01-04-2026, 03:22 PM
Most guests are great to work with, but the occasional guest will be awful. Handling that occasional awful guest can be very stressful, but it won't happen very often… in my experience it has only been one out of 20 guests. (5%)
There's a lot more work involved in short-term rentals than long-term, so unless you're going to hire a management company, think of it as a part-time job rather than as "passive income". It can be rewarding, but evaluate your area before you make such a switch. Short-term rentals earn substantially more per rental night than long-term, but the difference can easily be eaten away by nights that go unused, and if it's close you're probably better off choosing your current path, that is more reliable and requires less work. Short-term rentals peaked around pandemic time. Although I started after that and have continued to do well, I hear from hosts regularly that they have fewer bookings each year than the year before. Many areas are saturated with Airbnbs, and local regulations are popping up all over that make it harder or ban it entirely in some places. I don't think I'd recommend this business to most people, most of the time.
If you want to know what sorts of things the bad guests do, all you have to do is peruse the many posts about awful guests on this forum. Keep in mind, though, that hosts don't post on the Airbnb forum about good guests, and guests don't post on the internet about good hosts. Most of the stories you'll see here are true, but not representative of a typical stay.
There's a lot more work involved in short-term rentals than long-term, so unless you're going to hire a management company, think of it as a part-time job rather than as "passive income". It can be rewarding, but evaluate your area before you make such a switch. Short-term rentals earn substantially more per rental night than long-term, but the difference can easily be eaten away by nights that go unused, and if it's close you're probably better off choosing your current path, that is more reliable and requires less work. Short-term rentals peaked around pandemic time. Although I started after that and have continued to do well, I hear from hosts regularly that they have fewer bookings each year than the year before. Many areas are saturated with Airbnbs, and local regulations are popping up all over that make it harder or ban it entirely in some places. I don't think I'd recommend this business to most people, most of the time.
If you want to know what sorts of things the bad guests do, all you have to do is peruse the many posts about awful guests on this forum. Keep in mind, though, that hosts don't post on the Airbnb forum about good guests, and guests don't post on the internet about good hosts. Most of the stories you'll see here are true, but not representative of a typical stay.