Thoughts on Bed Linen change during stay.....

[Michelle-And-Michael0]

Hi All,

The majority of our guests to date have been short stay, 2-6 nights maximum. However, tomorrow we are expecting our first guest to stay 7nights.

We supply enough towels (generally 2-3 per person) and offer more if needed. But I'm not sure what to do in this case regarding bed linen.

Given that the Studio is private and self contained, I would need to gain access to change the sheets. Usually our guests are left alone, unless they need or request something.

I'm interested to hear what others do for stays of a week of longer......

Do you offer to do a change of bed sheets mid stay?
Do you leave some spare sheets for them to do it themselves, if they want?
Or would you not bother, unless it is longer than a week?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts,
Michelle 🙂

[Michelle-And-Michael0]

Thanks everyone, for your advice and sharing your procedure  @Mark116 @Shaun69 @Sarah977 @Gregory87 @Rachel0 @Sandra126 @Branka & Sylvia (sorry couldn't tag you)

It's interesting how everyone has a different approach.... but it all seems to be working out for each of you!

Our guest arrives in a few hours. He is a single guy by himself (looks like a mature age student)..... staying with us while he takes his University exams. I'm guessing he will be busy for most of the time, either with exams or doing some last minute study cramming!! 

Even though it is only 7 nights, I think I will offer him a mid week change of linen and light clean any way..... and  see what he says! 

Thanks again, everyone for your input 🙂

[Sarah977]

@Michelle-And-Michael0  It's actually a good idea to find a reason to go into the guest space (of course arranging the timing with the guest beforehand) if you have guests who you suspect may not be the tidiest and cleanest. I'm thinking young, and males more than females, although dirty girls can actually be much worse than dirty guys, since they tend to use so many more goopy products. And there are messy people of all ages.

One thing I've learned is you can't judge a book by its cover- I had a young, single male guest who left his room and bathroom incredibly spotless- he even made the bed perfectly, even though of course I was going to change the linens after, and emptied his bathroom garbage can and brought the bag downstairs. 

If the guest indicates that they'd prefer their privacy, of course play it by ear, but "I'll come in a do a quick vacuum and sheet change on Friday, what time would work for you?" can give you an opportunity to make sure the guest isn't living like a pig in there with pizza boxes all over, rotting banana peels, wet towels wadded up mildewing on the furniture, etc. And if the guest knows you're going to come in, they may be motivated to keep it tidier.

[Michelle-And-Michael0]

Great suggestions again @Sarah977 !! Nothing worse than smelly pizza boxes and wet towels etc.

I agree about not judging a book by its cover. Our most tidiest guests so far were 2 young girls that came and stayed for a night out to see a band at a local bar. They left it immaculate.... stripped the bed and folded the linen, even arranging their used towels and face washers in a fancy format. I was very impressed!! 

[Matt682]

I change my bed linens and towels every 7 days or between each guest, whichever happens first.  If a guest is here for 9 days, I would change the linens on day 4/5 because my rule would require 1 change anyway, so may as well make it halfway through, right?

I like to maintain the guest’ sense of personal space as much as I can during their stay, so don’t enter their room. With that in mind, I offer guests the option of me going in to do it, or me leaving them clean linens for them to do it themselves - up to them.

Word of caution though, once in 6 months with three listings this has come back to bite me... I had a guest with dubious personal hygiene at best, strip the bed himself saying it was better for his privacy, and then proceed to sleep directly on the mattress and pillow protectors with no linens. When I raised it with him 3 days later (he had his door open so I saw) he said he would do it. 4 days later he still hadn’t done it. From that point I changed the linens myself for him. I did try to charge him as I had to delist the room for a night for the extra laundry to be done, but I’m still waiting on that payment -_-

[Michelle-And-Michael0]

Thanks for the heads up @Matt682 about the guest sleeping on the unmade bed! 

I wouldn't like that to happen either.... so maybe, I wont give them the option of doing it themselves. 

As it stands with this guest, I've offered to do a mid week linen change myself.... but they need to let me know. So far, we haven't heard anything. 

[Alexandra213]

Hello, I also offer a mid stay change of sheets and towels if over a week. However I have a guest staying now who has requested a change of towels after 2 nights! I feel this is a bit excessive but maybe not?!? Any views? Does anyone charge extra for change of towels if more than a norm?

[Alexandra213]

They are staying for 10 nights so that’s a lot of washing! I charge a cleaning fee per booking which covers the average cleaning but not washing towels every 2 days 

[Sarah977]

@Alexandra213  That's pretty ridiculous and wasteful to request clean towels every 2 days. People have some strange ideas and it's irritating that many are so environmentally unconscious. I remember reading a post by a host who said she changes towels daily because in her opinion (altho she stated it as a fact) it's "unhygenic" to use a towel more than once.

I actually state in my listing that clean linens and towels are provided weekly- I leave 2 bath towels, a hand towel and a face cloth for the guest (I only host one at a time). If a guest is staying for 10 days, I'd offer them clean stuff at the halfway mark, 5 days. In almost 3 years of hosting I've never had a guest ask for more towels than that and often I find they've only made use of one bath towel after a week's stay.

Maybe these guests of yours are the type who just throw their used towels on the floor instead of hanging them up to dry,  they think an Airbnb is like a hotel?

I guess you could either explain that that's not the case and maybe compromise with every 4 days, and going forward, make sure you state in your listing how often towel changes are provided, as well as maybe a framed note in the bathroom-"As stated in my listing information, towels will be changed out weekly, so please be mindful to hang your towel up to dry after use." That won't help with this booking, but would be helpful for the future.

[Alexandra213]

Yes the towels WERE on the floor!  I have offered to change the sheets on Fri (half way through their stay) before they ask me to change them every 2 days also!! Thanks for info; I did put linen change once a week on the listing; but still find it hard to know what to say when guests ask for a more frequent change. Will tell them when they check in in future so we all on same page.