I always factor the cleaning fee in my decision to reserve a place. I wouldn't be happy if it was added afterwards and would probably tell her I wasn't going to pay it since it wasn't included in the listed price. I guess whether you pay it would depend on how badly you want to stay in that house.

If you don't think it is worth it, tell her she's going to have to cancel the reservation or accept the listed price. That being said, I would have a backup plan in case she canceled at the last moment.

Oh. And a $100 cleaning fee for a weekend is ridiculous unless the price is otherwise cheap.

Cleaning fees are typically added on to airbnb and VRBO. Unless you're gonna clean the sinks and toilets etc when you leave, I think some cleaning will need to be done. So push back if you want but they might just go ahead and cancel your reservation.

Mistakes happen.

Offer to pay half?

 
If you push back she will cancel and your only recourse will be a bad review. So if you have a good backup option then go ahead. If you don't then the $100 might be worth it to you. Or you could try to ignore it till after the fact, Airbnb already took your money so you could just ignore the message and show up.

Or get Airbnb involved and tell them she is trying to soak you for more now.

I have only used AirBnB on 4 separate occasions, but $100 seems ridiculously high. I am pretty certain I have paid $25-50 each time and it was clearly stated in the ad.

I agree with the others - tell her you think it is too high and are disappointed to hear about it this late in the game and offer to pay half.

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If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went. - Will Rogers

Emery's Third Coast Triathlon | Tri Wisconsin Triathlon Team | Push Endurance | GLWR

If the cleaning fee was not listed in the original ad/posting due to her mistake, she should eat the cost and learn from her mistake. If she owns up to it and gets a good review from you, she'll make it up in future rentals. If she pushes and requires the $100 even though not advertised, cancel and give her a bad review.

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Chris
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“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!”
― Hunter S. Thompson,

You might want to remind her that she’s violating AirBNB’s terms of service

section 7.1.2. Contains verbiage about not changing the fee once it’s been booked (including cleaning fees)

https://www.airbnb.com/terms/#sec7
“7.1.2 You are solely responsible for setting a price (including any Taxes if applicable, or charges such as cleaning fees) for your Listing (“Listing Fee”). Once a Guest requests a booking of your Listing, you may not request that the Guest pays a higher price than in the booking request.”

If she’s new to AirBNB, then this will be a learning experience for her. If she’s been on AirBnB for a while, she’s probably gotten away with it before.

When you booked - you booked for the price listed - tell her to pound sand

Seems a reasonable fee to me and on par with what I pay for areas on the west coast. But, midwest is kinf of backwater so I'm sure its cheaper there since you have outhouses and such.

Is $100 that high? We are putting our suite on Airbnb this summer. Its around 700 sq ft, 2 bed, 1 bath. I have had cleaners come through there and have been charged $130-180 for the service.

So far, we have three bookings, two for month long stints, one for 2 weeks. Our cleaning fee is $100. We figure we can blitz the garbage, laundry, etc then hire someone to wash the place down for $100, so, we aren't making money on it.

I was almost considering raising it to discourage shorter stays. We don't want to be cleaning the place every 2-3 days.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

This.

Their mistake. Charge the next customer the cleaning fee. They can eat their mistake, or cancel the reservation and get a bad review. Kind of sucks for your weekend plans though.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

bad review? - she already violated the TOS by asking for the add'l fees - she can and should be kicked off if she has any issue with this.

The OP (veganerd) should check her current listing and see if a cleaning fee is listed or not..... if not, he should ask her why it's not listed and show her the section from the TOS. Sure maybe the first time was a mistake, but now that she realizes her mistake, she should have updated her listing.

if she is anything but apologetic, he needs to walk away and dump it off to AirBnB. Anyone that will lie to get a $100 cleaning fee will likely lie about damage to the property once he leaves.

Seems high to me. But, I have only booked 4 times. It was $25-50 each time. Of course, I suppose they could have reduced the cleaning fee and increased the rental charge.

2 nights in Louisville. 1 night in Lexington. 4 nights near Crater Lake, OR. 4 nights in Bend, OR. So, maybe it is just the locations where I stayed?

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If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went. - Will Rogers

Emery's Third Coast Triathlon | Tri Wisconsin Triathlon Team | Push Endurance | GLWR

Maybe. I was also thinking, if you were staying in a place that is otherwise someone's residence, they may not hire cleaners each time like one would for a dedicated rental property.

I have also heard of hosts reducing the cleaning fee but leaving a cleaning list for the guests in the 'house rules' section.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

I have used Airbnb about 12 times. I am looking for a place in Irvine, CA right now and was just looking in Pittsburgh as well. The highest cleaning fee I have found was $45. I have had a higher one but I stayed at a house with 4 beds and 3 baths for an entire week but it was still only $75.

Even if she is new to Airbnb, it's pretty clear the cleaning fees are added on during the initial set up. One look at any property shows you the cost breakdown. I bet she saw what others were getting and realized she went too low and is now trying to recoup her perceived losses. I'm with many of the others, tell her half is fair. She probably won't cancel unless the time you are going is a very popular time where she will not have any trouble getting someone else to take the place.

Finally, if you stay at her place, make sure when you give your review you mention the extra fee added after the place was booked. I would also let Airbnb know, they may even give you a discount on a future booking.

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TEAM HD
Each day is what you make of it so make it the best day possible.

Just stayed in whistler, 4 nights in a condo. Cleaning fee was $125.

We have several ski houses on ABNB and the cleaning fee is high, because quite simply in ski towns you get what you pay for & it costs us $150-200 per cleaning, but it is done right.

Having stayed in didn't-do-it-right places, I'd rather pay extra for an immaculate place.....and would never stay someplace with low/no reviews. If she wants to do well on ABNB than she needs good reviews & should do everything possible to ensure that she gets them, including eating this cleaning.

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"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs." John Rogers

Might be that to get effective cleaners in that area, the cleaning company (or person) charges that flat amount or it is just in a remote location with few services nearby.

Keep in mind they are typically washing and drying sheets, running the dishwasher, etc. That takes time and eats up money.

It isn't that bad from what I have seen. Usually I just try to stay away from places with a fee like this because I generally only stay 1-2 nights so I don't want to pay $100 for that short a time. Unless it is still the cheapest option, in which case I just consider it part of the rent.

I prefer the places that offer the option of cleaning yourself. Last place the wife and I stayed for a night we were just in the place to sleep. The owner had a list of things that needed to be done to avoid a cleaning fee, we did those things and everyone was happy. Otherwise the charge was $100 which is too much to pay when we were in the place for a total of 10 hours, 8 of which spent sleeping.