Nervous about a guests reaction after I review them

[Samantha657]

I tried to search a bit but didn’t find a post with a similar issue. This is a bit lengthy, beware!

We had a guest that checked out a week ago that was a problem. I know that I should warn other hosts by writing a review, but I am actually nervous that he would retaliate against me or my family. Details below...

We typically don’t take last minute bookings (we are usually booked a month out) but happened to have a weeks availability, and this guest booked for day-of. He seemed to already be in town, and his messages initially were all very respectful and gracious. 

4 nights in to his 7 night stay he sent us a message in the evening that he noticed a leak- so my husband went down to check it out (the rental is a basement guest suite that is entirely separate from our house but as it is an older home, noise/smells/leakages could be caused from our kitchen and whatnot above). My husband thought he smelled marijuana in the rental but didn’t say anything to the guest then. The next day my husband left work to meet a plumber (to fix the leak) mid-day at our house, and smelled something in our kitchen. He went down to knock on the external door to the rental to tell the guest that a plumber was coming- and asked him if the smell was incense. The guest said it was. My husband asked him not to do that, as it is an non-smoking rental. 

the guest proceeded to send me a barrage of messages (I am usually the one who handles the Airbnb communication) asking for reasons why he can’t use incense for his spiritual practice. I told him that the smell had traveled upstairs and we couldn’t allow it, even though he didn’t consider it to be a violation of the non-smoking policy, we did. He spent a couple of hours messaging me crazy questions like whether or not he could cook a vegan spiced patty in the kitchenette in the rental, or would that smell bother us? Could he use the bathroom, or would that smell bother us? Could he use essential oils? He kept saying he “wanted to understand our new rules.” It was really unnerving, to be honest- but I responded really politely each time that he should feel free to do normal things but that we couldn’t allow him to burn incense. I offered multiple times to refund him if he wasn’t comfortable here and he could find an alternative - and even offered to call Airbnb to get their help in finding an alternative - but he declined. I’m sure he wouldn’t have been able to find another place for that kind of cheap rate, that would allow him to cook meals etc. Anyhow, he went back to being mostly appreciative and polite in his messages after that one evening— except for one message complaining that my husband hadn’t asked him for his reasons for lighting incense, only had said “could you not.” I responded politely again that I was sorry that he felt my husband hadn’t been as sensitive as he would’ve liked, but that we appreciated he was following our rules. Since there were only two nights left on his stay at this point we decided to just let it go through. 

After he checked out, my husband found a box under the bed that is clearly for selling marijuana (little baggies, a small scale with bits of marijuana on it, thank you stickers). I guess it’s possible he just sells it and wasn’t smoking in the apartment. Marijuana is legal here in Colorado, and we don’t have a problem with it at all morally or anything, but we live above the rental with our little kids and don’t want to deal with smells like that, thus the listing says that there is no smoking at all anywhere on the property (meaning the backyard as well).

The guest left a review right away after he checked out. He also left a gracious note, so I am not worried that the review is negative.

I’ve thought about writing a factual but honest review, that he was a pleasant guest except that he questioned when we asked him to not burn incense. I honestly don’t even know what I would say about the box we found. I would not want to host him again. But here’s where I am concerned — he has all positive and 5 star reviews, so he would know if I left him less than 5 stars. His cell phone number in his profile is a local area Denver area code, even though his profile says that he is from Texas - adding to my assumption that he’s been here a while. He knows where I live, and even though he cannot get into our house or the rental (it’s a keypad code that we change for each guest), he was super creepy and weird and I just feel hesitant to do anything that could piss him off, for the safety of myself and my family. So I am leaning towards not leaving a review at all, because I certainly don’t want to write a fake false one. 

it’s funny, because if it hadn’t been for our sink leaking down into the rental, and thus my husband being home mid-day the next day on a work day, we probably would’ve never known about the incense (and who knows if he stashed the box in a hidden spot so we wouldn’t see it). Aside from the evening of creepy and crazy messages he was a fine guest, and left everything in order and there was no smell in the apartment. I guess I say all this because he probably wouldn’t be an issue for others (and his profile had glowing reviews), but maybe I am just trying to make myself feel better about possibly not reviewing him?