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Good Morning. Love that so many TX hosts are willing to open their homes to disaster victims for free right now. You guys rock!
Is there a way for this same offer to extend to hosts outside of the current boundaries? Even to other states? With approx. 30K displaced families, the need will be extreme. And with so many wanting to help, the free housing program that’s been set up seems like the most capable vehicle for helping to fill a desperate need.
Thanks in advance for your response.
You’d have to ask Airbnb. Do let us know what they say.
There’s a host in my neighborhood in NYC who is offering up his home to share with him for $35.00 a night which is really inexpensive but I wonder if anyone would bother to travel here from Texas. And it’s not free. Here’s a screen shot, the listing popped up 2 days ago.
Strange. Obviously priced way under market but if someone is truly a refugee I don’t think they can afford a NYC vacation now.
I’m in El Paso and people are coming this far but I have bookings coming up so can’t take anyone.
Wow - That’s great!
Although the question would be, how would a Harvey victim ever find this?
I’ve sent a note to Airbnb to see if there might be a way to create a
search feature for these offers.
Thanks for sharing this, btw!
Here is the link. I don’t know if you can offer your place regardless of your location or not. On another page it says airbnb partners with government and NGOs so maybe people who are legitimately dislocated can find out about listings that way rather than searching the internet themselves.
Yes thank you - I have that link.
I run a non-profit and people all over the country are offering to host evacuees, but it’s tricky to coordinate for all the obvious reasons.
@Maggieroni. No one is going to travel from Texas to NY right now, but there are plenty of Texans who simply can not get home. I have a couple of friends stuck in San Francisco, Chicago and New York, so perhaps this host is thinking s/he can help them out?
Just a small reminder that Texas is huge and not directly impacted by the hurricane. Texans are traveling to NY now and always. Travel through Houston is obviously impossible now.
“Airbnb will let hosts sign up to donate emergency housing before a disaster”
I think it’s great that there are hosts who are willing to provide free housing to those affected by a natural disaster. I am surprised though that Airbnb doesn’t seem to contribute anything. Here is a $30 billion company that stands to get great positive publicity from this for free. The hosts not only earn nothing, but they will lose out on any potential earnings they could have gotten because they are now booked. The hosts are bearing all the costs and Airbnb gets all the credit.
The program provides hosts with preparedness training, which also takes up more of their time that they will have to donate. I think it’s a great idea and a wonderful program but the company should contribute something to the hosts especially since they are benefitting from all the positive press and goodwill it brings them. Am I missing something here or am I wrong?
https://www.airbnbcitizen.com/partnering-with-the-city-of-san-jose/
This really chafes my hide. Of course that is going on here in Hawaii, and one of our hosts here on the forum is offering assistance. But why does Airbnb grab the credit when they didn’t really do anything but coordinate the guest and host and free housing?
“Airbnb offers free housing to lava flow victims.”
What? No you didn’t!
Not sure why you would do this through AirBnB, I certainly would not.
And your amenities have to be exactly as advertised and they can leave a review! I mean I am sure most people who get free housing are grateful but there may be a few who… well you know.
Also, our host who is a forum member here said people were trying to book who were not actually evacuees. So there were a few trying to take advantage.
