Help with cleanliness rating

Jill520
Level 2
Paynesville, Australia

Help with cleanliness rating

I scrub and clean my house before guests come, however I still get low ratings for cleaniness.  I am a professional cleaner and very disappointed when I get these ratings.

 

At the moment my house needs a bit of a maintenance of painting here and there for chips on the skirting boards etc its not a lot but would that be a reason why I get low cleaniness ratings?

 

It is an older style house built in the 70s and has been renovated.  I still get "old" house.

Even though the lady who stayed at my house who called by house old had a bnb  house that was 50's retro style.  Again I am confused.

 

Can anyone give me some advice.

 

Thanks  Jill  Paynesville  Vic

 

 

33 Replies 33
Mary1211
Level 5
Somerville, MA

I can relate to this, I've started bringing in professional cleaners with each stay and still I'll get dinged for something like a tortilla chip crumb between the wall and the fridge, or the sponge had been used previously.  It's hard not to feel defeated.

Jill520
Level 2
Paynesville, Australia

Oh yes there are nitpickers out there.

 

Jill520
Level 2
Paynesville, Australia

Some people are very pretty.

 

Sarah977
Level 10
Sayulita, Mexico

@Jill520  I would echo what other hosts have said. More and better photos of the interior (the outside shots of your garden and seating area are lovely, clear and bright, keep those), take a couple shots of the bedroom, where guests are going to be spending most of their time when home, from different angles so they can see what's provided there- a closet? a desk? a chair? And of course the bathroom. 

It doesn't look all that cluttered to me, but maybe it's usually more cluttered day-to-day than when you arranged things for the photos? What it is, is old-fashioned decor, and guests seem to prefer clean lines, and a more modern look. But it's your home, so you should decorate and furnish as you like, just try to keep it simple and clear. 

The heavy drapes, the carpet and all the upholstered furniture is going to make it difficult to get rid of the dog smell, and no you can't cover it up with incense. Investigate products like Nilodor, specifically designed to eliminate those kinds of odors. And pet odors are just a bad review waiting to happen.  I have a dog and cat myself, but they mostly stay outside and I have tile floors, light curtains that can be thrown in the wash, no carpeting, and the animals are never on the couch, so there is no pet smell. I'd be turned off to stay in  a place that smelled of dog or cat.

Dog smell. Yes that caught my attention!

We have three dogs. We were very badly dinged on cleanliness by our first ever booking, the clown expressed surprise that we had dogs at all, which shows he hadn't read the listing very well, if at all.

OK so now we have added an air purifier in the common area room that guests have their breakfast in.

Since the hammering we took from this gentleman we have made a big point of having dogs on the premises.

What really annoys me is that the entire ground floor of our house is tiled in R12 rated non slip anti-bacterial tiles, you could literally eat your dinner off it, and it's steam cleaned every other day, and the dogs don't go upstairs.

I think it was a "cultural" difference, although we are very inclusive, I think we had a guest who wasn't as far as dogs are concerned.

Since giving the pooches more prominence on the listing and in the photos we've found that the first question half the guests ask is "where are the puppies!" 

We moved last year to a small modern-ish (70s) house in the country from a large rambling edwardian town house, and I look back on the constant maintenance involved and I really feel your pain. You can work your tripe out to keep on top of older properties but there is always something waiting to be done. 

 

@Kevin1322  When I lived in Canada, I had a 100 year old house that was a disaster when I bought it- sitting in the mud on rotted out timber foundations, no insulation, etc. Over the course of 25 years, while raising my children there, I renovated it.

When I bought a lot in Mexico and had a house built to my specifications, it was glorious for the first couple of years to have everything brand new and perfect. Then the reality of maintainence in the tropics set in. From scrubbing the blood spots from insect wars off the walls, to powerwashing the covered with black mold outside walls and walkways during the rainy season, to constant dusting during the dry season, not to mention the damage to equipment caused by non-first-world infrastructure ( fried motherboard on washing machine from power surges, replacing the fridge seals because they get moldy and can't be cleaned, replacing water filters on an ongoing basis as they get filled with the sand and grit that comes down the water lines), it's turned out to be just as much ongoing work as dealing with a 100 year old house. At least in the old house, I could do a deep cleaning in each room once a year and then just daily cleaning upkeep- here, if I don't deep clean everything at least once  every 2-3 months, it shows, and I could find some nasty surprises.

Sometimes you wonder whether your real job in life is your day job, keeping your house in one piece, or raising the kids. Then you realise it is all three! 

@Kevin1322  I listened to a radio documentary once on house-husbands. One guy they interviewed said that when he first was in that position, if he was at a party and someone asked him what he did, he would reply "I'm an architect. But I'm taking a year off to look after the kids because my wife has a job where she has to travel a lot and will get promoted to a position where she won't have to leave town, if this year goes well for her."  After a few months of looking after the kids, driving them around, shopping and cooking, doing the laundry, cleaning the house and looking after the house maintenance, he said he felt so ashamed for the answer he used to give as to his occupation- that he couldn't believe how his wife kept all that together so many years, that it was the hardest job he'd ever done and much more deserving of recognition and pride than being an architect.

@Sarah977 we were the other way round, I worked on oil rigs and came home every now and then and interfered in Mrs Kev's smooth running of the house and raising of the kids. Then I'd go away again for a few weeks and normal service would be resumed.

Kids are a full time job by themselves 😉

@Kevin1322  Haha. That was always my idea of the perfect relationship- one partner is away a lot of the time, shows up once every few weeks or month or so, gives you some great sex and adult conversation, fixes stuff they're good at around the place, and then leaves again, allowing you to settle back into your smooth-running routine without interruption.

we never managed the adult conversation, but the rest went ok 😉

Jill520
Level 2
Paynesville, Australia

Thanks for ur reply.  Yes, in order to get rid of dog smell I use incense , no one complains.  However I have asked friends to have a look and they don't smell the dog smells.

 

Paul154
Level 10
Seattle, WA

@Jill520 

You have a nice home and your pics are good.

Yes, you had bad luck with that first review. Guest wrote the review in a very nasty way.

Erase this guest.

Paint the room. Paint away the bad ju-ju left by this awful guest.

 

Mind you, I like to paint. I love the fresh makeover.

 

Jill520
Level 2
Paynesville, Australia

Thank you Paul for your positive feedback.  Yes, I like my house and when people say its old I am disappointed.  I will snooze for awhile and do some maintenance and thinking.  Really I am not looking forward to having people in my house anymore.  Sick of the unjust criticisms.

 

The first guest was so untrue. As you can see by the photos my house is not cluttered.   It was more their clutter, not mine.  It is my house and have whatever clutter I like.

 

Regards   J Matthews

 

 

 

@Jill520 It appears that your first two guests also went low on the Overall Ratings (2 and 3 stars, respectively). This could just be bad luck, but if two guests in a row were unhappy with their experiences it is unlikely to be over chipped paint.

 

It may be that you're better off snoozing the listings for awhile, do some home improvements and have some newer pictures made. Or perhaps it's best to identify the kind of guests that are the best fit for your home and hosting style, and appeal more directly to them. For example, you can feature your dogs more prominently in the listing and make it clear that the home is most suitable for dog lovers. Or if you like a higher degree of interaction with guests you can bring more of your personality into the listing and present as more of a cozy social homestay than a beach holiday house.