Does Airbnb Rate Guests? 3 Things You Should Know!

Let me tell you the story about a guest named Brian and a guest named Lauren.

Brian is 24 years old and recently graduated from college. He is looking for a relaxing vacation before he starts his very demanding career as a software engineer. Brian has never used Airbnb before, but after doing some research online he decides that it seems like a good option for him.

He doesn’t quite understand how the process works, but he found an amazing cabin in the mountains near some biking and hiking paths that he thinks is the perfect spot for his getaway.

Brian books the cabin and eagerly awaits his vacation, excited to explore the beautiful area around him and enjoy some time doing nothing but relaxing.

However, he didn’t realize that he booked it for 2 nights, not 3.

On the third day, while he was out exploring in an area that has very poor reception, Brian gets several missed calls with an angry message left by his host. He missed his checkout window and other guests are set to arrive, so the host gathered up all his belongings into a trash bag and set them aside for him.

Enter Lauren…

Lauren is also 24 years old, but she’s a party girl who works as a bartender to help pay for her expensive habits. She likes to use Airbnb to throw small parties and meet with various different boyfriends who provide her with free booze and drugs.

Lauren is used to getting her way and having a lot more leniency than Brian when it comes to things like checkouts and comings-and-goings, but one night she had one of her boyfriends come over who brought over a handful of other people.

They notice the security cameras, and instead of respecting the property and behaving themselves, they threw up gang signs and started making a lot of noise throughout the neighborhood.

When Lauren finally checked out, the place was trashed with strange stains on the sheets and cigarette butts all over the inside of the house, and the host was furious.

So what do Brian and Lauren have in common?

Although their circumstances are very different, they will both be impacted by Airbnb’s review system for guests in the following 3 ways:

#1. Your Airbnb Guest Rating Is Public

One of the most important things that Airbnb does to keep both hosts and guests accountable is to create a publicly-visible rating system. This means that not only does your host get to rate you, but you also get to rate them in return. And these ratings are public – meaning that anyone can see how good or bad you have been as an Airbnb guest.

If you’re an entitled Lauren who thinks that she can get away with being rude or disrespectful to her hosts, then you should know that your host is watching and waiting for an opportunity to give you a bad review.

#2. Your Airbnb Guest Rating Follows You Around

Whether you get a good review or a bad one, this rating will follow you around and be visible to anyone who does a search for your profile on Airbnb. Reviews are permanent, so you wont be able to get them removed without some major intercession from an Airbnb employee.

(Even if there was a misunderstanding and the host wants to change their rating, they wont be able to.)

And if you’re a guest like Brian, who is new to the platform and doesn’t have any reviews yet, then having your first review be a bad one can really hurt your chances of being approved for bookings in the future.

#3. Your Airbnb Guest Rating Can Affect Future Stays

Even if you’re a first-time Airbnb user and don’t have any reviews yet, that doesn’t mean that your host isn’t checking out your profile and seeing what other people have to say about you.

In fact, we’ve never approved anyone’s reservation without first diving deep into their profile and analyzing their reviews.

When it comes to booking guests who are new to Airbnb, hosts will often look at their profiles and check out the reviews that they’ve received on other platforms too, like Yelp or Facebook. In other words, if you want to get a spot in an Airbnb listing, then you need to be someone that hosts want to invite over.

Both Brian and Lauren will have a difficult time booking future stays on Airbnb once they receive a bad review, so it’s important that you take your responsibilities as guests seriously and be mindful of the impact that your actions can have on hosts.

Now the next question becomes, where and how do you see your guest rating? Well, we just so happen to have written an article about that here, so be sure to check it out.