Hello @Russell47,
Welcome to the Community Center.
It is great to hear you are looking to book an Airbnb for your wife's birthday, it sounds lovely.
I hope you don't mind, to make it easier to reply to your post, I have made it into a new topic here in the Help board.
In terms of your question, how long has it been since your messaged the host? You can also check the response rate of a host on their listings.
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Thank you for the last 7 years, find out more in my Personal Update.
Looking to contact our Support Team, for details...take a look at the Community Help Guides.