Guests who work from home

[Michelle2145]

Hello,

I just had my first guest after COVID, and my first guest works from home.  He booked a room for 2 weeks, my maximum, and told me when he arrived that that he would be working from home.  It is very hot in my area and air conditioning is required, and he never leaves the room.  I'm going to look at the bills after leaves, but I imagine it will be hefty since he is in there 24 hours a day (he has his meals delivered).  I wondered how others handle working from home, or if it is possible.  He also found a hole in the system in that he booked an additional 2 weeks in a new booking, which escaped the 2-week limit.  I'm talking to Airbnb about this now as I think they should have alerted me to see if I wanted to extend his stay past my maximum.  I definitely would have because the guy is a great guest, but I would have increased the rate slightly.   

This was not an issue for me pre-COVID because most of my guests were here on vacation and the few that were here for work went out to work during the day, the peak hours for electricity.  Now, everyone, including me, is working from home.

Thanks for any tips, Michelle

[Huma0]

I am wondering if it's a good idea to remove the 'dedicated workspace' from the amenities list? The occasional digital nomad/working from home guest is fine, but it's becoming so common now that I've had long periods of time over the past year when I feel like my house is being turned into an office with multiple guests here all day.

There is a desk and chair in every guest room, but some guests will take over a communal area as their office without asking if that's okay. Some will decide to camp out where I am working (I work mostly from home), sitting opposite me, which I find extremely distracting, so I usually end up having to move. Then there are the increased utilities, increased mess that comes with people constantly being at home and eating their meals here, and just general wear and tear. 

Do I need to add something to my already long house rules about guests not using communal areas as workstations? I already turned off IB, but have often found that guests are not that clear about their plans/schedules when booking.

I hosted one digital nomad who told me that his company had an office here so he would partly be working from there, but he actually only 'visited' that office briefly two times in the month he stayed. He would spend hours at a time hanging round the kitchen and left it a total mess. Another told me she was coming to London for an internship, but then it turns out she was doing the internship mostly remotely so again, barely left the house. There was a couple who were working/studying from home and therefore needed two separate workspaces. One of them took over the living room (without asking) for ten hours a day and even rearranged the room for this purpose. Some will use the kitchen/diner for two hour Zoom meetings meaning no one else can use it. Then there was the student who had no classes...

I'm a bit over it, to be honest. 

[Michelle2145]

Hi Huma,   I am definitely removing the dedicated workspace from my amenities list, and am going to remove the table from the room.  As soon as this guy leaves, I'm taking new photos and think I'll eventually replace the work table with a chair or something.

I don't allow anyone to work in my common areas.  I also work at home, and am clear that they are to stay in their space.  I think it would benefit you to be clear about the same in your house rules.

The digital nomad who is here now is similar to the one you talked about.  When mine arrived, he told me that he would be going into the office twice a week & probably go home to San Diego on the weekends.  He went into the office one day and has not been back.  I mentioned that he could have saved some money and worked at home in San Diego (about 2 hours away from here).  He didn't say anything but extended his stay longer.  I took off the Instant Book feature and hope that future guests are honest, but I will not accept any more that work from home. 

Good luck with setting limits in your house!   

[Huma0]

@Michelle2145 

Yes, I am definitely going to have to give this some serious thought. Hosting long term guests means that I am much more likely to attract digital nomads and working from home types than with short stays. I don't want to be really rigid about it or alienate this market completely because some of them are totally fine and it's not like I am getting tonnes of bookings since the summer release, but I do need to set some clear boundaries in relation to it.

I recently had the first guest in forever who was here purely for tourism (for a month). It was fabulous, not only because she was out all day every day, but because she came home with a chirpy attitude and it was lovely to hear about her experience of my hometown and share tips with her. She left me a glowing review and I was sad to see her go. It reminded me what Airbnb used to be all about.

In contrast, I had two guests earlier this year (one digital nomad and one working from home for at least half the week) who were uptight, passive aggressive and looking to find fault. Maybe they were unhappy or stressed in their jobs, I don't know. I just felt like they had a very different set of expectations.

One complained that the WiFi in her room was weak (once). I went and tested it on two devices and it was showing as 5 bars, no problem streaming movies, no buffering etc. Not good enough for her needs though, apparently, so even though I could hear her constantly on her video calls, she wrote in her review that the WiFi didn't work properly.

The other was on NYC time, so didn't start work until 2pm. He would spend the time before that lurking in the kitchen but not wanting to talk to anyone else, as if that was his personal domain and he should not be disturbed, e.g. he would not sit at the table to eat if anyone else was sat there. I had to bring him up on cleanliness issues a few times because he left the kitchen surfaces and sink dirty, dishes unwashed for days, expired food stinking out the fridge and kept blocking the drain over and over. He marked me down for cleanliness.

The two of them did not just treat me like an Airbnb host, with all the expectations that come with that, but they treated me as an office manager and daily cleaner too. It was exhausting and so not worth it as they left low ratings and I lost Superhost status for the first time in 5.5 years. That is exactly the kind of guest I want to avoid.

[Evamaria11]

i just made an unpleasant first digital nomad experience myselft. i wasn t aware of the problem being so common, thanks for sharing. i will take extra care now too - she left a very bad review - however fortunatly so bad it got deleted. the sense of entitlement was so annoying as well as long strange messages in  between. was a big relieve to see her go after three weeks she spent in her room mostly.

[Anonymous]

@Huma0   I'm wondering if people are even filtering their searches for the "dedicated workspace" amenity in the first place, or if it's now a standard assumption that every Airbnb rental doubles as a WeWork.

Before the pandemic, there was already quite a trend among neighborhood cafes to outright ban laptops - they killed the vibe, and their users hardly bought anything anyway. I've also stayed in some lodges and retreats with "screen free" policies in their communal areas. As heavy-handed as it sounds, once people come to grips with not being able to stare at their phones all the time, they really appreciate how much it improves the social atmosphere.

I think if I were managing a multi-room lodge, No Screens would be my only strict rule for the common areas. Play loud music, dance around naked, have a ketamine brunch if you wanna, but those laptops and phones are absolutely forbidden.

[Huma0]

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@Anonymous wrote:

@Huma0   I'm wondering if people are even filtering their searches for the "dedicated workspace" amenity in the first place, or if it's now a standard assumption that every Airbnb rental doubles as a WeWork.

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I think you have a point there. Even before 'dedicated workspace' was showing up at the top of my highlights on all my listings(!!), I was attracting a lot of these kinds of guests. I think the difference is that before, people would ask questions about the work station set up and the WiFi, and now they just assume. They also assume they can use the communal areas for work, when in the past, they would ask if that was okay.

I tell guests to feel free to use the living area or roof terrace or whatever to 'relax' in. I do not tell them to set up their office there. I really did not want to have to add to my house rules (so long already), but it seems this is going to have to go in as well. Or, at least, I will need to make it clear to guests who enquire/request that communal spaces are exactly that, i..e shared, and are for relaxing and socialising. It's a bit tricky though as I work from home, and not from my bedroom, so it might seem like one rule for them and another for me.

[Huma0]

@Michelle2145 @Anonymous @Ted307 

I just realised that I had already included not using communal areas for work in my house rules after the guy who rearranged the living room as his office. 

I guess this is one of those cases of guests cherry picking which rules they will and won't follow because I know for sure that some of them have property read the rules. There is one guest who has particularly impressed me in this respect. He didn't have to be prompted for the Easter Egg question (rare), asked when he wanted a friend to stay over what the extra person fee was and how to pay it, and other things that very clearly indicated that he had both read and absorbed the house rules. Still, it didn't stop him doing his Zoom meetings in a communal space. 

So, yes, a different approach is warranted here. Next time I show a guest around, I'll mention that the living room is for relaxing and socialising, not for working.

[Ted307]

@Huma0 

Mentioning it personally during the check-in sounds like a good idea. I do have one sign, a cute one my daughter gave us, about things that do not get flushed down our toilet. Too many signs would spoil the atmosphere of "home" that we like. We want it to be like staying with your grandparents, we do not try to be something we are not. We are not a "designer" or an "OMG" category and we do not want any guests to even think we are, they will be disappointed.

I am not sure I would want to host people if we did not have a separate guest house. We have had a number of weekend guests who stayed inside all weekend, not going to any of the places people who come up here go. I suspect that the privacy is what makes it attractive to those couples.

[Huma0]

@Ted307 

Yes, I think that there is a lot to be said for mentioning certain 'rules' at check in, so you can present them in a friendly, positive way rather than a list of do's and don't's. I do a lot of that already, so could easily add in the mention of the work free zones. 

And I don't mind the occasional aesthetically pleasing sign! I just can't imagine one in my living room. It's not OMG by any means, but it's probably the grandest, most 'chic' room in the house. Maybe I can find or make a really nice blackboard to use in there.

There is actually a small desk with a chair in the corner (once upon a time I planned to work from there but never did), but I don't think that is what is causing the problem as (apart from one guest who asked in advance of booking if there was a space outside of the bedroom where she could work) no guests have ever used that desk. They camp out and work on the sofa and coffee table, moving my artfully arranged coffee table books, flowers and candlesticks and all the cushions!  They never, ever put anything back where it was and frequently leave their coffee cups etc on the table.

Now, I'm not saying that my house is a show home where nothing should be touched. It is absolutely not. But the living room is designed to be a living room, not an office! It's also a communal space, so I think it's a bit rude to move stuff around and not put it back. Yet, so many people do exactly that.

[Ted307]

@Huma0 

Your house is really nice, I would think it is disrespectful to leave used coffee cups anywhere in the photos of your place that I have seen. My coffee table is a cedar chest that already has some rings on it -- I just stained them and if people ask, I tell them it's vintage and wears the scars of 50 years use. No one has down graded our star reviews over it. I have the kitchen counter top the place came with in the kitchen, it is grey linoleum from the WWII era. Same old sink, too. I point it out, and tell people that is what their grand parents used. Some have mentioned the mix of the old & the new in reviews. I have new phone charging plugs and new outlets, lighting, paint, flooring, and shower. I just tried to keep things looking a lot like what I grew up with while having the things we all like about modern tech & plumbing!

[Huma0]

@Ted307 

The leaving coffee cups and other drinks and paraphernalia on the living room coffee table, throwing the cushions around etc. is quite specific to people using it as a 'workspace'. Mmm. 

Now, in my dining area, I have an old vintage table and chairs. They are what one might call seriously distressed, i.e very scuffed and roughed about and not something I am too precious about. My mother (who usually loves my furniture) hates them and her cousin once described them as "sh*tty chic, rather than shabby chic". !!

Do guests leave their coffee cups and other detritus there? No, normally they don't. 

I feel that when people are in 'work mode', they are less conscious of the mess they are making. I once watched a documentary about workspaces that revealed just how disgusting and bacteria ridden a lot of office desks were. They took swabs from a toilet seat in a porta loo in the middle of the Glastonbury festival. They took swabs from an office worker's desk. The latter had 10,000 x more bacteria and nasties than that toilet seat that had been used by thousands of people, including E-coli and all sorts of other horrible stuff. 

Food for thought...

[Ted307]

@Huma0 

You are right, the workers really seem to like the kitchen. I only find candy and popcorn in the couch cushions -- they are eating and watching there. Coffee debris are always in the kitchen where I have 2 extra plugs and a phone charger along a 6 foot chrome and glass table they use as their work area. It is easy to clean, just spray and wipe it down. That's where our connected kids do their work when they visit us, too. I am glad, it keeps that stuff away from the kitchen table where people eat!

Those swabs are another reason I need to institute a once a week clean in our rules! I suspect that people who are OK with cleaning are more likely to be hosts. I can not imagine the cleanliness rating for some guests if they were the host! They would not last long . . .;)

[Huma0]

@Ted307 

True, if we rated guests on cleanliness to the standards that we expect from hosts, most of them would fall very short.

That's why it always makes me laugh when guests post on here saying they 'left the listing as they found it.' Did they? Really? I think in most situations, that's hard to imagine...

[Anonymous]

@Huma0  That's the problem with lists of rules. Even if you can get people to read them when they book, nobody keeps them all memorized weeks or months later and recites them back to themselves every night before bed like the Ten Commandments. That would be pretty weird.

As a guest, I read them basically just once when I choose a listing, to make sure they line up with what I'd normally do anyway, and I never think about them again. Thus far, no host has ever accused me of breaking a rule, even though I'm sure I've made some absentminded blunders. 

It sounds like the guest you described knew the letter of the law but completely missed the spirit of it. So I agree that arrival orientation is the better place to convey your behavioral preferences, rather than the House Rules. (My take is that nothing should be in the list of rules if it's not so important that I'd kick someone out for breaking it, but I know many hosts feel differently).

[Huma0]

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@Anonymous wrote:

It sounds like the guest you described knew the letter of the law but completely missed the spirit of it. 

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Yes, he definitely knew the letter of the law. He even asked me to recommend where to have a parcel delivered. I thought Yay! He actually registered my rule about not having parcels and mail sent here (I told him, don't worry, you can have your package sent here - that rule was more for people who really took the p*ss with that).

He has studied those rules in detail. He appears to be checking them if he has a question about anything, and for sure that is really, really rare. Yet, he's chosen to ignore one of the MOST important rules, which is no smoking in the bedroom. He thinks he is hiding it, but just because I am a cigarette smoker, it does not mean that I cannot smell weed emanating from the room!

I casually told him about some recent guests who were smoking in their room and that it was obvious due to the smell. He responded that he thought that was "really out of order". Mmm.

Anyway, I said nothing more. The room will be empty for a bit before the new guest, so I will just have to make sure there is no smell. I will probably just mention it in private feedback. He's such a lovely guy. I don't want to tear him apart with a bad review/ratings. It's not like he is going around breaking numerous rules. He's extremely respectful overall. 

Or, I could just tell him, "I know I said no drugs at all, even in outside areas, but if you want to smoke a joint, please do it in the garden." I guess that would be the grown up thing to do!