
I am now homeless - living on Airbnb for months - brianchesky
http://blog.airbnb.com/living-on-airbnb-0
======
sivers
I'm doing almost the same thing!

Homeless for a year (at least): living in 12 countries for one month each,
staying mostly at places found on airbnb.com. (Staying in each place for one
month each.)

Currently in Amsterdam at this place: <http://www.airbnb.com/rooms/23023>

Sitting on that red couch writing all day. Everything I own in one suitcase
upstairs. (Except my bike, outside.)

I love it. Thanks airbnb. :-)

~~~
pwim
Wow, $4332 for a month. That sounds pretty expensive.

~~~
rjett
One of the things I love most about AirBnB is that a lot of the people
advertising their space on the site are open for negotiation. So let's say
Derek looks at this particular place's calendar and sees that in the recent
past and in the near future, it has typically been booked for 20 of the 30
days of any given month. Well, 2/3 of $4332 is a great jump-off point for
negotiation. I have had particular success booking last minute travel at
greatly discounted prices on AirBnB. Negotiate everything!

~~~
frossie
_So let's say Derek looks at this particular place's calendar and sees that in
the recent past and in the near future, it has typically been booked for 20 of
the 30 days of any given month. Well, 2/3 of $4332 is a great jump-off point
for negotiation_

It's not just about the money though. There are disadvantages in signing up a
"guest" for a month. What if they are really obnoxious? Three or four days you
can wait them out, but a month?

~~~
jackowayed
If you look at the listing, you'll see "Room type: Entire home/apt". So
Derek's got the whole apartment to himself, not just a room in someone's
apartment.

I would guess that people who stay for long stretches like that tend to look
for full apartment listing, since the host might also be obnoxious, and it
might get old to stay with someone for a month even if they're just neutral.

------
rdouble
I tried doing this when I moved to NYC last year. I had not been in the area
for 10 years and wanted to try out a few neighborhoods before committing to a
lease.

Ultimately, I found the experience too stressful. Too much time and energy was
expended trying to figure out the next place to stay. I was working, and
looking for housing took up most of my time outside of work. If you don't have
to work, it's probably a better experience.

AirBNB wasn't as useful as I had hoped. Here are the issues I remember:

\- there weren't as many listings as craigslist by an order of magnitude \-
people would take too long to respond \- people would flake out at the last
minute

\- people would list something available for certain dates, but it wouldn't
really be available on a portion of the dates

\- people would require minimum stays that they didn't list

\- people were already becoming mini-hoteliers and trying to charge prices in
line with actual hotels

\- the mini-hotelier people were wanting security deposits up to $500

~~~
brianchesky
"If you don't have to work, it's probably a better experience."

My hypothesis is that a founder of a startup can do this and still manage to
run a company. In a few months, I will likely draw some conclusions.

------
dcurtis
Hmm.

Prices in SF on AirBnb range from $50 (very low end) to about $80-100.
Assuming you stay 30 nights at $60, that's $1,800. The apartment room he used
to stay in probably cost him $800, so it's about $1000 more expensive to use
Airbnb.

The publicity they have received just today has probably more than made up the
difference in cost.

~~~
Dirt_McGirt
If you get a 3 room apartment for $800 a month in SF, then why are people
there always whining about super high rents?

~~~
ahlatimer
I think he means that the guy from airbnb was paying $800/mo for his room.
That would be $2400/mo total if there's 3 tenets each paying $800/mo.

------
RiderOfGiraffes
"Dog-fooding" in the extreme? An interesting experiment.

Having travelled extensively for work, living in hotels for months, and waking
at three in the morning thinking "What country am I in?", I can't help feel
that this will pall fairly quickly.

I look forward to the updates.

\+ <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eating_your_own_dog_food>

\+
[http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=dogfooding+(t...](http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=dogfooding+\(to+dogfood\))

\+ [http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2009/01/the-ultimate-
dogfoo...](http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2009/01/the-ultimate-dogfooding-
story.html)

~~~
RiderOfGiraffes
Fascinating! Through sheer chance I noticed that this comment was at 5 points
before lunch, then on returning it was at 4 points (about 13:30 Zulu) Clearly
someone thought 5 points was too many and down-voted it.

I must admit I'm intrigued. Is it the term" dog-fooding" to which they
objected? Is it the explanation of why I think this will get very tedious? Is
it the links to explain the term "dog-fooding" which, I would've thought, some
people here wouldn't recognise (although most certainly would.)

I try to ensure that my comments and thoughts are generally useful (well,
perhaps except for this one. I pray indulgence) and hence add to the value of
HN, but clearly someone thought one wasn't. Oh how I wish it were possible to
see into the mind of the down-voter.

<sighs, shrugs, wanders off, wondering.>

~~~
rjett
I've noticed this before when I've posted a comment that is otherwise
receiving upvotes. I just chalk it up to "fat fingers" accidentally clicking
the down arrow. It happens.

~~~
jrp
I've accidentally downvoted on an iThing before. It doesn't seem worth it to
write a comment explaining.

------
ErrantX
_By using Airbnb everyday, I will get to know the product and the people like
never before._

Worth it just for this, I bet any "niggles" in Airbnb will be worked out
pretty quickly :D

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edanm
Ever since first hearing about Airbnb here, I've thought over and over about
what an amazing place to work it sounds. This just confirms it: one of the
founders truly digs into what creating a startup means (no better customer
development than using your product more than anyone else). Plus he sounds
like a really cool guy.

------
ComSubVie
What's the difference between Airbnb and Couch Surfing?

You have to pay for Airbnb but do get a bed? I do like the idea of Airbnb and
hope to be able to try it soon.

~~~
devonrt
I'm currently planning a trip and have looked at both. CouchSurfing seems to
rely a lot more on a sense of community, whereas Airbnd is more "business-y",
which only makes sense given that CS is free whereas Airbnd is not. CS users
are encouraged to maintain an up to date profile; the intricacy of some
people's profiles rivals MySpace profiles of yore. Airbnd has a much nicer
website.

~~~
ichverstehe
Also, included in the CS-experience is the socializing – nobody wants to host
someone who's just taking the "free couch"-part, so actually there is
compensation included, but it is not money.

------
gfodor
How much dogfood do you need to eat before you turn into a dog?

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Isn't being a dog the best way to understand what it's like to be a dog
though, that's the whole point.

~~~
gfodor
This was one of those posts where I had no point to make but thought someone
else, when reading it, would.

------
mr_justin
"If I need a lot of space for a week, I can rent a spacious apartment. If I
want to have a dinner party, I can rent a chic loft to host guests. If I plan
to work late, I can rent a minimal space close to the office."

Yes, you _can_ do that, if you have loads of disposable income.

~~~
mrduncan
Ideally, it'd balance out.

Most of the time, you'd rent a small place (thereby saving money as compared
to an apartment). When you needed something else, you'd simply get a more
expensive place for a few days, the extra costs would be balanced out by
having those smaller places most of the time.

------
DannoHung
Man, I was trying to write a science fiction story about a homeless (in a
similar way) technology consultant a year ago, but I couldn't come up with an
interesting plot.

I guess the problem was that it was already too close to be science fiction.

~~~
metageek
See the first chapter of _Accelerando_.

------
jackowayed
One cool thing about this is what it does to the marginal cost of travelling.
Assuming the place he would travel to has rooms for about the same as what
he's paying in SF, the marginal housing cost of traveling becomes 0, which
would make it a lot more financially feasible to travel frequently, especially
to places nearby enough that travel costs are low.

Now, he's a startup founder and probably doesn't have a whole lot of time to
do so, but if someone with a less demanding life did it, they could travel a
lot.

------
pclark
awesome idea. how much more does this cost than renting a place?

~~~
meroliph
I found that a small apartment in NY was around 2500 or more, and in roughly
the same area airbnb had something for 1800, plus the whole social experience
if you're into that.

------
fortes
How does he deal with physical mail and official addresses for taxes, etc?
(this has been a pain for me in the past)

~~~
johnny22
physical mail is easy, tons of mail forwarding services out that. The official
location stuff has already been covered by the retired RV community for quite
some time. Some of them even help you become residents in that state (usually
florida, texas, and south dakota).

I'm still trying to figure out the residency/domicile issues in case i'm
actually living somewhere semi permaently. I'm thinking about using my
sister's new house in norfolk, va as an "official" address

------
sliverstorm
Sounds like it could be fun, but I just can't cut my possessions down that
much. My passion for motorcycling (bikes + tools) books (I have a kindle, but
textbooks are heavy) and electronics (more tools) pretty much sees to that.

A small truck bed more than suffices, but not one suitcase.

~~~
elcron
If you wanted to try it you could put most of it in storage and try for a
week/month (or however long you want to try it).

------
tzury
well, impressive, indeed, that is the cutting edge of "use your on product"
mantra.

Thinking a bit more about this principle of use it your own, be happy you are
not the founder of amazon or ebay, in those cases you would have have to start
buying all items available on the shop.

Looking forward reading updates about this journey.

------
againstyou
you can find a good room in SF for ~$600/mo on craigslist

~~~
jsares
Look into SOMA warehouse spaces. They can be hard to get into but are the best
options for sub $700/room rents.

