I'm afraid there is no pleasing some people! I just received a review from a young American lady who stayed for a couple of days over Christmas. What I find odd is her statement "I was a little surprised at how different the house looked in person. The images suggest the house is much bigger."
Sorry? These are verified photos from the Airbnb photographer and don't even show all the rooms here. Now I know houses in Texas are probably bigger, but at 2,100 square feet, mine is 2.5 times the size of the average UK house and who knows how many times bigger than the average London home. What was she expecting, a palace?
Anyway, she has marked me down in accuracy for this, as well as because (as she explained in her private comments) the tube station was too far to walk and a struggle. I am a middle aged woman of average height and am not at all sporty, but it takes me no more than five minutes at a comfortable pace to walk there. It's hardly my fault if a tall, 22 year old can't manage a five minute walk! I think this says more about her lack of fitness than anything else.
She complains about a couple of other things like the number of stairs (clearly mentioned in the listing) and the smell of smoke. Again, it's specified in the description that we smoke and it's misleading to say the whole house smells of it. No other guests have complained about this. The guest rooms are non-smoking, far from the smoking areas, and other guests have even mentioned that they smell lovely (which they do).
What she fails to mention is how far I went out of my way for her, from letting her check in out of the normal hours, to researching all her travel options to help her save money, to being late for my own family Christmas dinner because she was late (and didn't bother to tell me even though she knew I needed to leave at a certain time). The only thing I didn't do was carry her suitcase upstairs but only because she had made me so late and I had to run!!
I know none of this is serious, but it annoys me when you go out of your way to look after a guest and they leave a review full of unfair/petty criticisms and low star ratings.
I don't think I will respond to her review, even though I'm sorely tempted to do so!