I am so sorry to hear that there were several idiots who ruined your hosting experience!!

I try to be neat, polite and meticulous in someone else's house, even if I'm paying for it. Those who treat rentals as disposable property TO DESTROY mindlessly are far too narcissistic to tolerate. Perhaps there is some kind of surreptitious screening tool for narcissists, hmmmm.

I just got my passport renewed, so looking forward to actually using it and discovering places to be comfortable "as is."

G

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But to answer the original post - yes, it's tough if you're off the beaten path for other destinations. That means you have to make your home a destination itself, and that will probably mainly appeal to locals.

A few things I've experienced that I'll mention to avoid:
the room in Seattle was a converted attic without a door at the base of the stairs. And there were no drapes. I was okay with it because the lay of the land didn't give a close neighbor a full view, but would have been good to mention. Also I was unclear whether I could use the kitchen to make coffee. He didn't offer and I didn't want to assume, but the nearest coffee spot was about a mile or so away (in Seattle, which is saying something!). I saw him only at check-in.

The very gracious host at another location brought me coffee at 7:30. As I sleep naked, I had to get dressed to open the door! (I don't think he would have appreciated me presenting in my altogether without warning, for his wife's sake.) Also every window in the back of their house looked out onto the "cottage", so the claimed "private entrance" wasn't. No possibility of a hot date, had I had any plans thereof.

The last I'll mention was a military host, who had a very nice house but was absolutely intolerant of anything being moved out of its specified place - i.e. a chair to the patio because there were none out there. He also invited a girl over to enjoy the hottub, and naturally I wasn't going to get in the way of their *date*, so I was pretty much trapped in my room for the night. And he had a "bully" dog, cute but smelly - I wanted to give him a bath.

Have lots of pillows for those of us who need to elevate our head to avoid snoring really bad. :D

Best of luck, man

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