How to Ask Your Airbnb Host for a Discount
You may not yet enjoy driving too far from home, but you are ready for the trip and a change of scenery. Great, but look twice before booking your accommodation. You may be able to save some money that you can re-invest in your travel budget. The secret, according to The Points Guy’s Chris Dong, is to ask the Airbnb host for a discount. “Many hosts have thought about their prices quite carefully and – especially in light of the pandemic – will be looking to recoup some of the lost income from the travel slump,” writes Dong. “However, that doesn’t mean you can’t negotiate at all.”
If you’re planning to stay for more than a few days, see if the host offers a discount for stays of a week or more, Dong suggests. Many hosts already have this built into their listing calendar, so play around with arrival and departure dates to see how rates change. If you don’t see a discount on a long stay, you can contact the host prior to booking to see if they are willing to offer it.
Or, if you are thinking of a listing with only a few reviews – perhaps the host is new – the host may want to charge less now in order to drive more traffic in the future.
Of course it will help if you’ve proven yourself as a guest on Airbnb. If you have a mix of good and bad reviews, or a limited booking history, don’t expect someone to offer you any perks. But if you have a solid history as a guest and travel a lot, your profile plus a very kindly worded query (hint) can grab the host’s attention.
Dong cautions not to send messages to a group of hosts looking to book a room at the lowest possible rate. Only tell the host you are actually interested in booking your stay with. While some hosts will be happy to accept a discounted booking to offset some of the lost revenue from the outage period, others may have already cut their rates as much as possible.
Remember to be respectful and not upset if the host doesn’t cut rates. Take your shot, but accept the fact that it won’t work every time. As with most shopping, you won’t save money if you don’t ask.