Superhost Shares Best Hair Dryers For Airbnb

When my wife Kate and I buy a hair dryer for one of our Airbnbs we always go with a basic model. The best hair dryer for your Airbnb is one that is easy for guests to operate and hard for them to break.

There are purchases for your listings where it makes sense to splurge. One example would be a mattress.

But the hair dryer is not one of those items. It’s best to buy a basic model that is durable and cheap to replace.

Hair Dryers in Airbnbs

Let me be up front with you. I’m an adult male who has lived most of his life with short hair. The only time I’ve used a hair dryer is the three years I grew my hair out for my rock band after college.

So I don’t know hair dryers. I want you to know that.

But I do know Airbnbs.

Related: How to WOW your guests with thoughtful touches

We have been hosting for almost 5 years now, and we just got our 4th listing up. We’ve hosted hundreds (probably over a thousand now) of stays in that time.

Here’s what I’ve learned about hair dryers in Airbnbs:

1. Not everyone knows how to use the accessories (so we don’t bother with them)
2. Hair dryers can blow breakers (so know where your breaker box is)
3. An expensive hair dryer is NOT worth the money

Quick aside regarding breakers (and what to do if the hair dryer quits working)

While not important for choosing a hair dryer, it is important to know what to do if your guest calls you saying that the hair dryer quit working (or a bunch of lights turned off). At some of our houses this has never happened and at some of them it happens every few months.

There are three things that can cause the problem:

1. Hair dryer actually doesn’t work

This is by far the LEAST likely problem. It’s possible that the blower just quit, but it’s never actually happened to us.

2. The outlet itself tripped

Most outlets in bathrooms will have what’s called a GFCI breaker directly on the outlet.

The red and black buttons in the middle of the outlet is the GFCI breaker. Sometimes the hair dryer can trip this breaker. To fix it, the breaker must be reset by pushing one of these buttons (usually it says “Reset” on it).

3. The breaker tripped

If the outlet doesn’t have this GFCI breaker, then it can trip the breaker in the breaker box. To fix it you just have to find that breaker and flip it back on.

My Thoughts on Picking a Hair Dryer

Here’s what I recommend. Get a cheap, sturdy, well reviewed hair dryer.

You’re buying a hair dryer for two reasons. First, you want to list it as an amenity on your listing, and second, you want to provide your guests with a hair dryer if they need one.

Related: Comprehensive list of Airbnb host expenses

You get just as much credit for a cheap hair dryer as an expensive one in your Airbnb listing. And if a guests cares about using a fancy one, they’ll bring their own.

So that’s why we go pretty cheap with our hair dryers.

Three Good Options

Here are three perfectly acceptable options for hair dryers in your Airbnb. Remember, this is not a big decision. You just need one that will work and be reliable.

1. REVLON Travel Hair Dryer

• Extremely affordable (you might even call it cheap)
• Just a hair dryer, no extra accessories
• Simple to use, just two settings
• Durable

View on Amazon

This is just a super basic hair dryer with no extra accessories, only two heat settings and very little opportunity for your guests to get confused. In my opinion, this is the kind of hair dryer you want in your listings. It’s what we put in ours.

It’s just a simple travel hair dryer that can take a little bit of a beating, and if you ever need to replace it you won’t sweat the price. Seriously, you can buy 10 of these for the price of a mid level hair dryer.

2. Conair Mid-size Hair Dryer

• Extremely affordable
• Another simple hair dryer with no extra accessories
• 2 heat settings
• Durable

View on Amazon

Yes, it’s another basic hair dryer. I don’t see any reason to splurge on a hair dryer. So here’s another very similar hair dryer from Conair.

You could maybe argue that this hair dryer has a better design than the REVLON. But we don’t put our hair dryers on display, so that doesn’t really factor in for us when we buy an Airbnb hair dryer.

3. Conair Travel Hair Dryer

• Extremely affordable
• One more simple hair dryer without accessories
• 2 heat settings
• Durable

View on Amazon

Are you seeing a pattern? I’m not recommending any fancy hair dryers. I just don’t think you need them. So here’s one more option (among many others you can find) with the most basic features.

This one has a retractable cord, which could help keep any messy cords out of the way.

Conclusion

After hosting hundreds and hundreds of Airbnb guests across 4 listings, we’ve come to the conclusion that when it comes to hair dryers it’s best to keep it simple.

You just don’t need a nice hair dryer. You get to list a hair dryer as an amenity in your listing regardless of how nice it is, and in our experience, guests who really care about their hair will bring their own hair dryer.

So my recommendation is to just grab one of the very basic hair dryers on my list and call it a day.

Happy investing.

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