That's revenue, not profit. I would guess that 90% of AirBnB hosts were cash flow-negative even before this crash (They wouldn't admit it or don't know how to do proper accounting).
That's revenue, not profit. I would guess that 90% of AirBnB hosts were cash flow-negative even before this crash (They wouldn't admit it or don't know how to do proper accounting).
I expected that to happen. AirBnB never really made sense.
AirBnB was becoming INSANELY expensive. The last few times I checked it, it was more expensive than hotels in the area.
For the same price (or less), I'd rather stay in a hotel. It's creepy living in a stranger's house. You don't know if they have cameras.
What about the migrants coming across the border? How much are they saturating the rental markets, lowering housing supply and continuing to drive up prices?
Air BnB has sucked for years. Paying massive cleaning fees for places that haven't been cleaned since the last guest. Long list of rules. It was always overrated.
Some cities and towns cracked down on air b and b and fined hosts who didn't own the property they were renting out. A lot of people were renting their apartments that they didn't own, for example.
“The sky is falling, the sky is falling, the sky is falling…” - jamin
I have used Air BnB and VRBO many times and haven’t had a bad experience yet. Lots of wonderful family memories made over the years! I sure hope that things turnaround as it’s never nice to see, or root, for someone else’s financial demise.
My last AirBnB experience was 4 years ago. Never again! I've been paying a little extra for hotels since.
good bye wrote:
AirBnB was becoming INSANELY expensive. The last few times I checked it, it was more expensive than hotels in the area.
For the same price (or less), I'd rather stay in a hotel. It's creepy living in a stranger's house. You don't know if they have cameras.
I compare when I am going to stay. If it is 5 days AirBnB often comes in cheaper. There are trade offs of course. But for 2 nights (which is probably a pretty typical hotel stay) it makes less sense unless it is a really good deal.
Their so-called superhosts are often terrible. Airbnb and Vrbo both are extremely dishonest in their pricing. At a hotel, the cleaning is baked into the price already. At an airbnb or vrbo, they are adding enormous amounts of cleaning and other fees on the price after the advertised price so that it is a complete bait and switch and ripoff. I couldn't find anything available for less than 200 a night in a crappy city with no beaches within 40 minutes. There is a serious mismatch between availability and knowledge of availability, the very things those sites were supposed to correct. The model of trusting reviews from trusted customers and owners doesn't work. The last airbnb place we took, for instance, told us not to talk to any of the management at the condo building (since it was clearly illegal); was advertised as oceanfront (but could only be at best bayfront, and was not and had no bay access for miles); was advertised as in a luxury building but was in a dingy looking place; had no pool in the building, contrary to the advertisement; and had dog poop in one pool and the other closed (in a four building complex) on our second day. No thanks.
Host here. Haven't noticed this at all.
- I own 3 units, 70m2, 170m2 and 235m2. Guests pay for exclusive access to the entire unit, no shared spaces or shared anything.
- No cleaning fees or other fees. Everything is included in the nightly rate.
- No subcontractors. I handle everything myself. Communication, cleaning, etc.
- Listing information and photos are extremely accurate for expectation management reasons.
Used to have listings out on Airbnb, bookingcom and vrbo, but vrbo doesn't integrate well with channel manager systems so I dropped the platform after a double booking. Airbnb accounts for under 20% of my total nights over the last few seasons, but as I'm not exclusive to that platform I can't really extrapolate any insights from that number.
Why is that? The race to the bottom for hosts. You essentially trade commission (the platforms' cut of your revenue) and exclusivity for promotion. The base commission is around 18% and then their bank charges around 1% for transferring the money. On top of this you have promotion programs that you can join. These programs give you better visibility in exchange for higher commission or discounted rates, so if someone else joins they outrank you in the algorithm despite having worse guest reviews. This is fortunately not a big deal for me as every season is barely 2.5 months during summer which is close to fully booked.
Who are my guests? Mainly families from the Arab peninsula (Saudi, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, UAE, etc.)
Where do I stay on vacation? Hotels
It looks like you have a realistic expectations.
I think most people underestimate the work which goes into it and the seasonality of it all.
I’m checking into a Vrbo today. My daughter is bringing 3 friends on the trip. We are bringing the dog and renting a golf cart. All things that are difficult to do at a hotel/resort.
I’d question if the decline is for short term home rentals in general or limited to Airbnb due to increased competition.
The majority of my vacations are in hotels as I prefer the ease and professional management of large properties.
AirBNB is great in foreign countries. Recently spent $180 per night for a nice apartment in Paris just a couple of blocks from the Eiffel Tower. Hotels in that area were ~$300 per night for a tiny room and bathroom you couldn't even turn around in. Had a house in the French countryside for $68 per night.
USA? Not sure. Hotel prices seem to be off the charts during the summer months ($250 per night for a cheap Baymont Inn near Lake Michigan, for example).
We travel a lot for kid sports and it is basically impossible to find a hotel room for less than 240 a night even like Hampton Inn or holiday inn express. Our last three trips have all been in air bnbs and it's been great. You just have to seek out the ones who don't add fees. Going to another one this weekend and in 2 weeks. We also have 5 kids so even if only 2 go or 3 a hotel room is boring. Last airbnb has a swingset. We used to stay in hotels before covid but only once since. When I travel for work of course hotels are easier.
I have noticed that a lot of people list their properties on both AirBNB and Booking.com. There are no fees on the Booking.com listings so you save money doing it that way.
Airbnb in the US may suck because the owners are greedy. they’re the ones adding in the cleaning fee, etc.
I have a house overseas that I rent out using Airbnb and while I was affected by the pandemic, I’ve had very high occupancy since.
I prefer staying in Airbnb’s too because you can get a house with a kitchen, which most hotels don’t offer. My kids also are old enough that I would need 2 hotel rooms, which raises the cost significantly.
People whose replies are "BUT WHAT ABOUT" followed by something unrelated to the post topic always have something Trumpy in their handle.
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