Memes

Yeah, if it's the same price why the hell would you not stay in a hotel instead of "pretend this random house is a hotel, but now with the added magic of no regulation"

AirBnb became popular when hotels inflated prices around certain events or were at capacity. Since then, AirBnb owners have jacked up prices to be more expensive than hotels, and you have to deal with the "landlord attitude." It turned from a genuine service into another cash grab scheme.

Don't forget having to find the cameras watching you, and text messages every 38 minutes telling you to leave 5 star reviews.

The basic problem of AirBNB was that it was never going to scale. Individual condo owners will never be able to compete with the efficiencies of scale of hotels. Having cleaning staff have to drive from building to building can never compete with a bunch of rooms in a single hallway.

The AirBNB concept does make sense for a few niche applications:

1. Small rental units in locations where big hotels aren't viable. (Think remote mountain cabins.)

2. Actual lived-in homes for people who are traveling and don't mind strangers staying in their house while they're away.

Neither of these scale. Cabin rentals can compete because it's not viable to build a hundred unit hotel on top of a remote mountain. But that market can't scale. Cabin rentals already have their own rental networks, and there are only so many of them. People renting out their actual residences can compete with hotels. You already have to pay your mortgage anyway, bringing in a short-term renter adds little marginal cost. But this model can't scale, as very few people actually want to rent out their own homes while they're out.

But AirBNB pulled the usual Silicon Valley bait-and-switch. Corner a market with unsustainably low prices, then raise them. The bait got many people to purchase rental units with the goal of renting them on AirBNB. But this was never going to be sustainable. Once AirBNB stopped subsidizing the rentals, the landlords have to raise the costs (both monetary and policy costs) to actually make the business profitable. And they simply cannot compete with the economies of scale of hotels.

AirBnB became too many people’s “passive income”.

They don’t want to take care of the property or have too many to take care of, so they treat customers like house sitters for the luxury of renting the property as well as building equity off them.

Pretty messed up. In the early days Airbnb was ok, we used it a couple times, but ai wouldn’t want to mess with it today.

Idk my airbnb had a heat alarm directly above the stove, so when we decided to cook we discovered that it sets off above 45°C, is not a smoke alarm, and we were already overwhelmed with stress before that cataclysmic screech. I smashed it off the ceiling (because I can't think through the noise to find the latch), told them "fuck you, hated the stay," and I never got a fine. Left the pieces of alarm where they lay.

If you’re a party of 4 or fewer and are only staying for a couple of nights, a hotel with breakfast included is the better choice. Chain hotels also have a minimum baseline of quality so you at least have some expectation of consistency anywhere you go. Less chances of hidden cameras too.

Unless the point of your travel is the accommodation itself, you’ll likely only be in there for less than 12 hours a day, so all you really need is a secure room with a clean bed and bathroom.

I’ve never stayed in an Airbnb, and after everything I’ve read online, I can’t think of a compelling reason to.

Edit: my goodness, such evangelism! Perhaps I should reconsider my position

AirBnB is not for ‘cheap’ stays anymore (if it ever was), it works a lot better when you use it to find quirky/interesting places to stay (like a treehouse!). People still try to use it to replace a hotel though. $100/night can usually get you a decent room with breakfast at a hotel in most areas.

I've been enjoying watching the Internet collectively bully that one AirBnB couple, Cassie and Jon.

I absolutely despise the social media feel of AirBnB. I already hate creating more accounts. Why the fuck do I need to make a whole ass profile and tick off a bunch of interests and whatever, and then when I see a property I want to rent, send a personal message sucking up to the property owner? Yeah, no. Lots of options out there that don’t involve that bullshit ant it baffles me that anyone finds it attractive.

This is the Fed's fault.

There should have never been less than 3 percent mortgages. They basically gave away free home equity to an entire generation. And you know what they did? Bought 2nd homes and allowed VRBO/AirB&B to thrive. Now with "normal" interest rates, none of this makes any sense.

Deposit at a hotel? I haven't seen that before.

$1k deposit, but yeah

It only took thirty minutes of looking at how AirBnb operates for me to choose a hotel, on the one occasion I considered AirBnb.

Wait how are they even able to enforce the fee?

Hotels suck ass too. We stayed in a "luxury" hilton and it was shit. It looked nice at first, but then

• Everything was falling apart.
• You got a "complimentary" water bottle (like a kirkland style) if you were a member, but it was $2.50 (maybe even $3.50 which I think I would have remembered cuz it's funny) if you weren't.
• They charged you a $60 deposit in case you use that bottle of water or something? We got that back, but it was stupid that we had to check.
• We didn't use the parking pass for 2 days and they refused to give that money back.

They're only being a little nicer right now because they're losing business. They'll go back to huge shits if they get the market share back.