some advice please

[Darrin1]

I'm a rookie and would like someone to look at my listing and see if I need to change anything.

"Furnish House. Great for 3 couples" Sulphur Springs, Tx

[Mimi19]

I don't see any pictures of your listing, do you have them? they will help a lot. Otherwise everything looks fine to me 🙂

[Darrin1]

i have a picture of the outside but plan on taking some of the inside in the next day or two.

[Lisa293]

your number of guests says 2 instead of 7

I don't see your price per night for extra guests

checkin says any time after 3am

you may like to beef up your house rules 

make sure you understand what flexible cancellation is

getting around should possibly have more about public transport

turn off instant book until you have some experience

Just on first glance I would start with looking at the above - best of luck!

[Darrin1]

the reason it says two guest is because i think a fully furnished house should be more than $99. i put $25 for each addtional person.

i live in a town of 20,000 so no public trans. it's a low demand area. if i rent it out 7 to 10 days a month i will be happy. there are a lot of fishing tournamants at Lake Fork so i hope that helps. Thanks

[Lisa293]

@Darrin1

Hi Darrin,

I just read that you can follow up on things that get lost in all the other posts by putting the mouse over your profile picture and looking at community activity.  Just thought I would check on how you were doing.  If you don't put @ and the name with your message it is next to impossible to follow up except through the community activity link.

In order for the pricing to come out correctly and for the listing to make sense, you need to go to your calendar page and open the drop down menu on the left.  Look for 'basics" and put in that the house actually accommodates up to 6 or 7 whatever your choice is.  In this way, it will come up in the right search results for people who are looking to accommodate that many.

Next go to "Price settings" on the top right of the calendar page.  Go to 'Additional pricing options".  This will allow you to set the price based on 2 guests and allow you to enter the additional guest fee.  The base price should read as the price for 2 guests or whatever minimum you want to set.

[Lisa293]

by the way your title does not say "for 3 couples" - it says "f 3 couples" - thought it might be a new abbreviation I was not aware of but on second glance it might be better to put in the "for".

[Darrin1]

they limit the number of letters you can put in.

[Sandra126]

''Furnish house'' sounds like a command, as in Furnish the house for me please! It needs to say ''furnished house'', if it is.

[Darrin1]

thanks

[Mathew6]

I'm also a rockie and would love to talk to another host or a representative from airbnb before I accept a booking, I have some questions that I would rather talk to someone.  Any suggestions?

[Gerry-And-Rashid0]

Turn off IB if you can - until you get a few reservations under your belt.

Your listing is unfinished - there are no  photographs so people wont book as they can't see what they are getting.

Good luck

[Lisa293]

@Darrin1

Sorry, just had to check your listing one more time.  Yes, it only has the capacity to be booked for 2 guests at the moment which may be part of the problem.  When you start a new listing, you get shown quite close to the top of the page for a period of time.  This is also a time when some hosts give special prices just to generate bookings and reviews and help them get up the list.  At the moment it is advertised at $135 per night for 2 guests.  The weekend pricing is $162 per night for 2 guests with a 2 night minimum.  You may like to reduce this to $145 or $150 just for the time you are at the top of the list so that you can cash in on some bookings.  Your costs are also a bit lower if they stay longer.  It may pay to just snooze the listing until you have the photos up because this may be holding people back from booking and it is a shame to waste your prime advertising time without optimum selling points.

I would put in a note about the public transport and your recommendation to rent a car.  Also if you know of good businesses who do charter fishing you could talk to them about giving you a commission for sending them clients and play this possiblity up a bit.  People who fish seem to be really enthusiastic about it so that can be a good draw card even if you pass the commission on to them as a discount for a while.

Hope that helps. 

[Darrin1]

i have it listed at $99 and $119. i dont know how you saw the prices you did. thanks for your help