Guests having a loud time

[Erica-And-Dan0]

Hey all, 

This is our 2nd time renting out our apartment downstairs and we're getting pretty booked. The first set of guests went well, but I'm not sure about our current guests. They are presently having a party downstairs - loud music, lots of yelling and jumping up and down, slamming doors. I do not believe there are more than the intended number of guests present, however, likely 5 people. I'm getting a little concerned - as we already found our shower curtain, rug and towels in the basement dryer stained with vomit and now the stain is set. I can appreciate the sentiment of trying to clean up after themselves, but we wish they had communicated with us instead of hiding it and creating permnaent damage to so many items. We also had to send them a message today to remind them about not smoking on the property and to not use our coffee mugs as ashtrays. We only know this happened because they left it out on the porch. 

OK, so the point. What is the expectation of guests? We say no parties in our listing, but in this instance it's just the guests having a good time - very loudly. I'm super anxious about the damage ongoing, especially with having just made this investment - everything is brand new - the floors, the furniture, etc. Maybe I'm just anxious because things are new. Am I being a square and too controlling? Is this something that others are more chill about? How people handle situations like this? We'll try to create better house use guidelines in our listing. 

[Rebecca160]

@Erica-And-Dan0 what do you have listed in your house rules? The house rules are critical to to how much support you can get from Airbnb, if things go wrong.

if you say no parties and your guests are clearly partying amongst themselves, then they are violating your rules.  Of course, you might want to make your rules a little clearer as to what you mean by “party.”

i would probably take this booming ok’ing as a learning experience.  Write down what you do not like and what you do like and then craft your house rules to fit.  And then announce on your listing and in messages to your guests that you have rules that you expect them to abide by,, send the rules and tell them you expect them to sign that they agree to the rules upon arrival. Might get you better fitting guests.

[Erica-And-Dan0]

@Rebecca160 Thanks for taking the time to respond. I agree that I may need to elaborate on what "party" means. I think these guests are helping me understand where I need to be more strict in the house rules. I appreciate the tips, they are really helpful. 

[Jess78]

Hi Erica,

Sounds like it could be a case of either one or actually both— you  being a little bit sensitive and this crop of guests being particularly terrible. You won’t know how terrible they’ve checked out or you knock on the door and get a look inside. It kind of sounds like they might be the pretty inexcusably terrible variety. Hopefully they aren’t staying very long!

You say you live in that apartment above, so there are a few things:

1) since it’s convenient, always try to meet the guests at check in or within 12 hours of their check in. 

2) change your listing to emphasize that you live upstairs and this listing is absolutely not for partying or any illegal activities, and no smoking inside or out. 

3) please don’t be shy about giving these guests a very low rating they deserve so other hosts don’t book them

4) now that you’re learning more about hosting, you’ll know to talk about being respectful neighbors, noise level, etc. in all the house rules. Be very specific and harsh in your listing to scare off anyone who is even contemplating those things.

5) the vomit stained linens may have to be a hard lesson, but don’t lose out hope that a good laundering may still be able to save those items, and that they just may agree to your extra charges for them. Maybe!

6) as ive done this more and more, the very cleanest and most respectful groups of people are families with mothers traveling with them. The least clean are the groups of youngish friends— in my experience males being worst. I know I’m stereotyping and this is definitely not always the case, but the theory is pretty strong. 

When do do they leave? Are you stuck with them for very long? If they are staying another night, i’d knock on the door with a bunch of water bottles or something and let them aware of your presence in the building. If you can strike up a conversation on how their visits going maybe you can take a peek inside. 

[Erica-And-Dan0]

@Jess78 This is super comprehensive. Thank you for taking the time. I do think the guests are being disrespectful of the space, but not in the absolute worst sense, ya know? I'm sure I'm more sensitive having already dealt with two issues with them today and then hearing a lot of banging around and loud music that's likely disturbing our neighbors makes me feel like things are getting worse. 

I appreciate your suggestions and feedback. We did meet with the guests, but I didnt go over any rules in person - we did that in the check in message through airbnb messaging. I'll definetly try to get more specific in our listing and I see this as a combination of needing to learn how to develop our rules and learning how to best intervene when there are issues. They leave tomorrow, so here's hoping the worse is what I've already observed. 

[Rachel0]

@Erica-And-Dan0 It would be  a good idea to add to your house rules "Please do not make a lot  of noise between 11pm and 7am."  Boundaries need to be set otherwise guests don't know what is allowed and what isn't.  I do hope you manage to sort this problem out and that it doesn't put you off hosting.

[Fred13]

 @Erica-And-Dan0  A nice place at $92, in downtown Chicago for 4 people, perhaps tht is the reason for 1/2 your dilemma. Cheap enough to be a perfect candidate for young or partying 'whatevers'.  Yahoos love inexpensive places.

   Perhaps make it $92 for 2 and extra $25 per extra person up to a max of 4, that will start changing the guest dynamics.  Price is the best (an only allowed) selective tool, listing description is next, then greeting guests and maintaining control and so on.

[Erica-And-Dan0]

@Fred13 Actually we just raised the price last night from our orginal $72 to $92 min, ha. I think it's part of learning Airbnb, as they were basically telling us how unattractive our place was with minimums $85 and over. Good advice on adding the charge to extra guests. We're going to play around with that. 

Thanks!

[Fred13]

It is a journey indeed, took me a full year to get the flic. If only I could redo that first year. 

[Rebecca160]

@Erica-And-Dan0 definitely do not pay attention to Airbnb’s price suggestions. No idea where these come from, but they are not based on fair market values, as the prices they suggest are consistently very, very low. 

Since you are in a major city, you can get a market price setter for your listings. My city is too small to have it, so the name of it is not coming to me, but I know a lot of host’s have it. It checks the pricing of all STRs and sets your nightly price accordingly. 

[Gregg28]

Try putting up with NOISY Germans inside and outside, including talking loud alot when they r outside your bedroom..am not a host btw, but a disgruntled guest who comes from a hospitality family of over 40 years, my Parents had people from all over the world stay at our place and we had bad and good guests, so i know what is annoying etc.