5 Ways Holiday Rental Owners Can Improve Their Guest Experience
By Carol Matassa
Let me start by saying that I am not a holiday rental owner myself. I have, however, stayed in more than a few in my lifetime and have developed some ideas on a few ways in which the guest experience can be elevated.
So, that being said, here are five simple things that I believe holiday let owners can do to improve their guest experience.
1 – Buy more teaspoons
Teaspoons, much like socks, have a tendency to disappear. They are also the one item of cutlery that always seems to be a little sparse. I’ve stayed in places where there are enough knives and forks for twenty people (despite only sleeping four) yet only about three teaspoons. Your guests are on holiday and likely to want to chill out with a few cups of tea or coffee without having to wash up each time.
My advice would be, work out how many teaspoons you think you need based on the number of guests you can accommodate…and then double it! This is one area where more is most definitely more.
2 – Add hooks wherever you can
In my experience, there are never enough hooks in holiday lets. They are, however, incredibly useful. They’re great for keeping clothes off the floor if storage space is limited, but they are especially great for towels.
If your rental home sleeps more than two people, then your guests need a place to hang their towels. One hook on the back of the bathroom door is not enough. The towels will never fully dry out, and nobody can remember which one belongs to who.
Unless your property is teeny-tiny, there’s sure to be some empty wall space for a few hooks, either in the bathroom or the bedroom. If not, then the back of the bedroom door, or the side panels on wardrobes are also potential places.
Please, for the sake of your guests’ comfort, add more hooks.
3 – Leave some empty space in the kitchen
If your guests are staying on a self-catering basis, then they’re inevitably going to bring supplies with them, and they will need somewhere to put them.
I’ve stayed in places where the kitchens are jam packed with equipment (except for teaspoons!) leaving no space for storing any food. This often results in the dinning table becoming a makeshift pantry.
If you can spare a small cupboard or a shelf for your guests, I’m certain they would appreciate it. And if you’re thinking ‘there’s no way I could empty an entire cupboard’, I would urge you to have an audit of everything currently in the kitchen and have a hard edit.
Do you really need four roasting dishes, a rice cooker, a slow cooker and seven saucepans, none of which appear to have a co-ordinating lid? Your guests are on holiday and unlikely to be hosting a dinner party. The likelihood is that they will eat out some of the time, and cook a few basic meals themselves. But basic is the key word here.
If you can spare some space for your guests, I’m certain it won’t go unnoticed.
4 – Make things as simple as possible
I’m going to re-emphasis the fact that your guests are on holiday. They’re here to take a break, so it really is best practice to make their stay as simple as possible.
For example, everybody will want access to the WIFI – make the password really easy to find. No having to read through a twenty-page welcome manual to get the details.
I’d also recommend making the bin/recycling situation really easy to understand. If you have a waste/recycling system in place, that’s great. I’m sure your guests would be happy to get on board, but please, please, please make it easy for them. They don’t need to know that your local council collects cardboard every second Tuesday. They just need to know what goes where. If you have three different bin collections, then give your guests three different bins that are very clearly labelled with what items go in which bin. At the end of the stay, the waste will be very easy to sort out.
And while we’re talking about the end of the stay, please think twice about asking your guests to strip the beds and empty the bins when they’re leaving. They’re on holiday! They’ve chosen to stay with you to have a break. And they’ve chosen you above all the competition. When they’re packing up to go home, they already have enough to be thinking about without having to help you turn the place around for the next guests. Once they’ve checked out, you’re either going to bring in a cleaning crew or turn the place around yourself, so doesn’t it make sense to just allow a bit of extra time and handle these things yourself?
You want your guests’ final memories to be happy ones, not ones of guilt because they forgot to do something, or worse, resentment about being asked in the first place!
5 – Invest where it counts
As the property owner I can only imagine there must be endless decisions to be made, one of which being where to invest and where to save. In my view, it’s wise to save on items that are likely to need replacing somewhat regularly, for example, glassware, bedding, crockery etc. If an item is likely to have a relatively short lifespan, it’s just not worth the investment, no matter how pretty it is.
On the flip side, there are a few areas where it is worth investing. There are a few things that your guests will take notice of, so it’s an opportunity to elevate their experience.
So where to invest?
Mattresses. Quality of sleep is so important. A bad mattress is something that your guests will remember, and it could be a deciding factor in whether they chose to stay with you again and/or recommend you to others.
Sofas. Sofas are a pretty long-term investment, so in my opinion, they’re worth investing in. A lot of bottoms are going to be sitting on them, so if you think of it in terms of cost per usage, it seems to be a prudent investment.
Artwork. It seems a shame to spend so much time, energy and resources choosing paint colours, furniture etc, to then not pay much attention to the artwork on the walls. It’s details like this that really elevate a space. People are unlikely to notice mass-produced prints that could be used in hundreds of other holiday lets. They will notice if you have taken the care to invest in one or two pieces of original art. It’s this level of attention to detail that will make your guests feel special. These are the details they will remember, and those are the things will tell their friends about.
conclusion
So, just to recap, here are the five simple things I believe you can do to improve your guest experience:
1. Buy more teaspoons
2. Add more hooks
3. Make space in the kitchen
4. Make things as simple as possible
5. Invest where it counts
If you need help choosing the right kind of original art to elevate your space, I would love to hear from you.
Carol x
free from ai
This article is free from AI, as is all other written material on this website. I’m a one-woman team and everything has been written by me, Carol, a human, usually very messily in a notebook before typing up neatly!
