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Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

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Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#21

Post by handoflixue »

donnachangstein wrote: post #17
fellowniusmonk wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will always love AirBnB for driving down prices by breaking the hotel cartels in major cities. Over 10 years ago I rented a folding couch right off of Pearl ST. Boulder, CO. I stayed in the living room of someones 1 bedroom apartment for $300 a night instead of 1k+ a night for the equivalent at what amounted to a travel lodge motel. The prices there were out of control, no inventory, just awful. There are "plausibl…

You could have saved yourself $300 and slept on a bench in the central bus station for approximately the same level of accommodation.

Can you actually? Every major city I've been to in the past five years is pretty harsh on that sort of thing. I'd happily pay $300 to avoid the risks of arrest and having all my stuff stolen.

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#22

Post by jazzyjackson »

donnachangstein wrote: post #17
fellowniusmonk wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will always love AirBnB for driving down prices by breaking the hotel cartels in major cities. Over 10 years ago I rented a folding couch right off of Pearl ST. Boulder, CO. I stayed in the living room of someones 1 bedroom apartment for $300 a night instead of 1k+ a night for the equivalent at what amounted to a travel lodge motel. The prices there were out of control, no inventory, just awful. There are "plausibl…

You could have saved yourself $300 and slept on a bench in the central bus station for approximately the same level of accommodation.

Funny but couches can be pretty comfortable, and in the days of Airbnb being a monetized couchsurf, you'd at least wake up to fresh coffee

Safe place to stash your luggage is another matter, there's a dozen apps that cater to this need now too so if you are sleeping in the bus station at least you can put your baggage behind a locked door

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#23

Post by lispisok »

fellowniusmonk wrote: post #12
elteto wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the writing is sort of on the wall for airbnb's current business model. Local regulations are finally catching up to them, limiting new listings or applying the same taxes and fees applied to regular hotels. And airbnb's are not cheaper anymore, and many times not any more convenient than a hotel, due crappy hosts and their excessive fees and regulations. Airbnb is still a great option if the location is unde…

I will always love AirBnB for driving down prices by breaking the hotel cartels in major cities. Over 10 years ago I rented a folding couch right off of Pearl ST. Boulder, CO. I stayed in the living room of someones 1 bedroom apartment for $300 a night instead of 1k+ a night for the equivalent at what amounted to a travel lodge motel. The prices there were out of control, no inventory, just awful. There are "plausibl…

What you described is an experience I would expect using couchsurfing.com which was around long before airbnb.

Source: Have hosted couchsurfers very long ago

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#24

Post by dbg31415 »

Airbnb started strong, but it has become a minefield for travelers. Scam listings have exploded -- Airbnb admitted in 2023 that it removed nearly 60,000 fake ones, but that's only a fraction of what slips through. Investigations like one by VICE uncovered organized scams exploiting the platform for years, yet Airbnb has been slow to implement meaningful preventative measures. Meanwhile, pricing has grown increasingly deceptive: hosts tack on hefty cleaning and service fees, often doubling the advertised nightly rate. Although Airbnb recently added an option to show total prices up front, it's not the default, and hidden costs remain a major complaint.

Even more troubling are the widespread privacy violations. Thousands of guests have reported hidden cameras in their rentals -- some even found in bedrooms and bathrooms. Airbnb didn't ban indoor cameras until March 2024, after more than a decade of complaints and several high-profile criminal cases. Combined with fake photos, misleading descriptions, and little accountability for bad hosts, it's clear the trust that once defined the platform has eroded. Airbnb didn't just lose its shine -- it actively neglected the safety and transparency that made it appealing in the first place.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/nationwide-fake-host-scam-on...

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#25

Post by jenkins6g »

I have an airbnb experience and just hired 2 people. Airbnb decided to pause my experience for no reason. Tried hitting up their support but they didn't provide a reason for the pause and a date when it would be resumed. This is why you never rely on one customer channel

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#26

Post by subpixel »

popularonion wrote: post #6
spicyusername wrote: post #3

reinvention of Airbnb I cannot for the life of me figure out why these companies don't just stick to their core. AirBnB provides an amazing service, the ability to painlessly book hotels that feel like houses. I guarantee you they are not going to be the next Apple or Microsoft, they're instead just going to dilute the value of their core business chasing things that aren't going to work, instead of focusing on their…

TLDR > It is also revitalizing an unsuccessful experiment the company began in 2016: offering bespoke local activities, or what it calls “experiences.” The next stage, launch date unspecified, involves making your profile on Airbnb so robust that it’s “almost like a passport,” as Chesky puts it > After that comes a deep immersion into AI: Inspired by his relationship with Altman, Chesky hopes to build the ultimate ag…

“ Airbnb must have learned to deal with trust/safety/reputation issues better than basically any other consumer app based company”

Not at all. Basically all reviews on Airbnb are positive bc of the threat of retaliation. Your reviews are like your social credit score, not worth threatening to post a negative but honest review.

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#27

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

elteto wrote: post #4
spicyusername wrote: post #3

reinvention of Airbnb I cannot for the life of me figure out why these companies don't just stick to their core. AirBnB provides an amazing service, the ability to painlessly book hotels that feel like houses. I guarantee you they are not going to be the next Apple or Microsoft, they're instead just going to dilute the value of their core business chasing things that aren't going to work, instead of focusing on their…

Because the writing is sort of on the wall for airbnb's current business model. Local regulations are finally catching up to them, limiting new listings or applying the same taxes and fees applied to regular hotels. And airbnb's are not cheaper anymore, and many times not any more convenient than a hotel, due crappy hosts and their excessive fees and regulations. Airbnb is still a great option if the location is unde…

AirBNB forced hotels to MASSIVELY upgrade.

There used to be very few hotels with kitchenettes, any space really beside just a bed.

There's way more suite and kitchenette options.

Lots of people travel for longer than just a night or two, or to travel beyond just business, where you might want to be able to actually enjoy being in your private space.

Hotels weren't really designed for this.

They wanted you to never be in your room, and instead upselling you at the bar.

Now, you can pretty easily find relatively affordable hotels that have many different types of rooms layouts for all different purposes.

Now, that defeats a lot of the point in having an AirBNB.

As you said, AirBNB is really only good if you're traveling somewhere with lousy hotel options, you're going to be staying somewhere for a long time, or traveling in a huge group, or you want to host a rager party or something...

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#28

Post by subpixel »

theGnuMe wrote: post #11

Here is how it should work. When people go on vacation they want an Apple like experience where it all just works. That is what AirBnB needs to sell. The only other person who probably understands this is Richard Branson (and Disney)... call it AirBnB Concierge (or even AirBnB vacations) to blend in the AmEx style angle. It's easy peasy Chesky, make it happen.

People want a hotel like experience where it all just works.

Airbnb had novelty, inventory, and savings as its special sauce.

Nowadays we all know what a sub-par, overpriced Airbnb is like and it’s worse than a hotel because it’s usually far more inconvenient.

So we’re back to a hotel like experienced as the desire: convenience, available, and competitively priced.

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#29

Post by nine_k »

CuriousRose wrote: post #20

It amazes me that companies like AirBnB get huge valuations and user bases when the fundamental feature of searching for listings is phenomenally atrocious. - Paginated results that reset and call an API for new results when the map is moved (even to a subset of the initial call such as in a zoom). - Inability to change pagination size. - Inability to hide listings you aren't interested in. - Map only displaying list…

Did you notice that the search at Amazon is not that precise? It's not because they could not make it more precise. Equally, did you notice how milk and bread are in the opposite end of the grocery store? It's not because they could not put them next to the entrance. I suspect that a similar factor can be in play here.

As of slowness, I suspect they don't have a DC an Australia, so your packets need to travel across Pacific and back.

I also suspect that their web site already brings enough customers, and a serious rework to make it more usable won't bring in many more customers, and any more money. Investing in that is likely a poor business decision. I bet their resources mostly go to protection from fraud, legal battles, and other non-engineering concerns.

Re: Airbnb is in midlife crisis mode

#30

Post by dayjah »

subpixel wrote: post #26
popularonion wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TLDR > It is also revitalizing an unsuccessful experiment the company began in 2016: offering bespoke local activities, or what it calls “experiences.” The next stage, launch date unspecified, involves making your profile on Airbnb so robust that it’s “almost like a passport,” as Chesky puts it > After that comes a deep immersion into AI: Inspired by his relationship with Altman, Chesky hopes to build the ultimate ag…

“ Airbnb must have learned to deal with trust/safety/reputation issues better than basically any other consumer app based company” Not at all. Basically all reviews on Airbnb are positive bc of the threat of retaliation. Your reviews are like your social credit score, not worth threatening to post a negative but honest review.

The Airbnb review process is so weird I can only assume it’s actually broken.

Give someone three stars; which is “okay” (airbnbs own language) and you’re forced into specifying why a review (or part of a review) got three stars. The canned reasons are pretty negative (“felt unsafe”, etc). The “write in your own reason” option is limited to 50 characters.

So you’re incentivized to select 4 or 5 stars which allows you to click through the review without any other entry requirements.

I only give truthful reviews and I’ve only had three cases (out of ~70 stays) where the host was an asshat in response.

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