Have "price tips" gone insane?

[Dede0]

About 4 days ago, the pricing tips from AirBnB (which I look at but mostly ignore because they're usually wellbelow what we actually charge  to VERY satisfied guests), suddenly went nuts. They surged roughly 40-50% higher than we typically charge. Or, to put it another way, 60%+ higher than the previous price tips. Has anyone else seen this happen?

We're not upping our rates based on this, because our bookings are coming in at the usual pace. On the other hand, if these tips are even partially valid, we'd love to make more money. I have my doubts, though, that even if the tips are semi-valid, whether our guests would be as 5-Star "happy" as they usually are. We already charge what I consider to be a premium rate, and I'd hate to push the boundaries if it would affect our ratigs and reviews.

[Kelly149]

@Dede0 Yes smart pricing went crazy

[Helga0]

Hi @Dede0, my price tips stay stable, relatively low, getting higher closer to Christmas. 

But I had atrange thing happen. I rent a shared room, rather nice, at night it’s more like a full unit with kitchen and bathroom. I ask for 43 including breakfast. Usually, the price tip suggests I reduce my rent to 29, like a nearby hostel, 6 sleeping places in bunkbeds per room. The pop-up is often funny, saying I have twice the bookings than the competition at the much lower rate and I should lower the price to earn more. 

For a short while, my “competition “ was shown to be luxury full units in tourist areas at 90. Price suggestion at 35. 

I ignore it as completely crazy. 

[Elizabeth429]

Hi there all, I experienced that when the search to book in my area/city is high due to special holidays (there are lots of bank holidays here in Spain), the prices tend to increase. I look at Airbnb suggested pices on a daily basis. Most of the time, they seem to match my chosen price. But most Airbnb hosts complaint that the suggested prices can be ridiculous.

[Dede0]

Two days ago, my price trips went back to normal. By that I mean that instead of suggesting I charge $170 for a night that I would normally price at $105, or charge $145 for a night I'd normally price at $90, they reverted to suggesting I charge around $85 or $75. In other words, instead of suggesting crazily high rates, they now suggest the usual too-low rates.

This change happened all at once for a 1.5 month span of distant (3 months out) open dates, rather than in a "sliding" fashion. Which leads me to believe that AirBnB fixed some glitch in their (normally bad) algorithm.

[Martin280]

@Dede0 I'm curious about this. I usually stick pretty close to the suggested price but because when I add it plus my cleaning fees plus possible extra guest fees it's pretty on the mark. I'm wondering if I should ignore it but now with the competition in NYC bookings in slow periods cause me to fill literally 24-72 hours before the day for 25% of the month. 

How much higher than their suggestions do you typically charge? Anyone else in large areas (private room, not entire apartment rentals) please also let me know. I'm curious. 

[Dede0]

@Martin280 We typically list for 20-25% more than the price tips, sometimes more than that, except for the last 2-3 days to book each month. We normally book up 95% two months out, with the third month out having more availability. (We only open dates 3-3.5 months in advance, on a rolling week-at-a-time basis.) If we have a couple of unbooked dates less than two weeks away, then we drop them some, but still rarely as low as the price tips recommend. Since I'm the person who cleans and preps, getting those last two nights booked at a low rate doesn't really appeal to me -- I'd rather leave them empty and skip the add'l cleaning.

By the way, our listing is for a private space, not just a single room in a larger house.

[Brent23]

My normal price is $59, sometimes they smart price-suggest me as low as $45, this spectrum is very consistent. BUT back in early October they were suggesting a smart price of $13 for Monday, October 30, 2017. What?? Of course I laughed and eventually booked it for $59. Did anyone else experience a ridiculously low smart price for Halloween Eve?  Contrary to the thread subject, I feel the site has been trying to jack me lower on my prices, not amused, that's the kind of crap Uber does to it's drivers. Also, I typically get roughly 20 views per day, somtimes it spikes up to 40 or 60 for a day or two. But recently I went an entire week at about 80 views per day, way more than just an excited future guest or 2 could run up. Ok, there's 3 good pieces of material, someone please sound off! 🙂 

[Michele39]

I generally ignore the price tips and instead do a search in "travel" node to see what other hosts in my area are charging. One thing is that I recently changed my listing to include another bedroom which means it can now accommodate 4 guests instead of 2, but Airbnb doesn't seem to take this into consideration and is still giving me price tips more in line for a 2-person stay.

[Scott278]

I just checked my "Price Tips" and here is one example, although they were consistent. From $43 /nt to $13 / nt. Yea...that's not gunna happen. Not sure why the drastic drop, but interested enough to investigate further.

[Dede0]

I want to point out that the original impetus for this posting was that the price tips had very suddenly jumped much, much higher than normal (like 50-60% higher). To levels so absurd that they were 40-50% more than we normally charge. With a key fact being that the price tips are usually much LOWER than we actually charge, yet they suddenly went way past that. In other words, they just went NUTS, temporarily. Something in AirBnB's (already next to useless) algorithm had broken. Yielding comically high recommendations.

After several days, they went back to "normal". Meaning that the recommendations are now always well below what we charge, even though we always fill up 95% using the rates we charge.

AirBnB needs to fire the entire team -- or at least its management -- that conjures up the price tips. They are SO bad in SO many ways. Any junior-level progarmmer could explain how to do it much, much better.

[Helga0]

@Dede0, that raises a philosophical question on your first post: Can a crazy entity go insane temporarily? 😉 My absurd high suggestions lasted way shorter than yours, when I wanted to see them again they were already back below hostel level for me. 

Although I don’t believe that it is an easy thing to program. There are much too many variables and they may interact I’m predictably, requesting fixes, which may increase flaws. 

There is an official explanation thread on smart pricing, which is totally unsatisfying. 

It would be interesting to put the factors taken into account in a list and let guests and hosts poll on them and also suggest factors. 

Maybe we as hosts would be surprised how few or how many factors are important for guests as booking deciding factors. 

Maybe airbnb would be surprised, if factors are voted highly on both sides, but low or not at all on their programmers’ list. 

Maybe we find, that we have factor we are proud off but they are not so important for guests. It’s up to the single host by then to adapt investment or to adapt communication. 

[Bob-And-Char0]

I agree! The price tips are a mess for us. So how do you shut off Price tips?

[Dede0]

You don't shut them off, you just ignore them. Just as you ignore almost everything else that AirBnB tosses your way. Instead, you invest your time into noting the interface changes that AirBnB makes w/o advising hosts. And checking the list of Amenities to be sure AirBnB hasn't added something that you need to check off, etc.

AirBnB's coding quality has improved noticeably in the past year or so, but that's not to say that their interface design or notices to hosts has improved. They have a long way to go in both those departments...

[Betsy13]

The price tips are ridiculous.  They are also bogus.  Airbnb says the price tips are supposedly based on what others are charging.  But from what I can see, they are just a scam to get us to reduce our prices.  Case in point - my rate for this coming Saturday was $179.  They said others were charging closer to $163.  I changed it to $159.  I checked price tips again. Now for the exact same night they say other are charging $140.  

They make money if they get more bookings because they just take a commission.  We, on the other hand, have bills to pay.  Don't fall for it.  Set a fair price.