hello youtube this is richard founder of short-term rental secrets.com and
Airbnb super host today I'm answering the question that one subscriber asked
and it's a really good one I think it's on many people's minds which is new to
hosting how do I keep people that I don't want in my home out of my home so
let me first just go on the record with a little disclaimer like I can't control
who you accept into your property no matter what tips I give you you know
this is life like bad things may happen so just realize that I'm trying to share
with you the things that I've learned but I'm still learning and I get fooled
sometimes and in fact I filmed a video where I had a bad episode so you should
watch that one and you know hopefully we all learn and if you have experience or
comments leave them so that we all benefit so jumping right into it I've
said this many times and it bears repeating now you want to be really
really transparent with your listing and the photos both the good and the bad and
what you want to try and dissuade is a really obvious things like if you don't
allow parties or you don't allow smoking or you don't want loud music after 10 or
whatever it is that's important to you just detail it many times it's okay you
don't want those people staying there so discourage them from staying there but
the other thing that's really important in your photos and in your description
are things that may be less obvious to you like I get asked all the time for
one of my properties that have stairs is this okay for my stroller and my
two-year-old or are there stairs that might be dangerous for a toddler these
are people that even though they pay just as well they're not going to throw
a party the last thing you want is any liability with god forbid a human
accident or incident so you want to be really clear about the stairs and how
many stairs and the flights and the color and uneven grate or you're going
up a little hill whatever it is because if that's a challenge for somebody then
they should be aware of it before they get there before they trip and they fall
and you have a real problem on your hands
the other thing that I encourage you to do is spend a minute trying to learn a
little bit more about your guests so take a look at their profile how long
have they been on Airbnb how many reviews do they have what do
other hosts say about them and to the extent that they don't have any reviews
feel free to go back and forth with them a couple of times and ask
that will help you gauge such as what brings you to XYZ region and who are you
traveling with and what's the purpose oh and have you been here before just
open-ended questions see how they respond there's no right answer but
you'll get a feel for whether these are people that you want staying with you
and in your home or whether they're you know maybe a little bit shady or you
don't feel like they're telling you to quite the truth and then ultimately
you're going to have to make a decision based on your gut your gut is always
right oftentimes where I have had problems and I don't mean problems like
parties are destroying my place I just mean like guests that are really
challenging or they're not happy instead of just complaining I don't want to do
that I just I can tell you right now that my friends on a Ledge smile and I'm
I don't think we're any comfortable here and I want to figure out a solution
that's going to be okay for you and okay for me they're very demanding when I go
back and I look at sort of the questions that they were asking I could have
guessed that they would have been challenging only there was nothing that
told me don't book them or you have availability take the money but in
retrospect when I go back and I analyze it it's like well who asked about that
and why would they have asked about it and sort of a little bit of a antenna
went off and said they might be better suited for a hotel and in the cases
where I've had actual bad experiences and there's videos on it it's always
been a same-day booking right and and you know if you have availability and
somebody's willing to pay it's really compelling to take that money because
it's going to go vacant otherwise but in my experience it's a little bit Shady
why would somebody not have a reservation and be traveling to your
city or your vacation home let's have a really compelling story about you know
what happened to their other plans chances are they're up to something
that's no good they don't want to do it in their own home so they'd rather pay
you you know a couple hundred dollars and use your home so I really at this
point shy away from that another tip that's not quite as
important but it always strikes me as a little bit weird are the people that are
trying to transact off of Airbnb or home away so if somebody says hey call me and
here's my number here's a website or do whatever that's sort of counter to the
whole community that I'm a part of and proud to be a part of and I take
seriously and while I don't love paying fees I'm happy to pay fees
Airbnb provides a great service for me and so people that are trying to skirt
the system it's a little bit indicative of me that they might kind of skirt my
rules or break my rules too and so I don't know that I would deny people but
when I get that sense and it's too strong I do in fact listen to my gut and
reject them I hope you found this helpful if you have additional tips or
information that you want to share with the community please do so like that's
one of the great things about this channel in the comment section we can
all learn from one another so what do you do what has been helpful what tips
do you have for others the more that we engage the more we're going to learn
mutually and we're all going to grow so go ahead and like the video leave your
comments and feedback if you haven't subscribed what are you waiting for
subscribe now until then happy