Shawn Monroe

These are very abnormal times so everything is out of whack right now and you can’t use it to gauge. But I will say that I usually try to stay in town for holidays because people have the extra time. Memorial Day especially, as that’s the first 3 day weekend of the year for a lot of people. I’ve also had a memorial day where I had a family emergency, and turned down about 7 appointments on the drive home. Labor Day is always a toss-up - people travel but a lot of people traveled in August and use Labor Day to wind down. so it’s not always a wash. but like I said right now is a terrible time to gauge anything.

Yep, back when I lived in Oklahoma. Congrats!

I couldn’t think of how to properly word this, but you worded it perfectly.

I’m not even sure what you’re asking. Are you asking us to answer for why one escort wasted your time and didn’t think it was valuable? Are you asking us to validate your frustration? I understand you’re asking us for input but what you’d like input on isn’t clear.

I actually love this question. I'd say that us as providers are at huge disadvantages compared to other gays. At the very least, we may or may not be able to tell potential friends what we actually do. Providers have to have some level of availability. Having a lot of friends doesn't leave a ton of time for that. Some say you should find friends by joining activities, which gives you less time for appointments. By having less time, people will begin to exclude you from activities since you won't be able to do them. [*]For us who travel, being out of town a lot leaves less time to find and develop relationships. [*]I've tried saying "befriend other escorts - they'll get it". But escorts are competitive (we've heard of the mafias in cities), and they may think you have an ulterior motive. [*]Related to what has been said above - many gay relationships are based off of sex. As we get paid to have sex, it can be hard to want to base relationships off of that. It's funny - when people would ask "How're you doing during COVID?" I'm like "Well I've learned to spend long periods of time by myself in largely one room." Now I won't go into some of the dismissive, divisive and heteronormative comments made above. But two reasons why it's easier to form relationships with clients because: The transactional nature means the expectations are out on the table Those clients you see on a regular repeating basis it can be easy to befriend just by the repeating nature of it.

I think one thing to remember is that some guys are not always looking for as many clients as possible. Some are looking for enough business to sustain themselves without going crazy. If he screens his clients for age and ethnicity it doesn’t matter if it offends you or not; if his business is sustained from those not offended by it then that is wonderful for him; it’s one less person he has to deal with. It’s the opportunity for one more that isn’t offended, and he’s found enough clients to sustain his business.

I will say that I don’t tend to ask for age or ethnicity - I have clients of all races, and my clients range from their 20s to their late 80s. I don’t care. But that being said, there are definitely consistencies in communication and you can tell with some level of certainty which clients will turn out to be time wasters as worst or hassles at the least. I will say that I try to give the benefit of the doubt, and I’m sometimes surprised, but a lot of the time you can tell. Now in terms of your friend losing business - it’s possible yes, but taking every inquiry that you get is also Ill-advised. sometimes you must save your sanity. I remember once @Benjamin_Nicholas said “you can’t trip over nickels to pick up pennies” or something similar.

May 15 is what I’m thinking too, since things are opening back up in atlanta.

This is exactly what I do. When I quote my rates I say this is for massage only and what it includes. If they’re looking for more then I must charge a different rate. This either peaks their curiosity, or gets them to behave, or they realize why it’s more expensive than going to a place like massage envy.

What I meant by my last comment is that my inbox is now called “Mailbox archive” and when you click into it it says “from now on, users will contact you via RM messenger”. Not to mention you can call on that thing too. So good luck.

They also moved from calling rent boys “escorts” in the us to calling them “pornstars” because porn is legal In the us, but escorting isn’t.

It seems as though RentMen is moving to messenger as it’s sole form of communication over email.

Interesting that it’s on rentmen but couldn’t find it on rentmasseur.

I’ve been waiting for this thread. I have rentmen messenger but I’m not fond of it. I may delete it. I think it’s the WRONG solution to the problem they’re trying to fix. it seems the problem they’re trying to fix is the lag in communication time between clients and escorts. And they want to keep it within their platform because it means more revenue and top of mind awareness for them, even though not ideal for us. but their email system is terrible. in my experience You get a notification for the first email but not any subsequent ones. Notifications by text used to have a link to the email, but after SESTA/FOSTA they say “to read it go to the site”. If they want communication to happen quicker they should have fixed their buggy email system. as @MrMattBig said, the messenger isn’t any more reliable either as I’ve missed notifications from there too. And quite frankly it’s another way for the power imbalance to be abused. A time waster reached out to me asking the same questions he had asked by text on my previous trip to dc. When I asked if it was his number he said no, because he knew what he was doing. So as I said I probably won’t be using it widely.

Not the best take, considering many (like myself) do massage (with a table) and escort.

I wouldn’t necessarily take no response as not a good sign. Ya may just need to nudge him a bit and show that you’re real and actually serious. A lot of times we get fake requests for weekend trips or overnights from a lot of different sources. Or people think they’re interested in overnight but change their mind when they hear the cost. So for sanity’s sake, we (or at least I) just ignore a lot of these messages. But last year I DID end up having an overnight / extended trip that DID initially read like one of the fake messages. It wasn’t until we had some actual conversation that I realized he was real and actually serious. And it was a good time!

After the eagle in Houston burned down and they rebuilt it, it’s just a regular sterile gay bar now. MMC was the closest thing to an eagle there but it’s closed now too.

I saw JD a few times when I lived in Oklahoma City and he’d travel there. 1) sweet guy and cute. That being said, he’s smaller than his pictures make him look. I’m 5’10, 175 and I’m bigger than him. He’s probably 5’7 or 5’8 and maybe 160. But he’s cute and has a nice body. I enjoy his Instagram too. 2) the massage is very good but on the therapeutic side. The more frequently I saw him the more sensual it got, but it was still like “thumb in the neck immediately”. So like I said. In terms of massage, he is a lot better than some guys, but less on the sensual side.

It could be a number of things. One, as you said, could be a lack of knowledge - You'd be surprised the amount of times someone is nibbling on my foreskin and asks if I'm uncut. Some may be afraid of the backlash or being counted out if someone is weird about foreskin, too, (similar to being listed as a vers top vs bottoming) though I've been hired specifically for it.

The easiest way to see if someone offers more is to see if they have a rentmen profile in addition to Rentmasseur (as many of us do). Also, If you’re looking for more than massage, specify before meeting. Either ask if there’s additional services, or if they’re a top or bottom. Or just say what you’re looking for. One of the most difficult things is trying to not only figure out what these terms mean but figuring out what someone means when they use the terms. “Full service” or “erotic massage” means different things to everyone. Some even use masseurfinder as if it’s rentmen and think “massage” means something sexual (even fully clothed and with a picture of your table in the ad). At this point I try to give what is included with massage when asking about rates. So if you’re looking for more, ask for more, and be prepared to pay more or at least discuss it up front - else you’re coercing and that’s bad, or you’re left with not exactly what you wanted, though the provider may not have known in the first place.

As @MrMattBig said, very few clients read ad text. Every time I’m visiting a new city, on rentmen and rentmasseur, I change my headline to the city I’m visiting and the dates and still get questions. Masseurfinder will no longer let you change your headline (they’re all now ‘’massage by [name]”) and they filter out anything not relevant to massage (so no longer can you put the cities and travel dates in the text.) I tried advertising outcalls only once in one city and it didn’t work. And at the top of every one of my ads I mention I’m available nights and weekends in atlanta as I have a 9-5, and still get guys disappointed that I can’t meet in the mornings.

It's not that there are complicated rules. It's how the sites display when you're in a city. Masseurfinder does a good job of denoting when a guy is coming soon vs when he's actually in a city, but RentMen and RentMasseur are rather terrible in that regard - their icons (home base, near travel, currently visiting, and soon to visit) are hard to decipher. Not only that, but RentMen will make it seem like you're in a city up to 30 days before you're actually supposed to be there - Masserfinder, it's 7 days before. With most guys wanting to meet that very second they contact us, we often find ourselves messaging "Hi there - I'm not currently in [x city]. My ad says I'm currently in [y city] and I'll be in [x city] from [date a] to [date b]. Would you like to meet while I'm in town?" more often than booking actual appointments, and to save some of the hassle, many will post their ads when they get to a city (most of our trips are front loaded anyway and most guys want to meet the first day we're in town). All that said, I still prefer to advertise ahead of time - that way I know if I'll at least have a gauge of how a trip will turn out, and whether or not i need to take the trip in the first place.

Agree with most everyone here. “Where are you hosting” is a perfectly legitimate question for reasons stated, especially in bigger metroplexes. Also, most chains will let you book and cancel up to 24 hours in advance in case you just need to say you’re staying somewhere, but I know you know this. On the issue of confirmations, I’ll say I’m almost neurotic at this point about confirmations. I will confirm the week of, and then again the day of. If they don’t respond, I assume it’s not happening and don’t stress about it. And I don’t travel to a city unless I have 3 confirmed appointments. I know some guys, like jake Jennings will send a text that says “CONFIRMED” with all the information like time, hotel, and rate. But I suppose the moral is to not assume that that our interests are always aligned to client interests and to not assume anything.

I was pulled over in Arkansas on my way to little rock on a bogus claim :-)

In Most cases, we’d prefer you go where you’re most comfortable. If you like beer, pick your favorite craft beer bar and we’ll accommodate. :-)