I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb • Hacker News Board

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#251

Post by htrp » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:38 PM UTC

atotic wrote: post #246

nakedrobot2 wrote: post #46

Dear Airbnb, You have destroyed the rental apartment market in my city. You profit from taking advantage of loopholes in legislation, legislation which protects consumers from unscrupulous, dangerous, and untrustworthy properties. The sooner every city enacts laws limiting "airbnb" apartment rentals to 30 days per year per apartment, the better. Otherwise it is abused at scale.

Wow. I had my own bad AirBnB experience, and privately decided never to never use them again. I wrongly assumed it was just me. This is sad, I thought AirBnB were one of the good guys, and had a good experience 4 years ago. Is there something about doing things at scale that makes things go bad? It seems like so many companies are great at start, but go downhill when their assumption that "fraud is a rare exception"…

Communities don't scale.

Airbnb 4-8 years ago was a quirky thing that biased towards tech early adopters. Because it wasn't wildly profitable, it didn't become a magnet for scams yet.

As the community grew, the population includes more diverse people (including the bad actors). Once bad actors find it's easy to get around the loopholes, they tell others and the scams become prevalent.

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#252

Post by htrp » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:39 PM UTC

magduf wrote: post #191

astura wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Verifying listings is not a hard problem, Airbnb literally just doesn't want to, it takes a "we are just a middle man, hosts are responsible for their listings" approach. This is what makes them money, I don't think an Airbnb with only verified legal listings would be very profitable.

>I don't think an Airbnb with only verified legal listings would be very profitable. I think it absolutely could be. As I said in a post above, I've used it once, to stay at a private home (with the family living there) when I traveled to Europe last year and the hotel rates in one particular city were absurd. It was a great experience for me, though of course staying at a private home is very different from staying…

VC money needs 100x returns

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#253

Post by duxup » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:46 PM UTC

iamaelephant wrote: post #227

saturdaysaint wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny, having young kids is what has sent me back to hotels (at least for the time being), simply because they are mostly designed with accessibility and some level of child-proofing. Also, the long corridors, lobbies and elevators in hotels are great outlets for toddlers to burn energy and curiosity. Cooping the kids up in a grown-up oriented space with fragile table decorations they can't touch can be exhausting.

> Also, the long corridors, lobbies and elevators in hotels are great outlets for toddlers to burn energy and curiosity. Please, PLEASE don't do this. You don't know what time people are trying to get some sleep in their rooms. Not everyone keeps your schedule.

You can wander around with your toddler without waking folks up.

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#254

Post by throwaway35784 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:47 PM UTC

julienchastang wrote: post #51

There have been a few threads about AirBnb lately with a lot of people reporting negative experiences so I will add my own $0.02. I have stayed in many AirBnbs. The reason is, I find it is the only way to have a tolerable family vacation is when everyone has their own sleeping quarters. When we are all piled into one (often overpriced and not so clean) hotel room, it makes for less than ideal sleep and everyone ends…

What does this have to do with the artice? You've had luck with Airbnb. You're just saying oh it's a company fraught with fraud and deception since its inception, but that's fine. My kids get their own room.

This company has no moral compass. Why are you advertising for it? Distracting from the reality of the company described in the article?

You know it has illegally ruined communities in the name of profit, right?

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#255

Post by nickip » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:48 PM UTC

pavel_lishin wrote: post #249

bluedevil2k wrote: post #121

I've run into a scam recently on AirBNB and several situations that ended up screwing me over. The scam was after booking a nice place in Orlando, Florida for a week through my wife's AirBNB account. The day after booking, the "owner" sent an email saying that they required a photograph of the front and back of her credit card, drivers license picture and full name. Not even a subtle scam, but that would probably foo…

The renter gets charged when the host cancels the reservation?

In my experience no. But it puts the renter at a disadvantage. I have had them cancel 5 days before my flight to a small island. Least to say it was extremely expensive to rebook a new room that matched the "quality" of the airbnb I was expecting. Of course if I had cancelled 5 days before I would have been on the hook for half the amount of the stay and the service fees, due to the cancellation policy the host choose (Do the host choose these?).

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#256

Post by cgearhart » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:48 PM UTC

> But my power was nothing compared to that of a company valued this year at $35 billion...

It may not recover their loss, but the author wields significant power with this article. For example, I’ll never again consider staying at an AirBnB property. I would caveat that to add “until they fix the problems with their platform”, but I don’t think it’s necessary because (a) I’m not sure they _can_ at their scale, and (b) it certainly doesn’t seem like they _care_.

Sure, I’m only one guy, but this is not the kind of press a company wants before they go public.

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#257

Post by duxup » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:49 PM UTC

tempsy wrote: post #228

I find it pretty crazy that AirBnB's tech never really evolved on the host or guest side at all. The experience is still basically like a pretty Craigslist with payment processing. I sometimes wonder what an engineer there even does other than maintain a CRUD app. For example, why isn't there an Alexa-like concierge device in every AirBnB that answers guest questions by now? Why aren't there smart locks on every home…

I think it is because evolving further in those areas inevitably could expose AirBnB to information they are happy to be ignorant of / responsible for.

A lot of tech companies, including AirBnB operate by passing risk / responsibility off onto everyone else (the host, the customer) and thus saving AirBnB a great deal of time / money.

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#258

Post by booi » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:49 PM UTC

harryh wrote: post #186

dannykwells wrote: post #175

I think what Airbnb, and uber, lyft, Amazon etc. All fail to understand is the longevity ans stickiness of brand. Once you become an untrustworthy or low quality brand, it's very hard to change that. You can still do fine (see: wal mart) but you'll always be looking over your shoulder for higher quality brands that poach the most lucrative customers, and eventually, thats what will lead to your downfall (see: wal mar…

Ah yes, the downfall of WalMart. The... checks notes ...largest company by revenue in America.

yeah if anything Walmart explicitly disproves this statement. Also see Dollar General et. al, Comcast, AT&T etc..

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#259

Post by zippzom » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:49 PM UTC

tempsy wrote: post #228

I find it pretty crazy that AirBnB's tech never really evolved on the host or guest side at all. The experience is still basically like a pretty Craigslist with payment processing. I sometimes wonder what an engineer there even does other than maintain a CRUD app. For example, why isn't there an Alexa-like concierge device in every AirBnB that answers guest questions by now? Why aren't there smart locks on every home…

I also don't understand why there's no lock that integrates with the app. Getting into Airbnbs is consistently inconsistent and confusing.

Re: I Accidentally Uncovered a Nationwide Scam on Airbnb

#260

Post by swozey » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 5:49 PM UTC

CPLX wrote: post #230

swozey wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I've stayed at lot of airbnbs (20-30 a year) and only had good to great experiences. I've met a lot of hosts that I specifically look up when I visit their city again. I've had plenty where they weren't exactly what I expected, like thinking a cabin I was renting was in the woods from the pictures but it was on a gravel driveway with trees in the background, but my trip wasn't ruined or anything. I've unfortunat…

I used to be an active Airbnb host for a vacation house I own. For reference it was a 4 bedroom Victorian. I had to pay $150 to clean the house each time I had a booking, that's what it cost me. I passed it along to guests at exactly that cost. Not sure if it was "worth it" for some guests, or people staying only one night. But that's what I had to pay, it wasn't part of any nefarious strategy. In developed countries…

I'm clearly not a single guy renting 4 bedroom victorian homes. I'm more talking about the people who charge you $80-150/night to clean a 1 bedroom studio, especially if it's a guesthouse in their back yard and I'm asked to do half of the work (put dishes in dishwasher, take out trash, take sheets off bed, etc) and still charged more than I know it costs to clean. Also the fact that it doesn't show up on the map when plotting trips, I have to go into the listing and wind up rejecting half of the options after.

At that point unless I'm looking for a specific experience (cabin in the woods, victorian 4 bedroom home) I'll probably just get a hotel to not have to deal with it.

I think my biggest issue is the DAILY clean fee. I'm fine with a one time clean fee if I'm there for 3-5 days. Hosts aren't coming in and rolling my sheets every night.