$1400 to cancel account?

Hi there, I need to cancel my AirBnb account because I have discovered that I cannot let the entire house, only a portion of it. I tried to cancel each reservation but the AirBnb website tells me it will charge me $100 for cancelling a reservation. I have tried cancelling the account but I just get the message: ‘you cannot cancel your account until you have cancelled all your reservations’. Does this mean I cannot cancel my account or my reservations unless I pay $1400? (I have 14 reservations). I cannot afford this. I am very poor. Please advise me. I considered simply sending a message to each reservation explaining that I can no longer host them, however they will need a full refund and if they try to arrange this from their end I’m worried AirBnb will still charge me $100 for every single reservation because I am the one who is cancelling. I simply cannot afford $1400. I don’t know what to do.

Is there any way I can stop my bank giving Airbnb money if they try to take some? I haven’t actually received a penny for any of the upcoming bookings. I am sincerely sorry for having to cancel these poor people, but it has to be done.

I can’t see any way around this. The guests are now put in a bad situation because you have to cancel (I know that you know this), and Airbnb is trying to recoup the coupon/rebooking incentive they’ll have to provide each guest in order to re-house them. If they didn’t provide an incentive to the guest in the form of a coupon they’d probably be bothered and just book a hotel thereby not making any money for Airbnb. Is there any scenario in which you can keep some of the bookings? Any local hosts that you can reach out to in order to see if any of the guests would accept an alternative?

There is definitely a cost of doing business here as you are sadly facing now…

Are you saying you can’t let your entire house because your landlord told you this, or because you found out about a local law? Note that, while I’m not recommending breaking any laws, if that is what you are worried about you should probably know that in most localities these laws aren’t really enforced, and you will probably be able to complete all your bookings without any problems.

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bkbnb is right - could you fill us in more on why you cannot keep the reservations? Without more information, I would just let you know that you can contact people you have reservations with, explain you cannot keep their reservation (you don’t have to give them a lot of details, but be honest like “I discovered my lease does not allow me to rent the entire house to you, would you be interested in part of the house? or willing to cancel your reservation”. They don’t have to, but you can ask. Knowing other hosts in your area is also a good idea - connect with them and see if they can take your reservation. Hosts in my area meet socially from time to time which is really a lot of fun and full of resources to share.

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THis is what you should do.

  1. Write to each of the guests telling them the place will not be available and apologies profusely.

  2. Offer to give them to links to other places that suit their requirements on Airbnb and even recommend which one looks the best, in their price range.

  3. Ask them to save the links on another page (eg word document) because when they cancel, both you and they will no longer be able to see those links

  4. Offer that if they decide to cancel, you can send them the cancellation fee they may be charged, eg by paypal or other means (or you may only offer if they ask)

  5. When they find a suitable place, most will just cancel from their end and move on, and may not even ask for their own cancellation fee (depending on how big or small it is)!

All the best!

If you still want to withdraw from airbnb, then block off your calendar, remove instant book and take no more bookings.

Airbnb cannot take money out of your account and can only deduct money from money you’ve earned through them!

An additional option is to list the room(s) that are available, then when you may money off them, you can use that to pay off the cancellation charges. So you list the rooms as new listings - “private rooms” and not as “entire place”!

tell every guest that a prior guest brought bedbugs into your home… all of them will cancel of their own free will !

I did this for the one time I cancelled a guest booking, and the guest contacted Airbnb and told them that I had done exactly this. I was chastised by Airbnb and reminded that under no condition can i suggest or ask the guest to cancel or offer them incentives to do so. I knew that it wasn’t the correct thing to do, but I knew the repercussions of a guest cancelling a booking are much less, so I thought I’d try. It didn’t work.

Why would you have gotten 14 reservations if you are “very poor”? You need bedsheets, bathroom, food for breakfast etc yet you only get paid by Airbnb 24 hours after the guests checked in, so you would need to pay a lot of money upfront.

Sorry to say, but your story doesn’t sound very credible to me.