but I think I am not. For me personally it's even easier not to be a super host, because tourists do not expect new york be dirty with rats and without escalators and they expect a super host having a new york tv style. Just when you live here, you understand that this is only possible in new york, when you earn 25K per month. You need to pay a certain amount of money to live and own a certain place which attracts certain type of people. Unfortunately it's a question of money.  

[Dave52]

@Gary-And-Rose0  I agree with you and had a chuckle at your post.  "It says no pets we have a very nice dog." 

I get this ALL the time.  Then they ask, will you make an exception for me and my nice dog?

Of course, everybody's dog is "very nice" right?  

Who would ever think to call a hotel with a No Pets policy and ask for an exception?  Nobody.

Don't make things personal is my advice.  When I get this question, my reply is 'unfortunately the listing has a No Pets policy'.

[Elisabeth40]

Thank you all for your recommendations, I stopped using insta book now and will screen my guests. 

@Anonymous I am not a victim here, I am more upset and deeply sad that it doesn't works out to embrace everyone. The real victims are the young people, I wish it could work out.

[Fred13]

   Interesting. In 6 years I never considered 'Airbnb guests' (whether first timers or not), to be a different  'breed' than anyone else; nor have I ever expected my guests to already have gotten some nebulous  'Airbnb concept' on how to be.  

   We are hosts trying to cater to people that hopefully are a good match to our very-different individual places and rules. A very simple goal. The less we interject our personal 'trip' into the whole affair the smoother and less complicated it will all be. 

[Mark116]

@Elisabeth40   I see a huge difference in first time guests pre covid and post.  For most of the time we've hosted I have found first time guests are often great, sometimes mediocre, but more consistently bad guests have been the heavy repeat users of airbnb. 

Post covid, most guests have been poor and first time guests much, much, much worse than in the past.  LOL, I don't think this perspective is too helpful, but I believe that the type of people who are traveling now is a different kind of traveler than before the pandemic hit, for the most part, at least to our area, others are still having excellent experiences w/guests.

[Ann72]

@Mark116  You've gotten me wondering if people who are traveling to certain locations now are just...less responsible people in general?  Not concerned about how their actions impact the larger community?  So many hosts have said what you say, and since the common factor is the pandemic, I'm thinking that the other common factor is the way people behave in response to the pandemic.  

[Blake159]

We received a 4 star review today because we’re ‘not absolute beachfront’. Our listing shows and says that... So I questioned airbnb about whether it’s fair for a guest to give you 4 stars based on something they knew full well when they booked. Apparently it’s fine. The only other 4 star review we’ve received was because we didn’t provide enough tea bags... We don’t even state on our listing that we provide any food or drinks! So frustrating. They could at least leave a 4 star rating for ‘location’ or ‘value’ but give 5 overall. Airbnb aren’t listening and don’t care how unfair this is to hosts, so I’m listing on Booking.com also and will steer guests there from our social media sites. 

[Anonymous]

@Blake159  May this be the greatest of your worries!

Seriously, I'm no fan of star ratings in general, but it wouldn't be realistic for any business to expect 100% of their customers to rate them perfectly. No matter what platform you list on, you're going to get your share of critics - all you can do is take the unreasonable complaints with a grain of salt and keep an open mind to the constructive feedback. A flawless rating score is an anomaly, not an entitlement.

But what I do find really unfair is the way Airbnb presents a 4-star review to hosts as an abject failure. Nobody should be feeling bad about getting a positive review for a successful stay, and the goal of hospitality is not to accumulate stars. Leave that to the astronomers.

[Blake159]

I completely agree. It is a first world problem! But I do work really hard and I think airbnb are unfair. They told me that '4 stars is still a good review' but we all know it's not, due to how they present it. There are platforms that are much fairer in this respect. That's all I'm saying...

[Catherine2412]

I totally understand.  I am a new host and have only had about 10 or so guests so far, but I am learning what you are saying fast.  I am uncomfortable already renting to folks who have no AirBnB reviews, and you are right, they seem surprised and put out that I would dare to suggest such a thing!  They ask me what they can do?  That is difficult because if they try to give me other references in lieu of AirBnB reviews, the phone number of email they give me is hidden by AirBnB.  I would like to have a standard requirement for folks who do not have any reviews yet, but I don't know what that would be or how to obtain that information.  I have been asking for 2 alternative character references, but how do they get them to me, plus, of course, they are in a hurry to book!!

[Brian2036]

@Elisabeth40 @Anonymous @Dk2 

What has not been mentioned here is that guests without reviews may not be first-timers at all.

They may have been horrible guests who found it necessary to open new accounts to get rid of the reviews that reflect negatively on them.

These are definitely people on my DECLINE list.

[Sarah977]

@Brian2036  They may also be guests who have had Airbnb stays before but their hosts didn't bother to leave a review, and they are actually great guests. A host has no way of knowing why a guest whose profile shows they have been a user for awhile, has no reviews unless you ask, and the guest gives an honest answer.