This is lamenting about the chore requirements some Airbnb’s instill, which I haven’t seen as much, but a recent discovery I made that is helpful to get around the other annoyance (ridiculous cleaning fees) hinted at in the article: in NL it’s illegal to unbundle price and cleaning fees, so if you browse with a Dutch VPN you get a map with both price and cleaning included, unlike in the States: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32780998#32786503
Sometimes I find it's difficult to differentiate between 'BNB's and 'hotels' on sites like booking and expedia. I was explicitly searching for hotel-looking rooms and booked them (checking on google maps those were not condo buildings or something). To my surprise - first one was indeed hotel-like, seems converted office building, self-check in with a digital lock. Second one - literally located in the office building, self-check in again, neighbors were insurance and tax offices. Both were good I would say - cleanness, location, price. Yet, I would prefer if listing/search explicitly said - self-checkin/office bulding/etc.
Airbnb has allowed hosts to ratchet up cleaning fees ridiculously. They look for any excuse to remove your negative review so they can keep that property (income stream) producing. And the hosts have become more and more draconian now that they are people whose sole income is being a property manager, as opposed to when they were just people getting some money for an extra bedroom.
I would short the stock but I don’t know what’s going to bring it down, where’s the competition. Hotels?
Regulations, hopefully. AirBnB is partially responsible for the housing crises that we're seeing worldwide. Hopefully regulation will catch up sooner rather than later. Tourists are not more important than locals.
When I go to a hotel, I never let any staff in. DND 24/7. I'm very clean, very organized, and very private. I don't really have to clean much when I leave, in fact if anything the room is likely cleaner than when I found it. This is how I was raised. I wouldn't pay for anything I normally wouldn't do, and my time is very valuable (a lot more so than money). AirBNB offers a better experience for me most of the time, but the locations and amenities of hotels are usually better. Hidden fees are awful, and let's not get surprised. You can contact the host before, and the barter system is in full effect on AirBNB. It's a lot less IRL with hotels (unless you're standing at the front desk). Anyway, I'm in the weeds too much on this. Consider yourself lucky you have the options and make a great memory.
Is it just me, or does this article look like a textbook example of a press hit / submarine marketing (as described by pg [1]), for Hilton's recently-launched anti-AirBnB campaign [2]?
I don't know if I can trust this. It's almost ridiculously anecdotal, and in a big enough market it's unfairly easy to find anecdotes to support almost any claim. There are no metrics about typical cleanup expected or whether cleaning requirements are truly growing; running a dishwasher and cleaning your own messes seems patently reasonable as part of the "deal" of this kind of rental. And as a very infrequent AirBnB user, it's not clear to me how the $143 cleaning fee works. Is it only applied if you make a huge mess? Are the expectations on cleaning and possible fee made clear going in? Or is this always charged and part of the standard fee?
I wish this kind of PR nonsense didn't exist; if so, the organic decision to write about this might be signal about a real trend. But given that it does, this may just be an attempt to pipe lies into my brain. I am suspicious.
Edit: This line is extremely telling when carefully parsed: "[AirBnB] said around 55% of its active listings charge a cleaning fee, which on average makes up less than 10% of the total reservation cost."
This is unscientific, but I suspect reflects the way a normal person might perceive Airbnb's fees as high:
I went to airbnb.com logged out, selected the first posting listed, and tried to find the fees. There was no way to see the fee amount, or even know that there are extra fees, without first selecting a date range. I selected three days, and got this fee breakdown
$614 x 3 nights: $1,842
Cleaning fee: $258
Service fee: $296
The unlisted fees increased the list price by around 30%, or $500. If I had been looking for a place to stay, found that place and decided it was reasonable, and then saw that number after I had already mentally committed, I would be frustrated.
(The nightly price is high because I live near a very expensive area and that was the first thing Airbnb tried to promote to me. But I think this would work to reduce the cleaning fee percent, because the cleaning staff are being hired from the same lower cost of living area that services the cheaper properties in the area as well)
-- rented an airbnb - said in the description: "recommend" we use the $30/week cleaning service they can kindly provide - we declined after we arrived - they opened a complaint with aribnb and airbnb just charged us for it anyway --
Airbnb is not a solution for me anymore. Their prices are really similar to hotels and resorts but with the added value of having to clean, cook, etc...
There's also the issue with housing affordability in the Airbnb's era.
Readit News
I would short the stock but I don’t know what’s going to bring it down, where’s the competition. Hotels?
Regulations, hopefully. AirBnB is partially responsible for the housing crises that we're seeing worldwide. Hopefully regulation will catch up sooner rather than later. Tourists are not more important than locals.
I don't know if I can trust this. It's almost ridiculously anecdotal, and in a big enough market it's unfairly easy to find anecdotes to support almost any claim. There are no metrics about typical cleanup expected or whether cleaning requirements are truly growing; running a dishwasher and cleaning your own messes seems patently reasonable as part of the "deal" of this kind of rental. And as a very infrequent AirBnB user, it's not clear to me how the $143 cleaning fee works. Is it only applied if you make a huge mess? Are the expectations on cleaning and possible fee made clear going in? Or is this always charged and part of the standard fee?
I wish this kind of PR nonsense didn't exist; if so, the organic decision to write about this might be signal about a real trend. But given that it does, this may just be an attempt to pipe lies into my brain. I am suspicious.
Edit: This line is extremely telling when carefully parsed: "[AirBnB] said around 55% of its active listings charge a cleaning fee, which on average makes up less than 10% of the total reservation cost."
[1] http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
[2] https://www.reddit.com/r/AirBnB/comments/wwqibv/hilton_launc...
I went to airbnb.com logged out, selected the first posting listed, and tried to find the fees. There was no way to see the fee amount, or even know that there are extra fees, without first selecting a date range. I selected three days, and got this fee breakdown
$614 x 3 nights: $1,842 Cleaning fee: $258 Service fee: $296
The unlisted fees increased the list price by around 30%, or $500. If I had been looking for a place to stay, found that place and decided it was reasonable, and then saw that number after I had already mentally committed, I would be frustrated.
(The nightly price is high because I live near a very expensive area and that was the first thing Airbnb tried to promote to me. But I think this would work to reduce the cleaning fee percent, because the cleaning staff are being hired from the same lower cost of living area that services the cheaper properties in the area as well)
The cleaning fee is added on to your bill on the checkout page when you make the booking.
It is charged no matter what. Even if you never need to clean anything at all.
There's also the issue with housing affordability in the Airbnb's era.
"...live long enough to become a villain.."