Advice on Declined Requests Impacting Visibility

[Yelena Korshak]

Hi Everyone! I have a MTR that I list on both, Airbnb and Furnished Finder. My current tenant moves out at the end of April, I've been getting several Airbnb requests that start in June, & I've been declining them to avoid vacancy in May. Now, I'm seeing a significant drop in requests; Last week, I was getting a few a day &, now, I'm getting none. 

After doing research & learning that declining requests significantly impacts visibility, I'm left with two questions: 

1) How would you go about rejecting people to avoid vacancies without getting penalized?

2) Most importantly, what do I do now? Do you have any recommendations on how to remedy the situation? Should I consider remaking my listing altogether? 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

[Michael Baum]

Hey @Yelena Korshak, well I am not an expert on AirBNB's way of ranking and rating. It appears to be a mystery to me sometimes.

But...when you reject requests with no good reason, it hurts the listing. No way around that. If all you are concerned about is no bookings in May, that is not a good reason to reject bookings. It needs to have some kind of violation. Obviously a party, too many people, pets in a no pet house etc. How many bookings have you declined?

So I think you have tanked your listing. That is my opinion with not too much evidence other than what I have gleaned on internet searches.

How many bookings do you get from FF vs AirBNB? How many 5 star reviews do you have?

If you only have a couple of good reviews, you could redo the listing. Not sure how well that will go. I do not know if AirBNB tracks listings by address or owner.

The bottom line is you don't decline on AirBNB without a good reason.

Is all your bookings over 30days?