To think many people have confused their paying holiday rental with house sitting?

[HeleenaHandcart]

Back from a week away and I’m starting to give up on UK holiday homes.

I obviously am happy to respect the property and be generally clean and tidy, but more and more I see higher and higher costs and higher and higher cleaning expectations. As well as earlier and earlier leaving times.

I don’t want to work as an unpaid house keeper before a long drive, nor generally add towards upkeep of the house I’m paying a ton for. I used to strip beds for example, but not with kids and an early leave time as well as wanting it all bagged up it’s a bit much before 9am. Frankly I’m not watering anything either. Now as well more and more places say you must leave by 9am, yet can’t enter until 5/6pm due to ‘cleaning’ but you must clean the place fully. Bins out and a list of chores for you.

Last week I was asked to be in for the washing machine repair man even (I said no). It’s not a bloody holiday- it’s house sitting and paying to be a house-sitter. My particular annoyance is stating ‘all surfaces to be cleaned and wiped, including the bathroom’ and they don’t leave a single cloth or cleaning product in the property. It’s like they also expect you to either purchase or bring a house cleaning kit.

Oh and ‘quirks of the property’, stuff that generally requires extra work to use stuff like ‘each day the windows all must be opened for 10 min’, ‘the shower cubicle has a daily water mark spray’ or ‘the boiler needs x, y…’

Its time to go back to hotel stays

10000% agree. I stayed in a really quite nice, quite expensive cottage, that required a complete clean before leaving. There was nothing in the advert or booking details, so we only found out when we arrived. I checked if the owner meant a proper clean, or just to do washing up, which I thought was reasonable. She did not just mean washing up, she meant a thorough clean so it was ready for the next guests. I was really quite unhappy about that, so asked if there was an extra charge for cleaning that I could pay. The owner told me they didn't have a cleaner so that wasn't possible. That is absolutely bang out of order imo, we don't go on holiday to spend hours hoovering, dusting, and cleaning bathrooms before the next guests arrive. It's a cottage quite close to where my family live, so we could have been repeat customers, but there's not a cat in hell's chance I'd book again. I now check carefully before booking anywhere to see if they expect anything like that. CF owners can do it themselves or employ their own cleaners for the rentals fees they charge.

Maybe all the mumsnetting Airbnb hosts should set up a 'rentfromus' page on mumsnet - fully stating cleaning requirements, check ins and outs etc- as most of you sound a damn site more 'aware' of what is fair and doable than most hosts out there!!! Post for free -but 5% to mumsnet !

So glad we have a cheap flat that we do what we like with- shared between my parents and us.

@CupcakesK Tax second homes heavily. State a fixed percentage of houses allowed to be let out for holiday homes through local license - include air bnbs in it.
I know someone who bought the last house as a holiday home in a village that someone actually lived in. Every single house in that village is now a holiday or second home. I have no patience for the resultant complaints about finding cleaners or the cost of maintenance due to paying someone who lives elsewhere to travel there to do work.

@ToadiesCouzin That is outrageous. What happens if someone just refuses to clean or does a crappy job? Does the next guest just have to deal with it?

I ask our guests to put the wheelie bins out on bin day and not to leave washing up out (can leave in dishwasher). That's it. I have 2 cleaners who do 5 hours each to do the turnaround between 10-4. There's no way I can expect a guest to clean for 10 hours when they're on holiday!!

I don't know, we begrudgingly did the cleaning, I wish we'd left it now. There may have been a breakages deposit or something that I was worried about not getting back, but on principle we really should have just driven off and forgotten about it!

Gosh. I am an occasional airbnb host and my cleaning requirements are just "please leave it reasonably decent" and checkout is 12 midday. I can't imagine having the brass neck to take a cleaning fee and then ask guests to... clean. I mean, one or the other, surely?

I do ask that they water the plants (my bookings are always a minimum of 3 weeks, so it's not completely crazy), although I had one couple who "weren't comfortable" mowing the lawn during their 6 week stay (fair enough) but also "weren't comfortable" letting in my gardener to do it instead. They consented to let the gardener in, in the end, because we were at a bit of an impasse.

They also said they were plant biologists and would be delighted to water then plants, then sent me a photo of my completely wilted peace lily and said "this one seems to have died". I politely suggested watering it and got an amazed message back the next day saying it was fine now. 🤐

@Crikeyalmighty you are being snipy. But holiday home rentals are expensive. If someone is paying a lot they expect a decent and professional service. Not amateur hour, broken things, not enough of the cheap basics, and demands to do a full clean.
So if you need to come in to check chemicals in a pool or hot tub, you say this in the listing and say what day this will happen.
You repair things quickly. Everyone knows that sometimes things do break down on the day you will be arriving, but you apologise and sort it out as quickly as possible. You do not have a list of things that do not really work properly.
You do not expect people to clean a property before they go that you are advertising as a luxury stay and you always put any expectations in the listings.
You have the basics. Tea towels, decent towel if you are providing one, dishwasher tablets, etc.
Not the minimum in the kitchen e.g. not just 4 plates and 4 sets of cutlery. These things are not expensive.
Look at what professionals provide. If you do not want to provide that market it as a cheap but basic place.

That's outrageous!

Sorry @antelopevalley - I think you misinterpreted me- it was a suggestion' - not sarcastic -- I fully agree with you and hence why I won't do Airbnb anymore!!

Hate holidays like this, only been a few times when family have invited us to join them. Cooking is a nightmare with rubbish knives, mis-matched crockery etc. Never enough sofas for everyone to sit down comfortably and tiny tv's!

@Crikeyalmighty ah sorry about that.

I live in a holiday area, and it’s not just hospitality staff, cleaners, etc. that we’re having issues recruiting.

We also can’t recruit teachers, doctors, nurses, social workers, etc as there’s nowhere for them to live as there’s no rental properties. The very few large companies we have here are closing as they can’t recruit staff.

We have to travel to other hospitals for essential services, such as cancer treatment as it can’t be offered in our local hospital as we don’t have the specialist staff.

Local families are currently living in 1 room in B&Bs as there are no rental houses available because their landlord has sold their house and it’s been turned into an AirB&B

These issues aren’t solely down to Air B&B and holiday lets. Our main economy is based on tourism, and there has always been 2nd homes and holiday lets, but the last 2 years seem to have tipped a balance. Add a huge increase in house prices, huge amounts of people moving over as they’re now working from home and we’ve got a bit of a perfect storm

I rent out holiday villas in Spain and we don’t ask guests to clean or make beds but we do ask them to take their rubbish and leave things where they’re supposed to be. It has to have reasonable dirt - if you’ve had a party then don’t expect our cleaners to wash all sticky stuff etc. in my experience, brits and Spaniards are the worst and Northern Europeans are the best at keeping things reasonable.

We once left a rental we’d had for 3 nights, and got a call while on the road saying we’d left it in “a disgusting state” and that they wouldn’t be renting to us ever again. Baffling. We’d barely been there. Emptied all the bins, stripped beds/towels into a neat pile, and hoovered. There wasn’t anything to be messy/dirty. Dh just laughed and said “ok”, but to this day I am confused as to what WAS expected.

@alloalloallo the same is happening in St Ives. I have friends there who can not recruit staff as the availability of affordable living accommodation is nonexistent unless you want a £400k flat or £700k house. Many of the local businesses are struggling particularly as more of the young people move away ‘up country’ for better career prospects.

This why I always stay at a hotel. I do not want to clean when I am holiday.

We always used to holiday in holiday cottages when I was a child. I remember helping my mum strip beds and clean before we left to go home so it is nothing new.

We stayed in a cabin in 2020 we only had to strip the beds and air it. We did make sure we left it clean and tidy which I didn't mind.

Haha - I’ve never stayed at one of these, and thanks to this post I never will !

Cleaning at 9am - as if !

There are still some decent ones. The last one we stayed at was on a farm, very private but also near the farm house. There were no requirements at all, apart from be out by 10am. But have also stayed at one with post it notes throughout the house with do this, don’t do that. Booked it over another because it boasted a dryer, only to find if didn’t have a washing machine.

With you on this, completely. Hate Airbnb with a passion, especially when you look at the effect on accommodation in the local area in places like Cornwall and coastal Wales. Give me a nice Premier Inn any time. (Ordinary b and bs are fine too but so hard to find these days).

No, it needs to be tackled by the government (or local government). Don't blame the customers.
Wales is working on it.

ToadiesCouzin that’s outrageous it wasn’t mentioned before you booked or arrived. People stay for all sorts of reasons - fancy assuming everyone has the time and inclination or ability to clean. You might be staying for work or recovering on crutches after an op etc.

I think this is why when you stay places often they aren’t really clean - especially kitchen equipment/glasses. They rely on the last inhabitants to have cleaned properly and then someone comes in and does bare minimum in between (im including my experience of centre parcs in this as well).

I’m stuck. We don’t want to stay in hotels because child has food allergies and it’s impossible to cater with a hotel stay, so no choice but to stay in self catering. We’d rather go abroad but at the moment it seems a disaster travelling and DH isn’t keen on getting a plane quite yet. When I was a kid we always went to stay in sites with cabins on them. Not fancy wooden lodges with hot tubs, just holiday camps (no entertainment) with rows of cabins. Does anyone build them anymore?

Totally agree, you can stay in a proper hotel for less money and not worry about losing a £450 deposit because you left out a dirty spoon after the stay.