Before booking your vacation rental, travelers must agree to your house rules, which cover everything from children and pet policies to maximum occupancy limits.
House rules
Used for
Setting traveler expectations
Benefits
Ensures travelers are a good fit for your property
Overview
House rules can provide peace of mind and a sense of control, knowing your guests understand what is expected of them during their stay at your vacation rental property. House rules must be agreed to before booking, and outline your rules for pets, children, and more.
House rules also give vacation rental homeowners and property managers a chance to clearly define your policies before booking. Since travelers must agree to your house rules before they book, you can relax knowing they understand what is and isn’t allowed.
Posting your house rules on your vacation rental listing can save time spent answering questions about your property. Likewise, you won’t have to screen travelers for pets or children, since they’ll already know your policies before they book. This minimizes any surprises.
Being clear about your house rules also helps travelers who want to find the perfect property that meets their needs.
How it works
Setting your house rules is simple and only takes a few minutes to add to your listing.
To set your house rules, go to your dashboard and click on Property, then “Rules and policies”. House rules are only accessible through our platform and not through integrated software. You can customize your house rules under the "Rules and policies" section of your property editor. There you'll see six fields where you can clearly list your rules regarding:
- Minimum age requirement. Clarify if the primary renter must meet a certain age requirement.
- Maximum number of overnight guests. Set the number of guests allowed to sleep on your property, including adults and children.
- Events. Let guests know if events are allowed on your property, from formal weddings to casual gatherings. Be clear about how many visitors are allowed for events, independent of overnight guests.
- Pets. One of the top-10 globally most popular search filters is for pets. Let your guests know if they can bring their pets, how many, what type of pet, and any size restriction.
- Children allowed. Inform guests and provide context for which children’s age groups are welcome at your property.*
- Smoking. Specify if and where smoking is allowed.
Each field includes extra space to add more information about each policy. You'll also have three extra fields you can use to add custom house rules unique to your property.
For special events, you may not see your event included. That’s because we only included the most common events. In this case, you can use the “Other” sections to include additional events you allow on your property. Finally, be sure your house rules always comply with any federal and local laws.
Note that if you begin to enter your house rules, you'll have to complete every field to save your changes. If you navigate away from the page, it will not save your changes. And don’t worry. If you want to add more details later, you can always come back.
While setting house rules isn’t mandatory, they're highly encouraged. (There won’t be any penalties for not adding them to your listing.) They’re easy to add and only take a few minutes.
*If your vacation rental is in Australia or New Zealand, age restrictions are against local policy.
From your dashboard, click on “Property”, then “Rules and policies”.
If you're connected via property management software, please update your house rules in your software.
FAQs
Once you enter the house rules page to make updates, any changes you make won't be saved until you fill out all the house rules. We encourage all partners to visit and update their house rules today, but not updating them will not result in any changes at this time.
Yes. Complete and accurate house rules in the shopping experience help travelers easily determine if your property will meet their needs while reducing potential rule violators from inquiring or booking.
It may be because you haven't completed all the house rules. You must complete all the house rules to save your changes. If you navigate away from the page without doing so, it will not save your changes. If you want to add additional notes later or make changes to your rules, you can always return to update your rules later.
To help ensure that you’re getting bookings you’re comfortable with, we offer house rules for you to clearly communicate expectations with potential guests. House rules help avoid unexpected surprises during the stay by attracting guests who fit your property.
There are predefined rules that you can set:
- Maximum overnight guests
- Minimum age requirement
- Events
- Pets
- Children allowed
- Smoking
Make sure your house rules comply with all federal and local laws. You also have the flexibility of adding up to three custom rules.
The new rules are currently only available to those who use the platform. If you use software to access your listing(s), more details will follow on when the new house rules will be available to you.
We focused on the most common events that partners allow for their guests. Use the “Other” section to include additional events that you may allow on your property.
House rules are displayed on your property listing so travelers can decide if they're the right fit for your home. Travelers are required to accept your house rules before they book with you.
We advise you to contact customer service during the guest's stay if you need further advice.
Our easy-to-use owner dashboard will be the primary location for managing your reservations, updating rates and keeping your listing up to date. Some partners choose to use a software provider to link our systems. They still log in to the owner dashboard to leverage our more advanced tools like MarketMaker and Boost.
Yes. Please select your language below.
- Brazilian Portuguese
- Dutch
- English - US
- English - GB (UK, SG, AU, NZ)
- French (Abritel)
- German (FeWo-direkt)
- Italian
- Portuguese
- Spanish
If you haven't found what you are looking for, visit our Help Center for step-by-step guidance on how to use our products.
Be accommodating to individuals with special needs and their service animals.
Do not add security deposits or pet fees — service animals are not pets.
Do not request documentation for a service animal. However, you may ask whether the service animal is required because of a disability or ask about specific functions the animal performs.
Visit your local laws page in your dashboard for more information.
If you’d like to get involved or learn more about the policy landscape in your community, please reach out to GovernmentAffairs@Vrbo.com.
Integrated property managers use third-party or proprietary software that they have connected to our marketplace to manage their listings. Integrated property managers can manage thier listings directly from their software by an integration feed that automatically updates reservations, amenities, photos and more.
