The AirB&B—one of the most common and lucrative forms of passive income in the modern day. Useful to travelers local and abroad, a high-quality AirB&B offers refuge to people that need a place to stay, but want something more personable than a hotel.
If you run an AirB&B, you know the importance of maintaining its cleanliness. When a negative review comes through, it’s very often related to a sense of unprofessional upkeep. After all, hotels pride themselves on clean and orderly presentation, so to expect the same of these smaller, more homey options is not unreasonable. A fast way to lose future customers are reviews suggesting your AirB&B has a bug problem. Worst of all: the dreaded bed bug.
Bed bug control is imperative to the success of your AirB&B, especially with the winter cold fronts moving in and more travelers beginning to head south to escape the cold. Bed bugs are going to look to hitch a ride on your guests and find their way inside. We at Burns Pest Elimination want to help you protect your space— and to quell the bed bug problem before it starts.
This is a quick tips and tricks guide, curated to effectively help keep your AirB&B customer-friendly and ready to go, no matter how much the bed bugs want to call it their home.
Common Signs of Bed Bugs
If you have no experience dealing with bed bugs in the past…first of all, congratulations! Eliminating these tiny pests is never a fun experience. However, that may mean you need some help knowing how to identify when you have an infestation in your home.
Fully mature bed bugs possess a reddish brown color and are usually no larger than an apple seed. They breed and spread incredibly fast, so if you find one, odds are there are many more lingering just out of sight, even if they aren’t obvious. You’ll probably notice dark red or brown staining on your mattress, furniture, or other commonly-used places where humans spend long periods of time, as this is where they tend to hide so they have easy access to their source of food.
If you find a bed bug in your home, it’s important to begin treatments immediately. Leave no inch of your home untouched, as these tiny pests can hide almost anywhere. Taking shortcuts can result in the need for a total fumigation in order to fully eliminate the bed bug outbreak, which can cost you in customer rental income while you wait for the treatment to conclude.
How to Prevent a Bed Bug Infestation
When it comes to bed bugs, it’s always best to have a proactive approach in order to prevent an outbreak from occuring in the first place. Follow the following tips in order to keep your AirB&B hotel bed bug-free.
Tend to the Linens Between Each Guest
Bed bug control begins by washing your sheets and blankets regularly in hot water. This will kill any of the bedbugs lurking in your bedding. Do the same with any towels, wash cloths, or other linens that you might offer to your guests. If you want to be exceptionally thorough, take all of these items to a laundromat and have them run an extensive hot cycle. Just be mindful in your transportation that the bugs don’t escape into the safety of your car, waiting for the next person to sit down and carry them out.
Vacuum and Dust Often
One of the best ways to prevent bed bugs is to regularly vacuum and dust often. This will help remove any potential hiding places for bedbugs. While you’re at it, make sure to check behind headboards, under mattresses, and in any cracks or crevices in furniture. Because of their size, bed bugs can fit nearly anywhere, but due to their common food source (i.e. your guests), they will localize where people are most common.
Bed Bug Extermination That Fights For You
Because of its tropical nature while the rest of the nation gets colder during the winter, the state of Arizona is a very popular destination for traveling snowbirds looking to stay warm. While this is great news for AirB&B owners in the state as the number of rentals begin to spike, it also means that the chances of a bed bug infestation breaking out in your property spikes as well.
Take preemptive measures. When screening guests for your AirB&B, ask guests to double-check their clothes and belongings to make sure they haven’t tracked any bugs along with them. When they leave, immediately take action to clean in the ways we suggested above.
If you’ve found bed bugs to be more resilient and prominent in your property than expected, it’s time to summon the big guns. Burns Pest Elimination is a family-owned and operated company with decades of experience fighting bed bugs all across Arizona and the Las Vegas area. Our highly-trained staff are experts of the local pest scene and dedicated to keeping your home, business, and AirB&B free of any uninvited crawling guests.
Bed bugs can be incredibly difficult to fully eliminate on your own. That’s where we come in. Don’t let bed bugs do a number on your AirB&B (and your bottom line) — Take a look at the areas we service and contact us to get your free quote today!
