The French are whingers. Yanks are too fat to fit in the shower. And you’ll never guess the truth about Germans!

A B&B landlady’s wonderfully indiscreet revelations about her foreign guests...

latest visitor, a high- powered executive working in Brussels with a wife and family, said as he tucked into bagels, cream cheese and strawberry jam: ‘I used to be a monk, you know,’ and added, ‘It was a wonderful experience, much like being an astronaut. You are up in the clouds all the time.’

He must have crashed back to earth working for the EU.

Another rich-looking guest from the South of England told me he and his wife had adopted five children in a job lot, all from the same mother. And father? ‘No idea,’ he said.

Nigerians, I have found, are clean and tidy, and extremely appreciative. One repeat visitor always leaves reviews which he signs off ‘with respect and admiration’, which is lovely.

But the best guests, by far, are the Germans. They are usually visiting for conferences or to write books, and they tend to leave glowing reviews.

And, contrary to their reputation, they have a sense of humour. A middle-aged couple had booked to stay for two weeks and we got chatting. The man said: ‘This is my first marriage, but for my wife I am number three. I think she was running out of options.’

Who are the biggest misers? Well, it’s not the Scottish.

Two Malaysian women booked last year but five of them turned up on the doorstep.

‘ There are only two beds,’ I pointed out. ‘Oh, we have sleeping bags,’ they replied, and when I demurred, they said: ‘Only for one night, only for one night.’

I gave in, and next morning five women trooped down, all in headscarves and long skirts, after what must have been a very uncomfortable night indeed. I thought it was a one- off, but my fellow Airbnb landlords and landladies across the world tell me this is a common, cheeky little dodge among people from that corner of the world.

Do they top and tail? Draw straws for who gets the floor? Swap in the middle of the night? I’d love to know.

With British people, I’d say there was a definite North/South divide. Northerners rarely complain and they like my place so much that they often book repeat visits. Middle-aged, middle-class Southern women are terrible whingers.

Generally speaking, I would rather have Germans than the British any day.

Friends always ask me whether I worry about being alone in my house with strange, single men, but I can honestly state that all of my male guests have been perfect gentlemen and absolutely impeccably behaved.

I have to admit, though, that I have a nicely growing collection of discarded men’s underpants in my linen cupboard.

Being an Airbnb host in your own home gives you a window to the world outside, but it is surprisingly hard work.

I seem to spend my life washing and ironing bedlinen and towels and I am always rushing to the shops to stock up on bread, jam, coffee, wet wipes and toilet rolls.

AFINNISH guest who stayed a few months ago had an Airbnb business herself. She totally sympathised with me when I complained how I could be bleaching, vacuuming and scrubbing 24 hours a day, and the place would still never be clean enough.

There is always that one rogue hair that eludes me, which some guest (usually Dutch or French) will find.

And those complaints, apart from being utterly infuriating, get you in trouble. A one-star rating by a guest will get you a ticking-off from Airbnb HQ.

And they’re always looking for ways to get you to reduce your prices. If, for instance, there is an opening in your calendar, it will trigger an email saying ‘ turn lookers into bookers. Reduce your prices by 10 per cent to get more bookings’.

Or, if potential guests look at my advert and end up booking somewhere cheaper, I will get an email to the effect that: ‘ Two guests have just booked a listing nearby at £42 cheaper. Consider reducing your prices.’

I never do discounts. For one thing, I don’t want to host cheap people. For another, I hate this endless haggling and discounting — an American import we can do without. While the Airbnb founders are trying to get hosts to offer a five-star experience for a pittance, the company keeps raking in ever more billions from all over the world.

Hosting Airbnb guests has been fun, sometimes nerve-racking, and always extremely hard work, but I am closing my listing from October. The main reason for this is the crippling tax I get clobbered with (I can currently earn up to £7,500 a year tax-free under the Rent a Room Scheme, but Government proposals are likely to scrap that).

But I also I feel like a break from all that scrubbing and roguehair-hunting.

I shall miss coming down each morning at breakfast time, not knowing what language will greet me or what tale from a distant corner of the world I will carry with me for the rest of the day.

And you Germans. I will miss you, sorely. Maybe it’s time I started looking on Airbnb and paid you a little visit myself . . .