How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord • Hacker News Board

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#91

Post by rprasad » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:06 PM UTC

tgrass wrote: post #17

jerf wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$20,000 isn't "little ways".

I don't understand why the amount is important. He did not cause $20,000 in damages to the landlord. At most, he did $20,000 in damages to the hotel down the street.

He may have imposed more than $20,000 in potential liability on the landlord (i.e., if something went wrong). Standard insurance does not usually extend to the hotel-style leasing that AirBnB offers, so the landlord (and the tentant) would have been personally liable for any damages.

It is possible that the actuarial value (i.e., risk-adjusted value) of those potential liabilities exceeds $20,000, but we would need more information to know.

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#92

Post by rprasad » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:07 PM UTC

drpgq wrote: post #82

uptown wrote: post #10

So he's: 1. Violated his lease. 2. Documented exactly how much income he received during that violation. 3. Probably thew up some red flags to ensure the IRS double-checks that he declares that income on his tax returns. And all of this before he finds out what the courts have to say about his actions.

I do wonder just how much Airbnb income isn't declared for tax purposes.

Hopefully none, since Airbnb reports the income it pays out on Form 1099.

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#93

Post by heliodor » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:17 PM UTC

cube13 wrote: post #64

nsxwolf wrote: post #42

The more I think about this and how it impacts me as a landlord, I am starting to see Airbnb as (warning: the following analogy is not perfect) the Napster of lodging. I think they'd better step up and become the iTunes of lodging in this regard, before more news stories like this start creating a rift between landlords and Airbnb.

I don't think it's that much of an issue, really. The problem isn't on Airbnb's end. It's on the renters that are giving up their rental property without examining the contracts that they signed. Airbnb could probably be treated the same as subletting or renting out the property, so any clauses in the lease/association contracts that covers that should cover Airbnb. The important thing for you, as a landlord, should…

Show me a single person on AirBnB who passes that requirement you quoted from the agreement!

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#94

Post by jw_ » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:22 PM UTC

cabalamat wrote: post #70

hack_edu wrote: post #7

Again and again, people who use Airbnb to 'hack' the rental market get little sympathy from me when the chickens come to roost. If your landlord was interested in running a tenement home/boarding house/hotel, they wouldn't sign you into a year-long lease. Also, and I know this has been hashed out before on these comment threads but he's grossing $30k a year on the back of his landlord. The landlord has every right to…

> If your landlord was interested in running a tenement home/boarding house/hotel, they wouldn't sign you into a year-long lease. But they aren't running a hotel (their tenant is), so what're they complaining about? If I was a landlord I'd have no more problem with this than if I was a wholesaler whose customers resold the stuff retail.

I don't think it's the same situation as somebody reselling goods you've sold wholesale. As other posters mention, running a commercial operation from a residential apartment brings with it a number of insurance concerns for the landlord, safety and security concerns for other tenants (which would also be the landlord's concern), and no doubt a host of other liability issues which I'm ignorant of because I'm not an NYC landlord.

If you were a landlord who was an AirBnB fan, you could certainly choose to not include clauses that specifically forbade this sort of activity. This guy chose to lease somebody else's property and then go ahead and use it in a manner that was expressly forbidden by his lease agreement to line his own pockets.

I have zero sympathy for him. He got slapped down for misusing somebody else's property and rightly so.

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#95

Post by maratd » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:23 PM UTC

bmelton wrote: post #87

maratd wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he didn't. But he did do some damage. That's the nature of property, the more it's used, the more damage it accrues. By having "extra" people in the apartment, the property was being depreciated at a greater rate without compensation to the landlord.

To that point, I wouldn't think it matters in any appreciable way. The lessee is still responsible for those damages whether or not he was renting the room, so the landlord has a path for recompense in the event that any portions of the place are damaged to the point of requiring rumuneration.

> to the point of requiring rumuneration.

And that's the key. I have never met a landlord who demanded compensation from regular wear and tear. Not for the appliances, floors, walls, etc.

I wasn't talking about holes in walls. I was talking about the general wear and tear that the landlord would never be compensated for. In the end, he would have to replace appliances out of his own pocket at a faster rate, etc.

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#96

Post by tgrass » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:27 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #90

tgrass wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why the amount is important. He did not cause $20,000 in damages to the landlord. At most, he did $20,000 in damages to the hotel down the street.

"I don't understand why the amount is important." Because, at the risk of repeating myself, $20,000 isn't "little ways". It is $20,000. We are talking about something important here. Yes, we all make a few holes in the wall or unsanctioned little repairs or something, but we're talking $20,000. It's not "little things". I'm not saying it's automatically "damage" or harm of any kind. In fact it pretty clearly isn't si…

The large amount of profit may inspire attention, but it doesn't correlate with the extent of lease violation (to my mind).

The lease likely mentions guests generally, not charging for them. Which would mean CouchSurfing.org is just as problematic - and that the amount of profit is immaterial.

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#97

Post by jw_ » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:30 PM UTC

chrisdannen wrote: post #72

ed209 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If your landlord was interested in running a tenement home/boarding house/hotel" - then he would have to staff it himself too, promote it and take the risk of no bookings. With a tenant he has someone making sure the place is looked after + he has a contracted income for the whole 12 months. By the sound of this place, the landlord could probably do quite well out of airbnb. But in that case, why not just approach t…

Exactly. This restraining order was the first I had heard from my landlord that he didn't want us airbnb'ing. A phone call and I would have stopped. I knew it was too good to be true.

The clauses in your lease which expressly forbid this sort of activity would actually probably count as the "first you heard from your landlord that he didn't want you AirBNB'ing." It's not like you were unaware of them - you wrote that you "had flouted the same clauses" before.

Now that you were cranking tons of guests through for personal gain, you were surprised when your landlord took exception. If I found out that somebody was blatantly disregarding the rental agreement they'd signed with me for commercial gain, they would not be getting a friendly "hey brother, can you please stop?" phone call either.

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#98

Post by Karunamon » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:31 PM UTC

blafro wrote: post #65

Karunamon wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>wear and tear You charge $1200 to rent a dwelling out. It's $1200 flat. Whether 1 person @ 1200 or 3 people at @ 400 each. How do you somehow accrue more nebulous "wear and tear" from a temporary visitor than you would from a second lessee? It's still no more than two people at once.

This is not necessarily true. Some people rent out the living room couch as well as the spare bedroom. Besides in the second lessee case, the landlord at least gets to vet the second person.

Vetting only lessens the chance of catastrophic damage from an idiot tenant, though. It does nothing to mitigate wear and tear. That was what my now-masisvely-downvoted point was. The "wear and tear" argument is on pretty shaky ground.

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#99

Post by fennecfoxen » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:34 PM UTC

fennecfoxen wrote: post #33

hack_edu wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, though if the landlord had a hand in the operation I'd imagine it would have to be a legal business. This means taxes, insurance, wages, administration costs, permits that probably make it more trouble than its worth.

Let's take a moment and see the amazing things that can be accomplished with AirBnB and marvel at the things that we do to ourselves with regulation which could make things like this practically impossible. Stifling business and innovation, deadweight losses to society, and all that economics jazz. Great for the traditional hotel industry, though, and whatever lobbyists they have at City Hall and in Albany...

Okay, I don't want to drag HN into flamewars for the lulz, so... Man, all you guys, chill. I'm not saying let's all go anarchist hyper-libertarian on you, or say that no regulation has any purpose or any benefit. I'm just asking you to think about the costs we impose on ourselves with it - I think this is reasonable, because you're clearly doing a perfectly good job thinking of alllll the benefits already, as your responses have clearly indicated.

And this is a specific occasion to see the costs. Most occasions you won't get to see the costs. They'll be behind the veil of obscurity and all you'll actually see is a bunch of (possibly self-interested) Republicans talking about abstractions, if the costs are mentioned at all.

Perhaps now that we are better enabled by technology we can get all or substantially all of the benefits with fewer costs in the future? Then everyone can be happy happy freedom joy double rainbow all across the sky puppy-kisses. For srsly. :)

okay i'm done here. :)

Re: How Airbnb Earned Me $20,000 And A Restraining Order From My Landlord

#100

Post by roguecoder » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 6:35 PM UTC

subpixel wrote: post #54

Crazy: I had the same landlord. I drove by his management office on Box Street last week and saw it was turned into a hotel, and now I see the luxury lofts listed on Airbnb. He's not a normal landlord, he's a shark. He owns several dozen buildings, prefers paying fines to getting permission, and once had our whole building manned with thugs to prevent a city agency from entering the building and confirming that he wa…

Those sorts of actions are what regulation was supposed to prevent.

The current option, of crowd-sourcing information about possible lodging, wasn't previously possible. While we still need regulation to prevent the dumping of raw sewage, we could get so much more out of the space we have with decentralized, information-rich decision making.

Plus, it's not like regulation has actually kept people like him from doing illegal things. As long as the punishment is "a fine" breaking the law is just another cost of doing business. If instead the government could evict him from his properties he might possible decide its worth following the law.