11407 Fire Wood

Why don't you use tronchetti? They come in boxes of 20kg which cost €3 each and are sawdust compressed by steam. They are great and we use them in our log burner. You get them from Giannini's in Comunanza.

Not being funny, but if I was renting accommodation I would expect the wood to be available at the house when I arrived and not have to start buying it in myself. What if they buy too much and start asking for a refund?

I think Lorraine has a point, the last thing I would expect guests to do is go out and buy wood when they arrived in Winter, but I take it this is supplimented by CH? and the wood burner is just a nice extra.
I think you are going to have to estimate how much wood has been used, assuming you are on site and then make a charge at the end of their stay. There are other web sites that deal with queries from owners of rental homes if you would care to pm me I will send them to you.Can be a mine of information and support....and some funny stories!.
A

[quote=strawberrystar;107998]Hello

Does anyone know of anywhere local to Force (AP) that we can tell guests to buy small amounts of firewood for the log burner? It would be easier than us buying a large amount and having to estimate costs to charge them.

Thanks

Strawberry*[/quote]
i think you'll find anyone selling the stuff wouldn't look at less than 10-15 quintali thats 1 ton to 1.5 metric tons.

I would agree with Lorraine, Angie and Robert. If I was renting a holiday home, I would not be terribly impressed if I had to go out to buy firewood, I would expect it to be provided. As it is only about €10-13 per quintale and it is highly unlikely that any guests will get through anything like that amount I would just treat it like any other utility and include a set amount for all hidden in the rental fee and not worry about trying to work out who has used what amount and how much to charge. It also means you can control size of logs, quality and how it is stored!

(I remember a while back a post by a forum member (sorry can't remember who) who had rented a lovely house for a summer holiday only to be handed a bill for electricity as they left - it caused a lot of upset and gave them cause to reconsider ever returning to that house or recomending it to others.)

I thnk Penny's suggestion is the most diplomatic - leave a couple of boxes of tronchetti for when they arrive, with a note of where they can buy some more if they run out.

Thanks for the comments everyone. The need to charge guests for logs is an optional alternative to using the gas central heating. With the increase in utility bills, as well as very high running costs, combined with trying to offer a low cost option for renting a luxury farmhouse at an out of season period it is simply not an option to foot the bill for something else. I am not on site, and was simply trying to keep things simple. I think I will proceed with the tronchetti suggestion. Is no one else having problems balancing the books this year?!

Thanks very much!

I don't know about everyone else, but we get our firewood in the summer - not in winter. So asking people to go and get it themselves might be difficult - especially as wood cut later in the year might not be seasoned.

Personally, if I were renting a luxury farmhouse, I'd expect the means for heating to be there when I arrived, and not to have to go looking for it. We burn through at most 10kg of wood a day - which is about €2 per day. You could always incorporate this cost into your weekly or monthly rent or even tell the renters that wood for burning was free (and environmentally more friendly than gas etc) and wow your guests with your generosity and green credentials! (No need to tell them how cheap wood is!) Seriously, anything else just looks cheap to me.

Why not just put in a costing for the winter heating in the rental, that way you can provide a good supply of wood, or if they prefer then they can use the gas instead.

[quote=Geotherm;108057]Why not just put in a costing for the winter heating in the rental, that way you can provide a good supply of wood, or if they prefer then they can use the gas instead.[/quote]

When we were house hunting [in Winter] we stayed in an apartment. When we asked for the heating to go on, there was an additional daily charge for running the gas central heating.

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Strawberrystar,

Unless you have complete confidence in the tenants, I would be hesitant to let them use the wood stove. Recently here, a multi-million dollar house was just lent to the owner's friend and burnt to the ground when the friend left a bucket with ashes around. This is not the first time I have heard of this happening. Our neighbor down the road did the same thing and burned down his kitchen and living room!

[quote=Lisa C.;108074]Strawberrystar,

Unless you have complete confidence in the tenants, I would be hesitant to let them use the wood stove. .............[/quote]

I tend to agree with Lisa C on this matter. Much safer to add something like 10 Euros a day, [or whatever you calculate as the real figure], to cover central heating costs, and put a 'do not use' sign on the log burner.

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Its a difficult one isnt it?. You want to provide a nice experience for guests and woodburners are so attractive, but for people on holiday, perhaps after a few drinks and being unaccustemed to using them ,could be a recipe for disaster. For the same reason I also dont provide candles, which seem to me to carry the same risk.
Keiths idea of a built in charge for winter gas is one we follow, and yes we are hurting from the current financial situation.
Perhaps we should be supplying thermals and hotwater bottles as well.Or even considering not letting over the winter months?.
A

In line with accommodation we have rented we will be adding a heating deposit - if they use less (we've just had a meter added to the gas pipe) then we'll given them some back, if they use more we'll take it out of the security deposit. If you build the heating charge in then there is no incentive at all for people to be environmentally responsible.

Not sure why but telling them where to buy logs does look cheap - provide some (as you might with half a bag of charcoal in the summer) and then say where more can be bought.

Chris

I do feel like if someone is going to rent the house during the winter months they probably want to experience the log fire, which I know is a risk. I did want to supply guests with the first load, and then recommend somewhere they can top up after that. We do charge for gas use but have found this difficult to estimate as some guests have totally misused it having it on constantly and at 20 degrees, while others use it just mornings and evenings and keep it low. It is difficult to provide guests with an accurate estimate of these costs, and thought that being able to offer an alternative might be a better option for some guests as they would be in daily control of the costs.

Hmmm.....so I guess in answer to my original question....no one knows of anywhere where you can buy small amounts of wood? I'm not really asking for further deliberation on whether I am doing the right thing, just where you can buy it!

[quote=strawberrystar;108395]........ We do charge for gas use but have found this difficult to estimate as some guests have totally misused it having it on constantly and at 20 degrees, .................[/quote]

That doesn't sound unduly unreasonable - when I'm in my place [just got back from there last week - temperature inside house was 2C when we got there!], I tend to aim for 20C - 21C in the daytime and 16C at night

After all - its a holiday and you want to feel comfortable.

Still - if its your own place - nothing beats an open log fire for relaxing in front of.

.

[quote=strawberrystar;108395]
Hmmm.....so I guess in answer to my original question....no one knows of anywhere where you can buy small amounts of wood? I'm not really asking for further deliberation on whether I am doing the right thing, just where you can buy it![/quote]

You can't dictate what sort of answers you'll get strawberry - people are only trying to help. And in that spirit - I've bought nets of logs from Conad in Comunanza before now. Can't guarantee their quality and the availability is sporadic. I'd rather buy the tronchetti from Giannini's myself

Thanks very much for the responses everyone. I guess it's interesting how everyone does things differently. I have used the tronchetti before, so will leave a couple of boxes out and let guests know about where to buy them if they need more.