3 Types of Airbnb Messages And How To Respond

1. Inquiry an inquiry is simply a guest asking you a question. They may have entered dates of stay in their inquiry, but they may not have. Inquiries generally come from guests who are not ready to book.

Otherwise, they would have used the Reservation Request feature or the Instant Book feature.

When you get an inquiry you must reply with a text response or your response rate will be dinged. After replying with text you can choose to pre-approve the guest if they have specific dates they are interested in, which will allow them to instantly book, but as you read pre-approval expires after 24 hours and you can pre-approve multiple guests for the same dates. Only one guest can book. It’s just about who books first. You can decline the inquiry if you want to prevent this person from booking. The only thing you have to do with an inquiry is reply with text. You do not have to pre-aprove or decline. 

The last thing you can do is send a special offer if you want to send the guest a discounted offer to stay for their dates. When you go to the special offer section and put in the subtotal it should include the cleaning fee amount. Airbnb will automatically add the taxes and service fees to that amount. Be sure to double check the breakdown of the special offer before you send it. Each time you enter a subtotal you’ll see the breakdown below change. You might need to first ask the guest “What is the total you see on your end” so that you can be sure the offer you send them is properly discounted. Frequently, when sending a special offer a guest will say “Why did the nightly rate increase when you sent the special offer?” You can reply by explaining “In a special offer you have to roll the cleaning fee in. The nightly rate may appear higher, but the total should be lower.”

2. Reservation Request A reservation request comes when a guest is ready to book and wants to reserve the dates. It may be that the guest has no reviews yet and doesn’t meet your requirements for instant book OR they simply didn’t see the instant book option. With a reservation request you can accept or decline. You must accept or decline. You will have 24 hours before the request expires. Don’t let requests expire. If you aren’t sure about the request feel free to ask more questions to help you decide if this is a booking you’d like to accept or not. If you decline you will need to select the reason you are declining. Airbnb Help Article: https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/28

3. Instant Booking Congrats! A guest has instantly booked dates at your property. I always respond to these with a thanks for booking type message. If you look at the instant booking and feel uncomfortable about it feel free to ask the guests questions. You can cancel an instant booking penalty-free by calling Airbnb if a guest does not meet your house rules.