Pre booking questions work when they ask about one real gap in a request. Asked of every guest, they mostly do not. In 1,010 real request conversations, hosts asked “who is staying” 578 times and “what brings you here” 504 times, and about one in seven of those questions could have changed the decision.
About the author: Ben McCarthy has hosted for five years. He has more than 25 properties in the UK and also cohosts for other hosts.
Did it surprise him that so few of those questions mattered?
“Not really. Every guest is different. … You also need to take into consideration things like how far in advance they’re booking, how long they’re booking for, what kind of day is it, a weekend, and what’s the reason for staying.” Ben McCarthy
The data comes from a UK host with over 25 properties: city apartments, most sleeping 4 to 8 guests. An AI review read each conversation case by case to judge two things. What should the first reply have been? And did any question that was asked actually matter?
How often do hosts ask, and how often does it matter?
Hosts asked “who is staying” 578 times. They asked “what brings you here” 504 times. Only about one in seven of those questions could have changed what the host decided. The rest added a wait for the guest and work for the host.
What should the first reply to a request be?
For each conversation, the AI review judged the best first reply from what the guest had written and what they had booked. This is how its judgement split:
- Accept at once: 42%
- Accept, with the house rules stated: 29%
- Ask one question: 16%
- Ask the guest to agree to the rules first: 9%
- Decline: 4%
That split is the review’s judgement, not this article’s advice. Ben’s own rule is this. If the booking and the first message give you no reason to worry, accept. If quiet hours or another house rule matters for the booking, for example a group, a one night stay midweek, neighbours in the same building or a celebration, say so before you accept and wait for the guest’s reply. Never accept first and raise it afterwards: once you have accepted, it is too late.
Hosts asked guests to agree to quiet hours in 598 conversations: 77% agreed and 21% never replied. When and how to ask for that agreement, always before you accept, is covered in quiet hours: ask or tell.
Which pre booking questions actually settle a request?
The clearest case is a specific gap between the booking and the guest’s own words.
What are red flags for Airbnb guests?
In this data, the plainest sign was more people coming than booked. In 92 conversations (9%), the guest’s own words showed more people coming than the booking said. Those requests were declined 23% of the time, against 8% when the numbers matched. This is the clearest case for a question, and a short one that names the gap does the job. There is more on this in guests who book for fewer people.
The count, above all. In a smaller pilot of 160 cases, a deciding question could be named in 43. The gap between the number booked and the number the guest mentioned was the most reliable of them, in 12 of the 43.
General questions sent to everyone
“Who is staying” and “what brings you here” were the questions hosts asked most, yet only about one in seven of them could have changed the decision. The AI review judged a question the best first reply in 16% of conversations. Ben’s rule is not to question everyone: send one clear message on the bookings where it matters.
Agreement to quiet hours
Only 9 of the 598 guests asked (1.5%) pushed back, while 21% never replied. So when quiet hours matter for a booking, ask before you accept and wait for the reply. If there is still no answer after one nudge, decline: the guest can request again.
Asked whether pre booking questions work for him, Ben said:
“Yes, I find they do. They really do help weed people out. Before I used Zugrow, I used to have my team ask 2 separate questions. … So the guest vetting, already doing that for us, reduces the amount of time that takes.” Ben McCarthy
Does asking less mean missing problems?
A method that names the one real doubt and asks only that was tested on 40 of the hardest cases. It settled 19 of them, asked less than the real hosts did in 26, and no guest was found to be offended. It is a small test.
In this data, 88 decisions were made before the guest had a chance to answer. When a question is worth sending, the guest needs time to reply to it. How fast hosts answer requests looks at what that wait means for both sides.
A separate article replays past requests to ask whether stricter guest rules would have helped.
What questions should you ask Airbnb guests before accepting?
- Read the booking and the first message before you ask anything. If they give you no reason to worry, accept.
- If your house rules matter for this booking, say so before you accept. For example a group, a one night stay midweek, neighbours in the same building or a celebration. Wait for the guest’s reply: once you have accepted, it is too late.
- Ask about the gap, not a general question. Compare the number booked with the number the guest mentions. For wording, see our examples of pre booking messages.
- Give the guest time to reply before you decide. If there is still no answer after one nudge, decline: they can request again.
- Judge the booking and the plan, never the person. Age, family, nationality, language and other personal traits are never a reason.
Limits of this data
- “Best first reply” is an AI review’s judgement, made from the conversation alone. The real hosts could also see each guest’s profile, so some of their decisions may rest on what they saw.
- Group size is counted from the number booked. Guests often book for fewer people than come, so the real link between group size and trouble is likely stronger than these figures show.
- The incident numbers behind this set of articles are small, so one stay can move a share by several points.
- Team chats record what was noticed, not everything that happened.
Where Zugrow fits
Zugrow is a channel manager for Airbnb and Booking.com hosts, with a Guest Vetting agent built in. It screens every booking request against your house rules and checks the stated party size, the gap this data found most worth asking about. It recommends accept, ask or decline with its reasoning shown, and declining a guest always waits for you. When a question is the right first step, the Inbox agent can reply in your voice. Join the waitlist.