12 ms·

Ahead Of NY Subpoena Hearing, Airbnb Weeds Out Hosts With Dozens Of Listings

36 points by malditojavi 13y ago

tvladeck 13y ago
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 13y ago
  > " 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.
- opendais 13y ago
  I wouldn't say it is amoral for them to attempt to protect themselves from anyone who was truly engaging in illegal activity which NYC might try to foist the liability for those Host's choices onto AirBnb. They need to create a narrative that it is just a few bad apples and they are empowering 'average people'. Selfish? Sure. So is every other corporation on the planet. I do think AirBnb should have been screening things better in the first place to prevent things from getting to this point. However, I'm sure that would have really slammed the breaks on their business model's growth.
- bitlord_219 13y ago
  There's nothing logically inconsistent here. They believe strongly that you should be able to do what you want with the properties you own (actually, the properties you rent), as long as it doesn't get them in trouble!
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- mjolk 13y ago
  > 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. Say that I sell pot on Etsy (which is illegal in NYC). Do I have a valid cause for complaining when Etsy shuts down my illegal business? In the AirBnB case, the company deserves to be fined for knowing that 13% of their available listings are illegal and not trying to actively stop the offenses. The people profiting off the criminal behaviors deserve nothing.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
nlh 13y ago
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 13y ago
  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 13y ago
    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 13y ago
      >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.
throwaway359ak 13y ago
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 13y ago
  .... 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.
  - throwaway359ak 13y ago
    Absolutely. That's why I made the choice originally to not expand, and am now ending the whole thing altogether. But a lot of other people didn't, and I feel AirBNB should be making more of an effort to protect its most loyal users, instead of just killing their business, as gray as it is, in one fell swoop.
  - uptown 13y ago
    "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?
wdewind 13y ago
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 13y ago
  Are you sure this was due to Airbnb and not just bad residents?
  - mjolk 13y ago
    Apartments aren't ad-hoc hotels. Only the AirBnB host and AirBnB benefit from the transaction, while the other tenants are put at risk.
  - wdewind 13y ago
    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.
josephschmoe 13y ago
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!
janj 13y ago
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.
- math0ne 13y ago
  I rented from these guys before and had a great experience.
- janj 13y ago
  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 13y ago
when civilization tries to evolve to be more efficient, inflexible politics ans business practices often slows down the process.

36 points by malditojavi 13y ago

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 13y ago
> " 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.
opendais 13y ago
I wouldn't say it is amoral for them to attempt to protect themselves from anyone who was truly engaging in illegal activity which NYC might try to foist the liability for those Host's choices onto AirBnb. They need to create a narrative that it is just a few bad apples and they are empowering 'average people'. Selfish? Sure. So is every other corporation on the planet. I do think AirBnb should have been screening things better in the first place to prevent things from getting to this point. However, I'm sure that would have really slammed the breaks on their business model's growth.
bitlord_219 13y ago
There's nothing logically inconsistent here. They believe strongly that you should be able to do what you want with the properties you own (actually, the properties you rent), as long as it doesn't get them in trouble!
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
mjolk 13y ago
> 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. Say that I sell pot on Etsy (which is illegal in NYC). Do I have a valid cause for complaining when Etsy shuts down my illegal business? In the AirBnB case, the company deserves to be fined for knowing that 13% of their available listings are illegal and not trying to actively stop the offenses. The people profiting off the criminal behaviors deserve nothing.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

nlh 13y ago

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 13y ago
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 13y ago
  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 13y ago
    >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.

throwaway359ak 13y ago

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 13y ago
.... 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.
- throwaway359ak 13y ago
  Absolutely. That's why I made the choice originally to not expand, and am now ending the whole thing altogether. But a lot of other people didn't, and I feel AirBNB should be making more of an effort to protect its most loyal users, instead of just killing their business, as gray as it is, in one fell swoop.
- uptown 13y ago
  "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?

wdewind 13y ago

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 13y ago
Are you sure this was due to Airbnb and not just bad residents?
- mjolk 13y ago
  Apartments aren't ad-hoc hotels. Only the AirBnB host and AirBnB benefit from the transaction, while the other tenants are put at risk.
- wdewind 13y ago
  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.

josephschmoe 13y ago

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!

janj 13y ago

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.

math0ne 13y ago
I rented from these guys before and had a great experience.
janj 13y ago
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 13y ago

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