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What happened to this person is awful and it´s understandable that she/he is very emotional at this point, but I don´t think the lesson is you can´t ever trust

What happened to this person is awful and it´s understandable that she/he is very emotional at this point, but I don´t think the lesson is you can´t ever trust people, or that the AirBnB model is flawed. It´s more like: hope for the best, plan for the worst. There is always going to be some black swan risk even if AirBnB does do more vetting. There´s no reason for example to leave valuables anywhere in the residence while strangers are there. You can´t be 100% protected unless you´re willing to get insurance, which probably doesn´t make sense for the occasional provider, but you can at least remove the low hanging fruit risk-wise. Perhaps AirBnB should take a more active role in educating its providers on basic precautions.

carbonica 15y ago
> There´s no reason for example to leave valuables anywhere in the residence while strangers are there. So you're saying AirBnB should advocate against rentals while you're away? Or are you saying, if you want to rent while you're gone for a week, that you should get a week's worth of self-storage (which I've never heard of, but might exist in a city), move all your important belongings to the self-storage unit, and move them back after the guest is gone? That seems quite onerous.
- danenania 15y ago
  That or drop them with a friend or relative. Why is that so onerous? I think people should use AirBnB however they see fit, but understand the risks in doing so and take whatever precautions are realistic to lessen them. This situation would still suck, but not be nearly as bad/scary/expensive if the victim hadn't left cash, credit cards, expensive electronics, legal documents etc. in the apartment. I'm just recommending easy steps to lower the potential downside and increase the overall EV of being an AirBnB provider given that this sort of nightmare is a slight but real possibility.
  - carbonica 15y ago
    It's not onerous until you consider that desktop computers and flat-screen TVs are "valuables".

carbonica 15y ago

> There´s no reason for example to leave valuables anywhere in the residence while strangers are there. So you're saying AirBnB should advocate against rentals while you're away? Or are you saying, if you want to rent while you're gone for a week, that you should get a week's worth of self-storage (which I've never heard of, but might exist in a city), move all your important belongings to the self-storage unit, and move them back after the guest is gone? That seems quite onerous.

danenania 15y ago
That or drop them with a friend or relative. Why is that so onerous? I think people should use AirBnB however they see fit, but understand the risks in doing so and take whatever precautions are realistic to lessen them. This situation would still suck, but not be nearly as bad/scary/expensive if the victim hadn't left cash, credit cards, expensive electronics, legal documents etc. in the apartment. I'm just recommending easy steps to lower the potential downside and increase the overall EV of being an AirBnB provider given that this sort of nightmare is a slight but real possibility.
- carbonica 15y ago
  It's not onerous until you consider that desktop computers and flat-screen TVs are "valuables".