@Peter-and-Cornelia0 @Michael956 @Sandra126 @Shawn117
Peter and Cornelia, as others have said you will not make too many friends by asking confirmed guests for more money once they have booked but, the thing that is concerning me here is the size of that cleaning fee! I understand you have a property on acreage and that you are catering for up to 8 guests but, the property has to be maintained anyway regardless of whether there are guests there or not and a $200AU cleaning fee, around two thirds of your nighly rate for that aspect of your property that guest may specifically use or effect, is a big ask.
It takes around two hours to service a listing if you are anywhere near efficient and to be charging the best part of $100 per hour as a cleaning fee I don't feel comfortable with.
It seems to me you may have set an unrealistically low letting amount to attract people to view your listing. Your nightly rate is the same for 8 guests as it is for one, and you are creeping the profit margin up with a large cleaning fee thereby disadvantaging shorter term bookings of just a couple of guests.
Peter and Cornelia I am not criticising your listing, or your ability to be outstanding hosts and I wish you every success with this beautiful property, but maybe you should consider setting a base letting amount to cover up to, say, two guests, and adding an extra per guest charge to cover the additional servicing that will be required for larger groups. You could then set a lower cleaning fee so as not to 'whack' the guest on the check-out page with heavy additional costs!
Cheers.....Rob