AirBNB is more for the guest than the host

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I am growing tired of how AirBNB caters to a first time guest with no reviews, and how Superhosts are treated. My Fiancee and I have been hosting since January. We provide a very reasonable price, high quality linens and great communication.

Of the MANY people we have hosted, we have had 2 bad experiences. First, was a party held at our home - it took 16 hours for us to clean it, and they caused over $300 in damage. We got $150 through the resolution center, but have the security deposit at $400. A lot of good that did. I am glad we didnt hire out the cleaning professionally. They didnt even cover cleaning the vomit stained carpet, and ruined Duvets/covers.

Last week, we had a person who was supposed to stay over memorial weekend. We have a 3 night minimum. They requested, through the messaging system, to reduce the number of nights (Not staying the first night) to two nights. They had 6 people and an infant. I said no, so they pulled the "Medical Emergency " card. When they did that, they changed to removing the last TWO nights. So in a med emergency it affects the whole group, and for the LAST two nights? OK.

Then, we get a storm, and it knocks out the AC. Had to cancel their one night. I have never been thankful until now for the AC to go out. It gets repaired tonight just as my new guests arrive.

I am disgusted with the treatment we get from AirBNB. We are strongly considering just long term rentals on our home.

Rusty and Donna

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I am fed up with the race to the bottom and downward pressure on our prices. I might go for LTR.

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Rusty and Donna,

Thanks for joining the forum. This is an independently funded forum of Airbnb and other STR and VR hosts, and not associated with Airbnb. If you take the time to read the posts here you will find many in agreement with you.

I think you will find that Airbnb doesn’t care about any individual host at all. You can be a Superhost or burnt toast. Airbnb has plenty of hosts and no problem churning the ones they have. It’s not for everyone, that’s for sure. If you decide to keep hosting the members here are full of experience and advice.

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That has it’s own set of problems with tenant rights depending on where you live.

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True. Difficult to remove them. Maybe just selling is the option

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Yes, Superhost status does not seem to really mean anything. I have not noticed an uptick in bookings for it, for sure. I would rather protect my property, and vet the people a little closer and cancel when I need to, to protect it.

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If you cancel there is a fee. Also Airbnb will suspend your listing or punish you by dropping you in the search ranks to the point that you don’t get any bookings.

As for SH, it’s about to get harder to qualify and many hosts will probably lose it anyway. It’s not worth getting worked up over but I expect to see many posts about it here once it happens.

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That takes place at the next assessment, right? It’ll be interesting to see how that all shakes out.

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I think so. Maybe the proverbial feces will hit the … and they will “delay” it a quarter. You know they are going to be inundated with complaints including allegations that no one informed them it was changing.

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My guess is that the new SH parameters will be accepting a higher level of enquriries and bookings.

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