A single mom of 3 booked an Airbnb during the Christmas holiday and had one special request for her host to make their stay extra memorable. She wanted the house fully decorated before she arrived.
However, the host was unsure if he would be able to fulfill the mom’s holiday wish and found her request to be “weirdly presumptuous.”
An Airbnb guest asked her host to decorate the house for Christmas before their arrival.
The Airbnb host took to the subreddit r/airbnb_hosts to share more about his guest’s disputable request.
According to the host, a single mother of three Instant booked his property from December 24 through December 26. Before her arrival, the mom asked the host if he could decorate the house for the holiday to make the experience more festive.
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The host explained that decorating his Airbnb would be an obstacle for him.
“I will be out of town for a few weeks around the holidays to be with family, so I would have to buy and decorate the tree at least 10 days before her arrival,” he wrote.
The host also explained that decorations could pose a serious liability issue.
“I haven’t decorated the Airbnb in the past, partially because I worry a bit about people leaving lights on/the tree not being watered by guests and it drying out/being a fire hazard,” he wrote.
He said that the guest was also bold enough to assume that he celebrated Christmas and would be willing to buy decorations and decorate the place.
He asked other Redditors how he should respond to the request.
“We’ve been hosting for 5 years, and have had over 500 guests and this is probably the most weirdly presumptuous request I’ve ever gotten,” he wrote.
Other people agreed that the guest’s request was presumptuous and offered the host suggestions as to how he should handle the situation.
Some encouraged the host to ask the guest what her decorations budget was, implying that decorating would be an additional charge and might deter her from her original request.
“If she wants you to decorate the place for Christmas and the place is not even advertised as a special Christmas suite (or something like that), then she should also pay you for Christmas, when things including Airbnb stays are priced higher (due to demands),” one Redditor commented.
Others urged the man to cancel her stay and believed her request inferred that she may be a difficult guest.
“A two-day guest with a weirdly presumptuous request like that would make me think there could be other unforeseen issues while you are away enjoying your family time. Not worth the potential headaches,” another user wrote.
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If the request was too much of a hassle for the host to accommodate, others reminded him that he was within his rights to inform her that he would be unable to do so and to remind her of the cancellation policy in case she wanted to utilize it.
It is important to note that not everyone celebrates Christmas, and some Airbnb hosts may deem it unethical to only deck the halls with Christmas trees and Santa statues, striving to establish a more inclusive environment by leaving their homes bare.
The decision of whether or not to decorate the property for the holiday season is entirely up to the Airbnb host.
However, this doesn’t mean that guests can’t bring their own safe and festive decorations if they want to brighten up the space!
Feel free to bring along your own gingerbread house-building kit, snow globes, and a tree that will not leave pine needles all over the floor and will not cause a fire!
Your host’s only job is to provide you with the space to do so.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.
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