
Ahead Of NY Subpoena Hearing, Airbnb Weeds Out Hosts With Dozens Of Listings - malditojavi
http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/21/ahead-of-ny-subpoena-hearing-airbnb-weeds-out-hosts-with-dozens-of-listings/?ncid=twittersocialshare
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nlh
This is very non-scientific and anecdotal, but perhaps worth mentioning:

The reaction of "regularfolk" to AirBNB feels very negative. I'm a very active
host of a single unit in NYC (and have had a remarkably positive experience -
met some wonderful people, received dozens of thank-you notes and gifts, etc.)

But my non-tech friends and folks I tell about this can't get it.

"You let strangers stay in your apartment? Are you nuts?"

"You're running a gypsy hotel in your living room."

"AirBNB should be illegal. Why don't people just stay in a regular hotel?"

"Why would someone want to stay in your place when they can just get a hotel
room?"

It hasn't improved over the past few years either. So although AirBNB feels
like a darling of the tech community, a LOT of regular people see it in a
negative light. I give the pitch every time I talk about it, but it doesn't
get me very far. 'Enjoy this while it lasts'

~~~
mjolk
I'm probably not a "regularfolk" in your eyes.

I _hate_ AirBnB in NYC. Why should you be able to rent out your apartment and
increase the risk of break-ins and pest-infestations for the entire building?

Your neighbors receive no benefit in the AirBnB.

~~~
cinquemb
I don't really care for airbnb either way outside of admiring the way it uses
technology to try and solve a problem, so I am left wondering based on what
your saying is that if the incentive structure were more aligned between all
parties typically involved (I'm not saying what that could be because I only
have vague ideas), would that be more palatable?

Edit: Monetary gain need not be the only incentive.

~~~
mjolk
>If the incentive structure were more aligned between all parties typically
involved (I'm not saying what that could be because I only have vague ideas),
would that be more palatable?

No. My girlfriend and I pay rent in a nice neighborhood so that we have a
safe, quiet place to live in NYC. Increased risk of vermin, strangers in the
hallway, and giving a stranger a set of keys to the building is not worth an
extra bit of money.

It's really unacceptable.

~~~
why-el
> Increased risk of vermin, strangers in the hallway, and giving a stranger a
> set of keys to the building is not worth an extra bit of money.

To you, of course. Other people might have different reasons. I don't know
whats unacceptable about this.

~~~
mjolk
>I don't know whats unacceptable about this.

It's against the terms of the lease for the building and the law. If the lease
had the statement "tenants may rent out their apartments (counter to the law)"
then I wouldn't have grounds to complain. I also would not have rented a unit
in the building.

~~~
cinquemb
There are many things codified in laws and agreements that people break
everyday that go ignored across the spectrum of offenses occurred. If they
were sufficient enough in addressing the problems that arise from airbnb and
the like, we wouldn't be discussing such today.

What I predict after some elongated period of time to the chagrin of those who
have been affected (and who will continue to be) surrounding this specific
case(s) with airbnb is that the law will hold airbnb more responsible, yet the
problems mentioned here will still remain because the void will be filled by
non physical entity (read: software protocol) that cannot appear in court. And
then government will still have to exert resources going after the same actors
post facto, and people will still be complaining without doing anything about
it.

------
wdewind
As a user of Airbnb it was great, the hosts seemed to like it too.

But then someone in my building (NYC) starting hosting. It really did have a
serious impact on my quality of life and on the maintenance cost of the
building. Lots of stuff in the public spaces were destroyed, loud roof parties
on weeknights etc. It fully converted me to absolutely hating Airbnb.

~~~
extrapolate
Are you sure this was due to Airbnb and not just bad residents?

~~~
wdewind
The law that Airbnb hosts break so frequently was designed exactly to prevent
this type of thing from happening. It's why there are zoning regulations that
prevent short term inhabitants. So yes, bad residents are directly to blame,
not Airbnb.

I take issue with Airbnb because they operate from a place of both knowledge
and leadership. They know that this is illegal, they have the tools to easily
detect it, and yet they do zero to either enforce the law, or advise their
members. Members that Airbnb organized into a marketplace they now run.

I understand they are trying to change the law, but I am strongly not in favor
of changing said law, based on how it has already directly impacted my life.

------
tvladeck
Isn't a bit amoral of Airbnb that they are throwing their most active hosts
under the bus? The ones with the most listings are those people that have
spent the most time, energy and money building out the Airbnb platform and
they are having their business/livelihood wiped out with no warning.

To preempt what I imagine will be a response to this question, which is that
these users are violating the TOS with Airbnb, I have two points: the first is
that Airbnb itself is violating many "TOSs" \- laws - so it doesn't give them
very good moral standing here.

The second point is stronger (I think), which is that Airbnb's position here
is logically inconsistent. They either believe strongly that you should be
able to do what you want with the properties you own, or you don't. I simply
don't see why it matters if N=1 or N=10 (put differently, N=1 is not a special
case that deserves being considered differently).

~~~
potatolicious
> _" I simply don't see why it matters if N=1 or N=10 (put differently, N=1 is
> not a special case that deserves being considered differently)."_

Because there is a narrative to this story that AirBnb wants to portray, which
may help them in their legal battles. It's the same reason why they call
themselves part of the "sharing economy" \- they're trying rub a grassroots,
everyman shine all over the company, deservedly or otherwise.

Large, organized, professional operations run counter to this narrative. The
story is _supposed_ to be about helping the average Joe make ends meet, expect
a lot of PR focus on working-class families, students, and the empowering
effect of AirBnb income. Expect things that run counter to this narrative to
be downplayed or eliminated.

------
janj
I've been enjoying Airbnb for a while now, both as a host and guest. I travel
frequently to NYC and have had great experiences staying with people renting
out a part of their place. Right now though I'm 1.5 hours away from checking
into my current Airbnb and I just got a call from a property management person
about my check-in time. I noticed the email for the profile who owns the
listing is bklynvacationrentals@gmail.com. I'm starting to doubt if the person
in the profile is connected to the apartment and it kind of makes me nervous.
I liked Airbnb when it was being used as intended but I might stop using it
for my NY trips.

~~~
janj
I want to follow up after getting checked in. The owner is away for a few days
and is using a management service to help rent the place out. The people from
the service are local and the entire check-in process was great.

Airbnb continues to exceed my expectations, I shouldn't let all the drama in
the news get to me.

------
jokoon
when civilization tries to evolve to be more efficient, inflexible politics
ans business practices often slows down the process.

------
josephschmoe
Oh hey, they shut down John Smith's account with twelve listings.

[SpongebobCueCard]One Day Later[/SpongebobCueCard]

Man, that Smith family sure has a lot of listings!

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throwaway359ak
Posting via a throwaway account for obvious reasons.

When the lease on my NYC apt expired 2.5 years ago, I've kept the apartment
and been subletting on AirBNB 100% of the time. A couple of months into it,
I've automated this to a point where I was making ~ $1-1.5K/month after all
expenses, and spending ~ 2 hours a month on it, so I considered getting some
more apartments and scaling the operation.

I'm very glad that I didn't. My lease expires in a couple of weeks and I'm not
renewing it. I'm deleting the listing, and my highly-ranked (consistently top
3 in searches for my neighborhood) account from the site forever.

I'm thankful to AirBNB for the opportunity to let me do this, but it's become
very clear early on that AirBNB doesn't care about its hosts, only about their
own company. Those people invested a ton of time, money and efforts into
building a viable business model on AirBNB - and now they're royally fucked.
I'm glad I'm not one of them, but this is a really shitty move by AirBNB.

~~~
JonFish85
.... or you could get involved with local politics, and convince your friends,
neighbors, coworkers, etc. that the law needs to be changed.

"building a viable business model on AirBNB" Well that's kind of a grey area.
It's viable as long as the city government doesn't get wind of it (there's a
reason you're posting anonymously). It's viable as long as a landlord doesn't
get wind of it, or a condo association. That's about as viable as any other
"legal grey area" business is.

~~~
uptown
"convince your friends, neighbors, coworkers, etc. that the law needs to be
changed."

Property owners of NYC purchased condos and co-ops with the understanding that
they were buying a residential property ... not a hotel with transient
occupants. What's your argument that their residentially zoned property should
be converted to a mixed-use property? What impact do you think that would have
on their property value?

~~~
JonFish85
I completely agree with you. As a whole I am against Airbnb's willingness to
look the other way, and see it as a good thing for these types of places to be
shut down.

I'm saying that instead of complaining about being forced out of business,
realize that there are reasons for it--talking to
friends/coworkers/neighbors/etc can be enlightening for everyone. Maybe
understand that a friend Joe doesn't want to have his 2 young children be
surrounded by complete strangers who change daily by talking to him. Maybe in
that way a political middle-ground can be found. That's all I'm saying.

