I think my account is blocked as I have had no requests, and I am a superhost. What to do?

[Cathy224]

I am a Superhost with a great property on a popular island. Last year at this time I was fully booked for the summer season. This year I have not had a request since January, when I had to turn down three requests in a row for good reasons. First, a guest had a pet,  although my site says no pets. Second, the person was arriving the same day the last guest was leaving and I had no turn around time to clean. I had an extra day blocked for this on my site but it was somehow removed and thus caused this problem. The third person didn't answer my question about how many guests were coming.  House sleeps six, but he said he was just one person, which seemed odd. As there is a small charge to cover extra linens and cleaning for more than four guests, I wanted clarification. I rejected his request as he did not answer within the 24 hours airbnb gives the host to decide. Never heard from him, or airbnb, but I have not had a request since. That was months ago! And my island is rumored to have record visitors this year. 

Any advice would be aprreciated.

[Coln0]

You don't really need to press the "reject" button to turn down a guest.

[Cathy224]

So what do you do? Airbnb presses you to respond within 24 hours...Either accept or reject. In all cases, I tried to come to some agreement with the guest, but the time window was too small.

[Matthew285]

@Cathy224 I don't know if the rejections have caused your listing to fall very far in the search rankings.

When I look in your area, I found your at #48 of 174 listings, which is not low.

When searching for all places with 5 or more beds in a much wider area, yours was #81 of 194.

Have a lot of new listings appeared in your area?

[Cathy224]

Hi Matthew,

Thanks for taking the time to do that search. 

Yes, there are loads of new listings. The government has changed the law, no longer requiring a licence, making it much easier to rent out property. Our property is probably high end, as it is large, private, fabulous views, near beaches, has a private pool. Maybe visitors are going for less expensive rentals. Still, it was quite weird that we had seven inquiries within two months, and then not one since January. We can't get our acceptance rating up if we don't have an inquiry. Have to say, being a "Superhost" has not seemed to help me at all. 

[Matthew285]

@Cathy224 (don't forget to tag people with the '@' so they know you sent a reply... I only saw your reply by accident).

If they changed the law to make it easier to host a listing, then it makes a lot of sense that it is now much harder to be seen. Also, having a lot of new hosts tends to cause prices to drop, which is bad for everyone.

Maybe you can look at the other nearby listings and see if they are busy, and what they may have changed their pricing to. A competitive price always helps make your listing more attractive to guests.

[Cathy224]

I am a bit of a dinosaur and don't know how to do this @Matthew285 thing. Well, actually maybe I just learned. So, thanks for that too.

About lowering our prices, similar properties are already asking for much more than we do. In fact, for the last couple of years. But they use different platforms. I liked airbnb cause I though they were so user friendly. Not so sure now.

[Matthew285]

@Cathy224 you don't actually have to lower your prices overall to have your listing appear with a very competitive price.

I use an automated pricing service, and one of the options it has is to lower the price for vacancies that that coming up soon (for example, a solo night that is just 4-5 days away.) And when a guest searches *without dates*, the lowest upcoming price is shown as the price for your listing.

For example, if your normal price is $250 / night, but there is an upcoming vacancy that is priced at $119 / night (just for a few nights), a guest searching without dates will see your listing as costing "from $119 per night". And your listing will be positioned in the search ranks as if that were your basic price.

Like many hosts, I do not like to compete on price; it attracts the wrong kind of guest and (of course) makes less money. But when your listing needs attention, putting a few nights "on sale" can really help.

[Cathy224]

@Matthew285 Now that sounds like a cool, little trick. I have to digest it, but I think I get it. As we are not renting in April, I will wait a bit and give it a go a bit later, if I still have vacancies. Hopefully, I won't.

Another consideration for me in lowering prices is that I do not want  guests who have already booked at a higher price to feel like they made a mistake in not waiting to book and get a last minute bargain. But putting just a few days with a bargain price might be a good solution.

Still, I think airbnb should be friendlier to hosts. They did not notify me of a change in my standing. There was no warning that this could happen. Nothing. How many requests can you reject without a mystery penalty being applied? I am guessing this is what has happened. And also, there is no way to explain or arbitrate. Instead we seem to be at the mercy of algorithms... and knowing clever tricks to outsmart them.

But you Matthew, I thank. 🌻

[Matthew285]

@Cathy224 you are clearly a very thoughtful and considerate person to be thinking of the existing guests and how they might feel about seeing a lower price!

If someone asks / complains about that, let them know that they paid your *normal* price and (because they booked early) got to pick and choose their travel dates with full freedom.

Travel pricing often includes last minute discounts, but there are costs associated with arranging things last minute: could they get a flight at the last minute? How much would last minute airline tickets cost, even if they were available? Could they get time off from work without much warning?

The reason rooms booked early might cost more is simple: they are worth more.

Personal story: I happened to have some leftover nights at a very nice timeshare in Manhattan that I had forgotten about. They were about to expire. I offered them to everyone I knew (relatives, friends, relatives of friends, friends of relatives) for FREE. 

No takers. No one could arrange travel at such a late date.

Imagine: a room that normally costs $400/night had no takers at $0 because of the last-minute nature of the travel.

Rooms booked early are just worth more.

[Cathy224]

@Matthew285 Wow. That is a sort of sad story. Live and learn. You make me feel a tad better about this. I will follow your tip if dates are still free closer to the time. 👍🎈

[Cathy224]

So, I have followed several of your tips. Still, no booking inquiries. And now, after I finished  booking  a small vacation for my self with airbnb I  see our prices are, in fact, ridiculously low. So, this can not be the problem. We had loads of inquiries until I rejected a few, for good reasons, and then blocked a high. Season week formy own family who are coming for a visit from abroad. What is happening? All I can think is that my listings algorithm has crashed, maybe because I blocked the high season week. This is crazy. I need to be able to use my own house for my own family and still rent out other weeks.

Any more thoughts? How does a host ("superhost") make an inquiry with Airbnb? This is not a host-friendly platform.

[Matthew285]

@Cathy224 I just searched for your place and it was on the first page when I moved the map to your area. It also noted that if I booked the price was reduced for the dates I chose.

I am hoping it will just be a matter of time before people re-discover your lovely place; having people click on your listing helps boost you even further, so let's hope for a virtuous cycle to happen.

[Cathy224]

Hey Matthew,

that was so sweet. Gave me a warm smile. Thanks. 🌻

[Sarah977]

@Cathy224   It is considerate that you don't want any guests to feel they got shafted because they see you are offering a lower price for days you want to fill, but you could think of it this way- if you book a flight, say 2 months in advance, you will pay a certain price. If the airline finds that that flight is not fully booked within a few days of its departure, they may drop the price significantly to fill those seats. We trade the security of knowing that we have a confirmed reservation for that date, for the possibilty that the flight will be fully booked if we wait until the last minute to see if the price goes down.

I actually keep my price the same regardless, whether it is a holiday, long weekend, tourist season, etc. This is because my place is priced as budget-friendly as I can make it and still have it be worth my while to host, nor do I rely on bookings as my sole source of income- it's just an aside for me, and if it's not fully booked, I really don't care- gives me time to do any needed repairs, deep-cleaning, or just enjoy having the place to myself. But of course, this is just me, other hosts run their listings completely differently and wish to be as fully booked as possible and be able to charge more for peak times.