I have been an Airbnb host for many years now and during this time I have developed various strategies that can help you to grow your Airbnb cash flow. Here are my top 2 Airbnb Hosting Tips:
1. Never decline anyone.
You don't want to decline anyone who makes a request to use your property. If you do that often, Airbnb will know that you are not accepting everyone, which results in making their customers unhappy about the service. Airbnb, just as any other platform, has an advanced algorithm which puts the best hosts in the front line when someone makes a search. It's a win-win situation. If you win, Airbnb wins. If you don't let yourself win, Airbnb won't win either. This is the reason you may end up far below in Airbnb results. One trick to avoid doing business with someone you don't want to use your property and not "get caught" from the algorithm is making them a special offer. You don't decline their request, but you can double the price. If they accept, at least you know you earned something more. But usually, they won't.
2. Don't be afraid to give refunds.
If you spend some time doing this kind of business, you'll see that people will make up stories so they can ask for a refund. Let me tell you a real example that happened to me some days ago. We were installing solar panels on the house. The girl who was staying in the property texted me in the evening saying that she worked from home and because of the loud noise over her head for like 6 hours, she wasn't able to work that day. Eventually, she asked for a refund. The worst part was that the workers didn't finish all their work, so they would have to come back the other day and probably she would ask the same thing. That property has a price of $2oo/night which would make a $400 refund. The solution we came up with was the following: we proposed her refunding the work hours that she disturbed. So, 6 hours the first day and 6 hours the next day, it was a total of 12 hours which is half a day. We refunded her $100, the price of a half day in that property. She earned something and we avoided the big loss of $400.
These were my top 2 Airbnb Hosting Tips. Feel free to try them out and I can't wait to read your comments below.