Hello fellow hosts,
This morning I awakened to a peculiar booking inquiry. Our place is quite large and we do not live there full time, and so our house managers requested that we leave a full day before and after each booking to give them sufficient time to clean and prepare the house properly. And we were happy to oblige them.
Today, however, a guest sent an inquiry that overlaps into the preparation day. It would also be just one day prior to when another guest, who has actually booked with us for TWO one-week periods over the winter, is arriving.
Now, we're still relatively new to hosting, and so I'm wondering what to do here. I did write to the guest to explain the situation, and also because she does not meet any of the criteria we had set as prerequisites to booking our villa. For instance, she has no previous history on Airbnb, no government ID, no photo provided, and no email address or phone number provided. She hasn't even listed her city of residence.
If I decline this inquiry, or if I simply let the 24-hour period expire, will this hurt me on the website? I've been reading a lot about how hosts who decline inquiries and booking requests, or who don't respond at a rate that the Airbnb algorithm approves of, can see their listing go down in the guests' viewing window. Would that actually apply in this case, do you think? When we have specific criteria for booking listed and the day before blocked?
We would appreciate any feedback you have on this, especially from you experienced hosts. Thanks a lot.