If you were renting a vacation rental home for your next trip, you wouldn’t want to arrive with nothing but a bed. While it’s still your home, and guests should feel that to a certain extent (it isn’t a hotel after all), there are ways to make them feel more at home while away too. You’d want it to feel like a home away from home, which is what it’s supposed to be. That means that you should keep a few amenities around for your guests to enjoy during their stay. Here’s a quick list of what the average guest would hope to find when they stay at your vacation home:

• A welcome binder. Make your guests feel welcome. Assist them with general local information and answer their questions in a welcome binder.
• Some Favorite Recipes. Make a small recipe book easily accessible in the kitchen. Sometimes it’s too easy to just order pizza after pizza when you’re away. Keep the recipes simple so that they won’t have to spend a lot of time or money to make the dishes too.
• Some books. Almost everyone enjoys some relaxing time just reading a book while on vacation. Light fiction or a selection of classic tales are always well loved. Books about your local area could come in handy too.
• Pens and paper. Make it easy for your guests to write home about their wonderful trip, or to write in their travel journal. Don’t leave personal stationary with your information on it though.
• If you decide to have a personal computer available for your guests to use, make sure there isn’t any of your personal information or files stored on it either.
• Don’t avoid having a few family photos on the wall. It is your home after all. As long as there aren’t hundreds of pictures of your nieces and nephews all over the place, it will still feel homey to both your guests and to you when you’re there.
• Leave some ingredients for hot drinks. Your guests will probably appreciate being able to have some coffee or tea in the mornings, so leave some coffee, tea, sugar, and creamer in the kitchen for them. You can also make sure there’s milk, cream and butter (for toast) for them when they arrive, but don’t leave any already opened food like jam or peanut butter.
• Movies for the DVD player or VCR. Make sure the movies are family-oriented, in case your guests bring children. Also make sure there are none of your home movies in among the others.
• Decorate with handmade items like quilts and centerpieces. This is another step towards making your vacation rental seem homier.
• Keep some first aid supplies on hand. Band-Aids, gauze, etc, might come in handy. Make sure there aren’t any personal prescription medications or even cough syrup (may be expired or cause allergic reactions) in with the other things.
• Along with the above, having some sunscreen and bug spray available is also a nice touch.

A few tips to make your guests feel more at home, even though they’re in yours. Your vacation rental home should feel like a home away from home for them, but you can still save some personal touches for yourself when you’re there too.

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