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Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

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Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#101

Post by olyjohn »

Jommi wrote: post #50
alexandec wrote: post #33

I've had bad experiences with multiple Airbnbs including: - showing up at night with the key not in the agreed location, and not being able to contact the owner until the next day - showing up and someone else was already in the unit - a webcam was plugged in and placed on the bedside table with no warning - conditions in the unit were significantly worse than those shown in the photos All these listings had great re…

And then you give a bad review and those places lose their listing? Not sure what you want to do? Pay more so that Airbnb reviews them for you? Are you really up for paying old hotel prices again?

Last few times I have gone on there, the prices have not been cheap like they used to be. There's always a $50-100 charge for cleaning, and some other bullshit fees in there too. Of course those fees don't show up when you're searching the listings.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#102

Post by yroc92 »

amiga_500 wrote: post #97
3pt14159 wrote: post #39

I have a friend who got into hosting AirBnbs pretty early. Bought a 4 unit place in a rough part of Toronto that was still pretty close to downtown and lived in one of the units while he AirBnbed out the other three. Occasionally he'd go on a trip and AirBnb out his own unit. It was enough money for him to cover his mortgage and not have to work if he watched his spending. He's bleeding money now and it started about…

> He's bleeding money now Maybe he should work instead of leeching off his community.

Why so hostile? The community is not who is using this guy’s Airbnb units.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#103

Post by foobar1962 »

jcims wrote: post #81
foobar1962 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Airbnb is a middle-man, they make money from the transactions (bookings) between guest and host. The more bookings, the more money they make. The number of bookings is decreasing, and they are refunding their cut from bookings made months ago.

Yes but to GP's point what are their costs? Marketing and a website? The last place I went to book for 3 days had almost $90 in 'service fees'. ???

I'd cynically like to say political lobbying (and be right, they spend a LOT) but much would be support, development and hosting.

BTW Airbnb charge both the guest and the host, they make a commission from both parties.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#104

Post by carapace »

CydeWeys wrote: post #38

At this point I'm rooting for them to go bankrupt and fail, because they continue illegally operating in my city. It is illegal to lease entire units in NYC for <30 day spans, yet AirBnb does absolutely nothing to stop these listings and indeed refuses to cooperate with the city government in shutting them down.

Yeah. They're not a "home-sharing company" so much as a distributed hotel.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#105

Post by foobar1962 »

wnissen wrote: post #98
cgurke wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

International customer service in many languages.

Serious question, have you ever used AirBnB's customer service? It's so spare as to be nonexistent. They make Google look high-touch. The host is providing 95% of the service. AirBnB is only there if the host won't answer messages or there is some colossal problem with the listing. I've had several dozen stays and only invoved AirBnB service on maybe 5 of them. AirBnB should be making money hand over fist since essen…

I'm a super host and can be talking to a real person usually within 5 minutes. I'm in Australia, it might be a time zone thing.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#106

Post by amiga_500 »

fbonetti wrote: post #74
3pt14159 wrote: post #39

I have a friend who got into hosting AirBnbs pretty early. Bought a 4 unit place in a rough part of Toronto that was still pretty close to downtown and lived in one of the units while he AirBnbed out the other three. Occasionally he'd go on a trip and AirBnb out his own unit. It was enough money for him to cover his mortgage and not have to work if he watched his spending. He's bleeding money now and it started about…

That’s basically what I’m doing, except with a 3 unit building in Michigan. In an average month, the two AirBnB units bring in 3-4x the mortgage in revenue. Not enough to retire of course, but it’s a nice side hustle. That being said, our bookings been hit pretty hard by the coronavirus. We’ve hade multiple cancellations recently, and the month of April is basically wide open. We usually have an occupancy rate for 85…

Paying off two dwellings at little effort is a nice "side hustle". No wonder nobody in the west is working! Meanwhile the Fed pumps more money to protect banks from rentiers blowing up, while taxes go unpaid and hospitals are underfunded.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#107

Post by xenocyon »

yroc92 wrote: post #102
amiga_500 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He's bleeding money now Maybe he should work instead of leeching off his community.

Why so hostile? The community is not who is using this guy’s Airbnb units.

That is precisely the problem.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#108

Post by nostrademons »

partisan wrote: post #58
nuggien wrote: post #42

Airbnb is a shitty company. Last october we traveled to Seoul and couldn't find the location of the apartment we booked. Even the local taxi driver couldn't find it after circling the area for ~30 minutes. We called the host during the entire 30 minutes and didn't get through to them. After about 1 hour of time, we decided to call it quits and go book a hotel because it was 10pm at night and our kids needed to sleep.…

I find it a bit naive to take small children along with you into unknown situations like that. I question your judgement after repeating the mistake. I think Airbnb floats on questionable judgement and people are starting to catch on.

Eh, we AirBnB'd a place for our anniversary when our kid was 4 months old. It was his first night away from home, so we were a little nervous, particularly since he was a pretty noisy baby and had yet to sleep through the night. We only went an hour away so we could bail and come home if it was a disaster.

He ended up having a blast. The hosts had two pre-school age kids, and he was fascinated watching them ride their bikes around the courtyard. He was quiet enough that the hosts didn't even notice him, and he slept through the night for the first time.

Kids are pretty resilient, and if you never stretch into the unknown, you never find out what you can do. We've taken him on another (international this time) AirBnB trip, when he was 16 months, and he had a blast again. Though he did give us a minor heart attack when he woke up from his nap, evaded the baby monitor we'd set up, climbed off the bed, walked across the basement, and ascended a full flight of stairs by himself, only making his presence known by scratching at the kitchen/stair door.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#109

Post by amiga_500 »

Brendinooo wrote: post #4

I'd imagine there's a sizable group of people who think Airbnb is only worth it if the price (and maybe location) is significantly better than a hotel, and that seems to be less true as the company matures.

It's less true as more and more lazy landlords try to get on the bus.

Re: Airbnb’s loss nearly doubles in fourth quarter, before virus

#110

Post by chx »

JenrHywy wrote: post #54
Brendinooo wrote: post #4

I'd imagine there's a sizable group of people who think Airbnb is only worth it if the price (and maybe location) is significantly better than a hotel, and that seems to be less true as the company matures.

It's also about facilities. Having a full kitchen and separate rooms makes a world of difference when you're traveling with kids.

Just a microwave saves significant money as I only need to order one restaurant meal a day and can easily split it in two. I need to be very picky about what I can eat so if I found something I'd much rather not waste half of it.

So many hotel rooms don't feature microwaves. Sure, full kitchens are a fire hazard but a microwave?? Maybe because some has room service and want to push that instead? Or maybe they had room service it ceased but the lack of microwaves stayed like bugs in legacy codebases.

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