Hello Airbnb Host community,
I hope you guys can help me navigate through this situation and maybe provide some advice on how to avoid such occurrences in the future? Let me illustrate two istances where the situation in question has occured so you can get a better picture. We share a two-bedroom apartment here in NYC and one of our rooms is on Airbnb.
1. I had a guest who booked the place only for the night, they were two young Korean girls and all seemed to go well, even after their arrival. They were fan girling all over my dog, clicking photos with him and even sent me message over the night saying and I quote, "your house is really nice!!". The next morning they vacated the place BUT as soon as I saw their review, it's what shocked me! They gave me a 3-star review and in private feedback, gave me 2 stars for value 2 stars for cleanliness and basically mentioned that all places in the house was dirty!
-----Let me provide my view here. I am a complete neat freak and even though I have a fawn colored Labrador retreiver and dark wooden floors, I make sure I vaccum the place atleast once every day and even go as far as sweeping the place if I find the hair a tiny bit excessive. I try and keep the house well-maintained all days of the week since I am home most of the time.
2. Again, two girls who were exchange students from Japan, booked our room for a night and they too had really good communication. Kept me informed incase they were arriving late as well and even praised me and my boyfriend on our apartment and dog. But when I saw their review I was held in disbelief.
She mentioned that my place was hard to find, gave me two stars for everything in private feedback, and said that the apartment was in a "busy" area and that she couldn't sleep during the night at all.
-----I have a clear check in guide which literally shows photos from the train station all the way to our apartment building, elevator and apartment door all with VERY clear instructions and I make sure I send this guide to all my guests before their arrival. Also, my windows literally sound-proof everything in the house, I am super comfortable sleeping at home and find it very peaceful in the night and I'm from India! So, I definitely know what noise is.
My question to the community is, how do you hosts deal with guests like this? And now I've provided them a stellar review but their review of my place is degrading my apartment's value. Although their review is private feedback to me, I still want to respond to it, other than sending them a private message there's not much I can do. I find it very disheartening that when they are not happy with the place then why praise it in the first place? Can't they be honest with their feedback or atleast mention it to me while I am talking to them?
