How has COVID-19 impacted on your Airbnb property?

Thanks for posting this on here - the announcement from AirBnB had gone in my junk. I had a 5 week booking cancel which qualifies under this policy so I'm really pleased to learn about this.

 

Just had a request to book month by month for five adults at just over half the usual rate, with the monthly discount the rate worked out to $113 a night, but, they offered much less than that, sheesh.

 

They offered 450, I googled the requester based on the info and it may be that the five comprise the couple plus the parents of one and one child. The info on google nominates parents in the same workplace however shows three children , two little ones plus the older who, under Airbnb criteria would be considered an adult. So, if they were one family they could be together but 7 people is different to five and that would be extremely cheap living! Yes, it is big enough for five or seven for that matter.
they wanted to rent it in a month by month basis dependent upon the situation. They said they had returned from OS but did not mention whether they had been in isolation here.

 

No, the nightly rate is 120, the discount is for over a month. Weekly rent would be 480-500 I imagine but obviously tenant pays water and power.

 

I had a Sydney couple move into my pad out the back in Feb. They had handed in the keys to their rental flat and their plan was to stay for a month before heading overseas - first stop Italy. When it became apparent how big this problem was, I took a few beers out to backyard and we had a chat. I told them they could stay till the end of the year if they wanted to. They were so pleased - they like it out there.
In my big pad upstairs, I have an American couple who have been in Australia for 6 months and who have stayed with us previously. They are there for another month and after that they'll either stay or head off. When they leave, I have a local who wants to stay there long term. I've told them they can probably have it till the end of the year.
I'm hoping there is some travel permitted after Christmas. I like the ebb and flow of the Airbnb guests we have.

 

We’ve had three more dodgy sounding requests with the last two looking like they come from the same group of what looks like backpackers, we’ve declined them .

 

I have now got long term (6 months) tenants in my Airbnb now. Rent is half of the Airbnb normal rate.
The borders closed, lack of travel, no physical classes at the universities, no weddings etc....
No demand.

 

The local agent inspected ours with a view to letting it out, probably sign it up next week. Rent is also about half.

 

Good luck with it!

 

Thanks Gockie, it’s still on the market, it was pre Covid, the agent feels supremely confident it will sell at today’s home open now we’ve made the call to rent it out. It is a stunningly beautiful day in Perth and it has lovely ocean glimpses so maybe today is the day! If not, rental next week!

 

The local who was going to stay in my main Airbnb pad after the people there now leave has changed his mind. So I put a post on a FB group called Sydney Sub-Lets. Got a few responses in a day or so and a couple move in for 6 months the day after the Airbnb tenants leave.
The rent is $450 per week, so maybe 30-40% less than my Airbnb long stay rate, but I won’t have to do anything, which is good. And there will be no booking holes in that 6 months.
One of the girls is an artist and works at a gallery in Sydney, so she will get involved in the downstairs studio for sure and make herself useful. The other girl is French and is finishing a degree here and is also doing some French tutoring. Because I reduced the rent to $450 per week, the deal is she needs to talk to my youngest daughter in French for one hour per week - that daughter is doing French for the HSC.

 

Haha I love the bartering.

 

WA has re opened some regions internally ( that sounds odd!) and I believe Airbnb’s and B and B down South have solid bookings now, I even booked a weekend place through my union, and only one was left so people are moving around, likely too late for metro Airbnb operators.
After having great confidence the agent is EXPECTING to send through an offer on our Airbnb house today, not signed and sealed till it’s signed and sealed though.

 

Yes, the people who have been most hit are the ones who took out leases on multiple properties, furnished them, and then put them on Airbnb. Their income would have collapsed. It was a punt that did not pay off. They would be trying to flog the furniture and get those properties onto the long term market.
I had a guest from the US a few years ago and she got in touch a few weeks ago. She works for one of the big travel magazines sometimes asks me stuff about Australia. When she got in touch this time, she was doing a story on Airbnb and how the fact that it has strayed so far from its roots made it (and hosts) vulnerable to the current problem. In the beginning, Airbnb was all about hosting people in your own home. Those days are long gone and people with multiple hands-off listings dominate the platform. When the article runs, I will post a link.

 

We airbnb our second bedroom in a central location where you can walk to supermarket, restaurants, parks, etc. We were booked at >90% for March/April/May, only to have every reservation cancelled once the travel restrictions started kicking in.

But almost concurrently, we experienced significant demand from overseas visitors who've become "stuck" in Australia. The first day after our calendar opened up we had three requests, each looking for several weeks to several months.

We seemed to get interest from two main groups:

• young backpackers for whom our place (shared with us) is a step up and more expensive, but they want to be more comfortable / in a more "home-like environment" now that they're no longer able to be out doing stuff all day; and
• tourists who had been in hotels, who want both the reduced expense, and the ability to cook meals and do washing etc now that they're here for longer.

Our present guests are in their second month with us, at about 25% below usual rate (which we offer anyway for bookings more than a month). They plan to stay until August. It's been pretty good for us so far.

 

Airbnb house went under offer yesterday here in Perth, won’t count the money till it is all done and dusted!

 

Here is that article I mentioned:

How Airbnb Could Change After the Pandemic—For the Better