BED BUGS in an Airbnb?! (What to do!)

(00:00) what’s up guys in today’s video we’re going to be talking bed bugs as you may have noticed I’ve got a slightly different background than I normally do and if you’ve been super attentive you’ll notice that I actually switched to a different background as well a couple of videos ago and that’s because I’m traveling right now and I traveled for a few months to a city to stay in where I booked an Airbnb and when I got into that Airbnb after the first day we had an unfortunate realization that there were in fact bed
(00:35) bugs in the property and that’s the bad news it means I’m saying in a hotel for a few days but the good news is that this host actually just so happened to put on a master class in how to deal with this type of issue and so I want to share with you from the guest perspective what to do if this happens to you and then also from the host perspective what to do if this happens in one of your listings so let’s dive right into it obviously this is a bit of an icky topic to talk about no one wants to imagine having bed bugs crawling
(01:05) around in their bed or the the bed of the property they host or own or manage um but the reality is these things sometimes happen I will share that this property was a relatively new property super clean impeccably maintained we got in it’s not like we were staying in some budget place that was likely infested that was really dirty or unkempt um these things do just happen sometimes there’s a level of inevitability to it for example if someone that stayed at that property had previously stayed in a place with bed bugs and just carried
(01:35) them over then there’s not a whole lot you can do the bed bugs in this particular place were hiding in the bed frame not even in the mattress they weren’t visible anywhere um and so there’s a few things that you’ll want to do to prevent this from happening as a host and that comes down to just looking at and inspecting your uh sheets and your mattress protector these things what you’ll notice is that anytime that there are bed bugs you’ll see small signs little Wei spots of blood or little black spots I don’t actually know
(02:03) enough about bed bugs to know what this is from exactly uh this is just from a few quick moments of Googling to figure out how to find bed bugs and figure out if you have them but uh now good to know as a host to be aware of that and have your clean team check for that kind of thing um and if they do find something like that to inspect further to find bed bugs they’re not all that hard to find once you start looking for them once you start looking for them they’re a little we red bug and they’re pretty easy to
(02:29) see and to spot now what you can then do as a guest side we’re going to start there and I’m going to dive over to what to do as a host and share with you what this host did that in my opinion was just a master class and how to deal with this issue effectively as a guest you’ll want to reach out to your host first and foremost and then you’ll want to reach out to Airbnb get things resolved with your host first let them know about the issue then reach out to Airbnb so that you can go and get accommodated
(02:52) somewhere else until the issue gets dealt with now I was told by Airbnb that sometimes this process of eliminating bed bugs can take a really long time up to 20 days they said in my case the Exterminator was in the very next morning dealt with the issue and I’m 3 days in a hotel and then going to be back over to the property now one thing that is super super important to discuss with Airbnb is whether or not you want to cancel the reservation Airbnb will by default want to cancel your reservation and then also suspend the host listing
(03:21) now for me because the host dealt with it so so well and they were all over it I definitely didn’t want their listing getting suspended I’ve been through that myself as aost and I definitely didn’t want this impact on the host especially because I had booked with them for 2 months so it was pretty much guaranteed that they were going to get the issue resolved by the time that I checked out and another guest would potentially check in so there’s really just no need to suspend the listing which is why I
(03:46) asked Airbnb specifically please do not suspend the host and I also asked them to please not cancel the reservation I didn’t want to be scrambling last minute to find a place to stay for an extended period of time and so I just asked them to hold my reservation um put me up at a hotel for a few days which Airbnb agreed to do now that’s an important one as well you’ll want to ask Airbnb to comp you for the hotel stay because obviously that’s part of the protection that you get as a guest staying on Airbnb and
(04:14) then you can go back and continue at the rest your reservation which is exactly what we’re doing the host has now completely uh resolved the issue they have the Exterminator go in there the Exterminator has verified that everything is resolved there’s no bed bugs they took care of everything for us um and now we’re going back in and just going to enjoy the rest of our stay in the place that we booked in the location we wanted everything we wanted we were very particular about picking that place so I’m happy to say that we get to go
(04:37) back there now let’s jump into how you can deal with it effectively as a host and I want to walk through what this host did because honestly there’s not a real thing that they did wrong here in fact I think they went above and beyond what you could reasonably expect a host to do U basically I called the host and within minutes they were there at the property to check it out for me now that is a luxury of them being uh they live live right next door basically so they’re very very close by um now that’s
(05:03) obviously not an expectation for every host cuz a lot of US host remotely but getting someone to the property quickly is going to be really important especially with this because it happened in the evening that we noticed it and then we had to figure something out before we actually went to sleep because we’d have to find out some other kind of for form of accommodation and get this kind of resolved relatively quickly so getting someone over to the property whether it’s your cleaner your handyman someone you have boots on the ground
(05:27) quickly is going to be really really important not only does it help just expedite things and make it nice and efficient for the guest staying there but it also reassures the guest I can say from experience that you actually care about the issue and that you are on top of it so that was the first thing the host came over didn’t uh you know interrogate me or like question me or blame me or anything was just like very uh concerned wanted to check it out took a look at it himself and then took some photos and immediately uh he basically
(05:55) said hey I’m going to go and contact Airbnb um you can take care of anything like contact Airbnb on your end take care of what you need to I’m going to go and contact Airbnb and I’m going to start working on this and I’ll keep you posted U and so he immediately went called Airbnb got on the phone with them got on the phone with an exterminator company sent them the pictures got them to verify that yes indeed these were bed bugs got them scheduled for the very next morning so when the host came back
(06:19) to me about an hour later he had already spoken to Airbnb already confirmed that whatever was needed to get me re accommodated and refunded for any nights I wouldn’t be staying there would be taken care of he had already called the extermination company already booked them
(06:35) for 10:00 a.m. the next morning already gotten an estimated timeline from them of when I’d be able to be back in the property all of that was sorted out so again that all happened within about an hour now um obviously for me this was the actual host themselves but for uh for any of you that are managing Properties or uh have a larger portfolio you want to make sure that your portfolio manager the person that you have kind of triaging these types of issues is well equipped to deal with this issue and effectively problem solve that’s one of the most important
(07:03) character traits that I look for in a portfolio manager is that critical thinking and problem solving ability because once you find someone that can do that effectively and take care of a situation like this in a very similar way to that this host did um that is when you really get to be hands off on your portfolio and you’re no longer sucked into that day-to-day guys just want to take a quick break here to say that for those of you watching who want to build cash flow and long-term wealth by purchasing airbnbs and short-term
(07:31) rental properties there’s a link in the description right down below for a free training that’ll walk you through my exact strategy for investing successfully in airbnbs now if you’re not ready to actually buy properties and you want to get started managing other people’s properties on Airbnb the same way I got started and build a full-time income managing other people’s properties there’s actually another free training Linked In the description down below as well that’ll be a really great
(07:57) fit for you so whether you want want to invest in short-term rental properties and actually build amazing cash flow and long-term wealth by acquiring the assets buying the properties themselves or you’re looking to earn a full-time income managing other people’s properties on Airbnb we’ve got some awesome trainings that are linked in the description down below that’ll definitely help you out when you sign up for the trainings we’re also going to send you a few other tools and resources completely for free just to help you get
(08:23) started again the links to sign up are in the description down below and both trainings and all the tools are completely compl free so make sure to register for the trainings links in the description down below now from there uh the host went again an extra mile and we had to obviously pack up all of our stuff that we had just unpacked take it out with us and so this host generously offered to help us putting everything that we wanted into his fridge next door to safekeep it until we got back uh he also offered to store anything that we didn’t
(08:52) necessarily need over the next 3 days but needed to get out of the uh the house because the process for extermination we didn’t want things just sitting in there while they like heated the house out and sprayed out any chemicals that kind of thing so he generally offered as well to just uh hold that stuff inside of his garage or inside of his house uh whatever was needed just so that we didn’t have to like lug it all over to the hotel with us so that was super helpful and then went an even step further and offered to
(09:16) just drive us over to the hotel we’d be staying at so we wouldn’t have to deal with ordering an Uber and that kind of thing so again just really really helpful throughout all of that process making sure that everything went really really smoothly with getting us out of there and getting the issue resolved then from there the host communicated with us over the next couple of days to let us know how things were going sent update pictures sent updates from the extermination company saying hey they did a full inspection of the place we um
(09:42) you know they determined that there was only bed bugs in the one bed it hadn’t moved anywhere else to like couches or other furniture or anything like that so that’s obviously reassuring just from like eliminating an ick factor for us as the guest staying there um he then went overboard with the extermination company and did not one not two but three rounds of different kind of types of remedies for the situation just to be absolutely positively sure that the issue was completely resolved and they bad bugs
(10:08) wouldn’t come back there’s basically three different levels of extermination that you can do and he went all out got all three levels done and then went an even set further and just threw away all the sheets all the pillowcases all the comforters the duvet in the property bought all new ones and has them there ready for us like everything all cleaned all made up done up ready for us to go so again just getting rid of some of that like kind of ick factor involved with the whole situation so again I think this is really above and beyond he
(10:35) said himself like the extermination company didn’t say that he needed to do any of that didn’t say that he need to do all three rounds didn’t say that he need to throw everything out I personally if I were hosting the place I would throw that stuff out just because again for the guest it is a bit of an ick factor and the last thing you want is that by some chance there actually is a bed bug just kind of hiding in or an egg or something hiding in one of those things and then you have the issue come
(10:58) up all over again so I actually think it is just a good call to do that in a situation like this um although expensive it obviously is just necessary to resolve and remedy the situation so did that communicated with us really really effectively and updated us so we weren’t just kind of left in the dark and left in limbo um and then made sure everything is ready for us to get back there later this afternoon so again I think that was a real master class from the hosting perspective um he managed to maintain the reservation there was a
(11:24) two-month reservation so that’s really great we wanted to stay with him and if you had a handle really poorly then obviously he could have lost that reservation that’s what Airbnb wanted that was their first gut reaction but just because of how incredibly well he handled it there was no question in my mind that I wanted to keep staying at this property if we could after the issue was resolved so we managed to achieve that just by being a really good solid host and I’m going to absolutely be leaving this host a five-star review
(11:52) obviously pending the next couple of months not any nothing crazy happening going to be leaving this host a really really good review and just because again I really believe that as hosts we should be measured not on any incidents that happen that are outside of our control but on how we deal with it which is fully within our control and that’s why I always tell people that it’s not these different challenges or these different problems that arise that are going to get you bad ratings it’s your inability to deal with them the right
(12:21) way for example an air conditioner breaking there’s just nothing you can do about that assuming that it is a freak thing assuming you don’t have like a 20-year- old 30-year-old 40-year-old AC unit that’s on like its last legs and you can’t possibly expect it to keep going and you’re just trying to be cheap and keep it keep it running sure you could do something to prevent that but things happen in this industry you know you have air conditioners that break you have different things that break things
(12:46) that don’t work you know the dishwasher stops working the fridge stops working these different things happen and it’s unfortunate but a lot of the time it doesn’t actually lead to bad reviews from guests because guests are relatively understanding human beings that are rational and understand these kind of things can happen to anyone for the most part but what they do reled to bad reviews for is if you don’t handle them effectively if you just leave it you don’t communicate with the guest
(13:11) about what’s going on you don’t keep them in the loop you don’t jump into action and actually try to resolve the issue right away you drag your feet with it that’s what leads to bad reviews and so as hosts we need to make sure that we have the right systems and processes and teams in place so that we can get on top of this stuff and communicate effectively with our guests so that’s my experience I hope this is helpful and valuable to you and I think it can be applied the same kind of philosophy to a
(13:34) whole bunch of different issues that might come up when you’re hosting so let me know in the comment section down below if you have any thoughts questions anything you want to share if you like this video found it valuable or if you just want to help me out and help grow this channel get these videos in front of more people then make sure you hit that like button takes half a second so just hit that like button down below the video if you’re new here and you haven’t yet subscribed to the channel make sure
(13:53) you hit the Subscribe Button as well so you can stay up to date with the two new videos WE Post every single week here on the Channel with all that being being said thanks so much for watching this video and I’ll see you in the next [Music] [Music] one