Discrimination Lawsuit for Declining Booking with Children

Thought this might be interesting to some of y’all. It is a major discrimination lawsuit against a host and Airbnb filed last week for discriminating against “Familial Status”. It was just a matter of time IMO since a lot of hosts have transitioned to doing long-term rentals (30+ days).

This is specific to US Fair Housing Laws which cover long-term rentals. Short-term rentals, for the most part, fall under different laws called Public Accommodations laws and very few places prohibit discrimination against familial status in short-term rentals with some notable exceptions like CA, NY and Maine so this will mostly be relevant to those doing long-term rentals.

Airbnb’s official policy on discriminating against families is that it is not allowed “where prohibited by law” so it’s best to know your local laws about it as it can vary by state and sometimes by city.

My advice is to never ever state a discriminatory preference in writing anywhere, especially not in a message to a guest. If you don’t want to host them, find a different (non-discriminatory) reason or just say “no thank you” and move on. This host was arrogant and ignorant and is paying for it now. And depending on what happens with the suit I could see Airbnb making new policies to cover their asses as the plaintiff has sued not only for discrimination but also for associated damages (including her husband’s job loss).

https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-sues-airbnb-after-host-rejected-rental-mother-with-children-2025-01-10/

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Interesting. Thanks for posting. In the article, it says:

Airbnb’s website says hosts are prohibited from discrimination based on “familial status (having children).”

The San Francisco-based company said hosts may highlight features that could lead guests to decide when properties are unsuitable for children.

(My italics).

That’s exactly what I do. Although our listings say that the rentals are not suitable for children, like all hosts, I get the occasional “I know that you don’t accept children, but our three-year-old is so well-behaved…” type inquiry.

By explaining this further, I have been able to avoid hosting kids because the apartments truly are unsuitable for children. Most parents will accept that when I explain the unfenced canal frontage, the 2nd floor open catwalk with invitingly climbable railings (tempting for kids), the hard Cuban tiled floors and so on.

If needs be, I can invoke the dreaded ‘not allowed by the HOA’ excuse which is actually true.

Tricky business though.

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Can you imagine any parent or pet owner saying, “Well, our kid is kind of an out-of-control brat”, or “My dog is badly behaved.”

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I think the next time someone says “Don’t worry - we’ll take care of your home like it is our own!”, I’m going to ask them to send pictures of their home…

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Yes. In my dog boarding business I’ve heard that a lot more than in the Airbnb business of course. Just this month, guests in my Airbnb told me their dogs would cry when they left and they did.

Not sure I’d classify dogs crying when the owner leaves as “badly behaved”- more like annoying to whoever has to listen to it. I’d consider a dog badly behaved if they chewed things up, scratched and damaged doors, barked incessantly, dug holes in the yard and gardens, ignored commands, relieved themselves indoors, etc.

Of course, that’s really not the dog’s fault, it’s on the owners who haven’t bothered to do any training. Seems like it would be hard to train a dog not to cry or howl when left alone, though.

I believe from your past posts that you only allow 1-2 week stays and also know that FL doesn’t protect familial status in a STR so you’re safe anyway. However, I believe that it’s always best to deal with these issues diplomatically as you’ve described anyway.

Erm. An HOA can’t make discriminatory policies against familial status either unless it’s a legally-designated senior community so I wouldn’t use that if you ever did decide to do long-term rentals for some reason.

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I realize I posted an article about it that is very brief and didn’t include the conversation between the host (landlord in this situation) and guest (tenant). The guest confronted him about the discrimination stating “you do know that it’s illegal to discriminate against families with children, right?” and then the fool dug in even deeper seemingly having no knowledge about the laws and (inaccurately) leaning on Airbnb “policy” instead.

I don’t know what will become of the case. It could disappear into nothingness with a pre-court settlement but there’s no doubt that it was easy for the guest to get legal representation since the host made it so damn easy by typing the discrimination out in plain English for them. Doh.

I am supportive of that law when it comes to long term tenancies. Long term tenants usually are expected to provide their own furnishings, aside from major appliances, which are included in many long term rentals. Damages that may occur from wear and tear due to having children would largely be damage to the tenants’ own belongings. And landlords of long term rentals expect to have to do some repairs, fix wall dings, repaint, replace carpets, etc. Plus they have a security deposit to cover damages beyond normal wear and tear.

That’s completely different from short term rentals.

Looks like it’s time for the billionaire owners to get down to Mar a Lago and do a little ass-kissing.

Seems like the “hosts” were more remote “investor” Airbnb owners- have an Airbnb in Alabama, but live in Santa Monica, Calif.

One of the things this highlights is that Airbnb, despite pushing long term rentals, isn’t set up to properly handle them.

And when hosts are forced into long term rentals by local jurisdiction regulations, that is done to discourage strs in favor of providing more housing for locals, in which case str platforms are a poor choice for home owners.

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Wouldn’t that be the simplest and most solid answer to any such inquiries?

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I guess, but it wouldn’t be as much fun -persuading them that they were ‘bad’ if they stayed here. (An ego thing actually ‘can I manage to persuade them not to come?’) :rofl:

But as @JJD says above, depending on where you are, HOA rules don’t overwrite the law unless the complex is age-designated - which ours isn’t.

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We have verbage that says no kids under age ten and please ask if you are bringing a child or a service animal. We have successfully hosted kids and service animals, but no toddlers that we know of. Even craigslist, where I’m trying to find a fire evacueee or home loser has flagged me for no kids. There’s other verbage that mentions dangerous animals, no lawn or fencing, rocky cliffs and couples romance so … maybe that’s why we get mostly couples.

Thanks for sharing.

Increasing the price is one way I avoid hosting people I don’t want.

They are usually outraged at me for being so unethical.

Then at that point I will block them for being abusive.

Can you elaborate how this works? I assume that you do not use IB, so once you receive a booking request with potentially tricky guests you just increase the price before accepting?
I don’t quite understand.

I find it amusing that you think that people with more money somehow are safer and more caring in our business. In my experience, having a lot of money many times allows the guest to let their sense of entitlement To dominate over any sense of decency.

As we are seeing every day in the news, people with wealth can be complete asshats And their wealth not only insulates them from consequences, but many people look to people with money as having somehow succeeded in life beyond the simple accumulation of Currency.

Being poor is never a choice.

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That’s not what @house_plants meant. They raise the price on the dates the guests requested to get them to drop their request. Note the comment on the guests being outraged at them being unethical.

I don’t either I have to admit.

houseplants has mentioned doing this before. I guess it’s similar to some hosts blocking dates an inquirer asked about if they see red flags.

Seems like blocking dates would be a better strategy anyway, though, as if the price is raised enough to make the inquirer go away, it’s probably too high for anyone else to book. And then the guest has no reason to accuse the host of being unethical- the host can just say those dates got booked by someone else.

But I don’t understand why all these strategies are even necessary, when you can just decline if an unwanted inquirer is being persistent.

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