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Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

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Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#181

Post by ryandrake »

baus wrote: post #148
exclusiv wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tahoe is a tough market. Prices should be way higher for what you get in my opinion. I'm not in Tahoe but I can sleep 16+ people at my place and I have more problems when I have the price lower. I had guests complain once that there were a few things in one of the bedroom closets (still tons of storage for their stuff), some things in a small pile in the garage and some food in the cupboards (usually have ketchup, ho…

This is changing the subject slightly, but Tahoe, especially S. Tahoe, is a total bargain. There are few destinations which offer what Tahoe does for the price. I will never understand why other alpine destinations can demand higher prices. There is quite a bit of supply in Tahoe though. I do think people have unrealistic expectations, but my house is pretty damn nice. My cleaners are amazing. I'm pretty happy to sta…

I've rented thru AirBnB twice in the Tahoe area and both times it had been absolutely phenomenal. I mean unbelievable in terms of value for what I was paying. The competition there must be epic.

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#182

Post by untilHellbanned »

sperling75 wrote: post #161
sperling75 wrote: post #157

The hogging of VC funds by airbnb, uber, and many other not startups is super unhealthy for the startup ecosystem. The public markets will eventually punish these companies for valuations that lack transparency. Airbnb is on the way out with their current short term renting business in most large cities. It's illegal and the quality of service is suffering dramatically. Supply side quality is on the way down. Demand…

If you are down voting why not offer some opinion so it can be a discussion..

Upvoted but sadly you can't take YC prodigy and downvote. It's a lose-lose propositon kinda like staying in an airbnb. Say something nice about YC or don't say something at all.

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#183

Post by rootsudo »

wnissen wrote: post #142
exclusiv wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tahoe is a tough market. Prices should be way higher for what you get in my opinion. I'm not in Tahoe but I can sleep 16+ people at my place and I have more problems when I have the price lower. I had guests complain once that there were a few things in one of the bedroom closets (still tons of storage for their stuff), some things in a small pile in the garage and some food in the cupboards (usually have ketchup, ho…

Wait, can't you enforce the number of guests with Instant Book?

People lie. You still get negative feedback if you cancel a guest that is obviously lying.

Sure, you can follow up w/ airbnb, but since they outsourced their staff to a Clearwater, FL and Ortigas, Metro Manila call center their SLA dropped from 24 hours to 2 weeks.

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#184

Post by andor436 »

morvita wrote: post #149
aquadrop wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But AirBnB reviews don't work like that. Even though you leave star rating, nobody sees it (I don't know how it looks like on the host side though, as I only used it as a tenant). Only feedback traceable to you is text you write, but you can be honest with stars. And you see compound rating on the property page, which they only show when there's enough reviews (so again, if you left your review first, they can't see…

I have been an Airbnb host for a while and if you follow your reviews closely, you can tell when someone leaves you low star ratings. In the host dashboard, you only see aggregate stars, but it will break it down as x 5-stars, y-4 stars, etc for each category, so if you know that before your last guest left a review you had 20 5-stars and 3 4-stars and now you have 4 4-stars it's pretty easy to figure out where that…

I'm a host as well, and their new stats section breaks down the reviews in detail. You can see who left what stars. Don't know if this works the same for the traveler.

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#185

Post by andor436 »

supernovae wrote: post #71
MichaelGG wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that why AirBnB is pushing the Instant Reservation system really hard?

Nah, that's mostly to reduce the long tail of rentals.. in some cases it takes months to turn a person into a customer and book now/instant reservation helps shorten this cycle and reduce off platform fishers/scammers.

And it helps address the racism issues they've been having trouble with.

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#186

Post by sperling75 »

dlubarov wrote: post #176
sperling75 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are down voting why not offer some opinion so it can be a discussion..

I didn't downvote, but your claims could use some justification. What makes you think quality is declining? Personal experience? Second hand anecdotes? Media stories?

Personal experience. It's fairly obvious if you have been using the service for any length of time in cities like SF, NYC, LA, Berlin, Paris, Barcelona, really any large city that has banned or curtailed the legal offering of the service. The result is you have a lot more people offering properties where it is banned leading to awkward situations for customers. The listings are not permanent and get removed as soon as they receive a bad review. There are no checks on host providers at all. I actually think it is not any better than craigslist at this point.

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#187

Post by sperling75 »

untilHellbanned wrote: post #182
sperling75 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are down voting why not offer some opinion so it can be a discussion..

Upvoted but sadly you can't take YC prodigy and downvote. It's a lose-lose propositon kinda like staying in an airbnb. Say something nice about YC or don't say something at all.

Small minded to think or act like a cabal

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#188

Post by angryinbangkok »

mapmeld wrote: post #178
JimDabell wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently booked a place in an apartment complex, and when I arrived, there were big signs at all the entrances saying it wasn't a hotel, that it was for residents only, and anybody found to be renting daily/weekly would be arrested as trespassers. I was only staying there for a couple of nights and didn't have time for the hassle of arguing with Airbnb at the time, so I just took the risk. After my stay, I reported…

I had a similar experience (apparently these signs are common in Airbnb apartments in Thailand). At the same time, the apartment front desk staff and doorman were completely aware of my staying there temporarily. I showed up, asked for the keys, the front desk had an envelope, and there were no questions. They must have someone doing that every few weeks, and the signs are someone else's business.

I live in condo in Bangkok where a couple of units are being rented out on Airbnb despite the warning signs.

Most of the inhabitants are people with 9-5 jobs who wish to enjoy a quiet evening after a long day at work. Having tourists next door doesn't help.

People coming home drunk late at night, kids playing soccer in the hallway, Scandinavian women walking around topless and in thong at the pool* - Airbnb guests treat the condo building like a resort, which it isn't.

The walls and doors are thinner, there's no carpet in the hallway and there are less elevators than in a hotel.

Here's a message to everyone considering renting an apartment on Airbnb: GET A GODDAMN HOTEL ROOM!

Thank you SV for "disrupting" my quiet evening [/endrant]

* I know some might actually enjoy this, but Thailand is a conservative Buddhist country. Respect that please.

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#189

Post by [deleted] »

datasage wrote: post #137
JimDabell wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently booked a place in an apartment complex, and when I arrived, there were big signs at all the entrances saying it wasn't a hotel, that it was for residents only, and anybody found to be renting daily/weekly would be arrested as trespassers. I was only staying there for a couple of nights and didn't have time for the hassle of arguing with Airbnb at the time, so I just took the risk. After my stay, I reported…

Best bet is to report it to the condo association or property management company. AirBNB will basically turn a blind eye to those kind of rentals.

[deleted]

Re: Airbnb raises $1B at $31B valuation, became profitable in 2016

#190

Post by mosselman »

ansgri wrote: post #109
nradov wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of asking customers to give numeric star ratings, perhaps a better option would be a short list of Yes / No / Unsure questions. Were there clean sheets on the bed? Were there any cockroaches? Did the appliances work? Etc. Such questions are more objective and less prone to inflation.

Booking.com does it, btw. And I strongly prefer it.

Surprised there is only one mention of Booking.com here. It is an indispensable tool for booking my vacations. The reviews are very useful and a lot more accurate than things like yelp. I have glanced at other websites, but nothing gives me the reassurance of the legitimacy of the reviews that booking.com does.
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