thursdaysd

Long but very interesting (if sad) article on AirBnB scams in London, along with the failure of regulation. (Not just London, but that is the focus of the article.)

Takeaway: "That lack of transparency is giving scammers a place to hide and prosper. Yet, for many, this is what Airbnb has become: a thin sharing-economy veneer hiding a vast slurry of unscrupulous profiteers."

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/airbnb-scam-london

rialtogrl

thank you for posting this - it is very interesting. I did not know about this 90 day rule.

I have stayed in three airbnbs in London and have spent many hours looking at various places. I always read the reviews and try to avoid places that are obvious "hotel" airbnbs. I have stayed in one where the owner rents out rooms in her house (a modern day boarding house) and she is always around. Another place was a family home, and they rented when they went on vacation. The third was a flat close to Canada Water station and I was very worried because there were no reviews, but it turned out to be fine. In the future I would only choose places where the owner really lives there or at least nearby, but you have to spend time to vet those places.

Christina

Many cities have rules about how many days, that's to try to accommodate people who claim they are just doing this for extra money when they would be gone on vacation or a short time, anyway.

I don't really understand your objection to "hotel" Airbnbs as those may be more likely to be legal than non-hotel Airbnbs. Not sure what you really mean by that, but if it's a hotel or residence hotel, it may be legal to be rented all year to short-timers (like aparthotels).

CaliNurse

Thanks for posting this. The situation is almost identical to similar problems described in Chicago, in this story from last year:

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/4...scam-on-airbnb

rialtogrl

Cristina, I stay in aparthotels in London all the time, but I book them through the hotel not through airbnb.

Did you read the article? The places I want to avoid are the type of airbnb the writer describes.

janisj

"I don't really understand your objection to "hotel" Airbnbs as those may be more likely to be legal than non-hotel Airbnbs. Not sure what you really mean by that, but if it's a hotel or residence hotel, it may be legal to be rented all year to short-timers (like aparthotels)."

Christina won't see our responses, but just in case - no, 'airbnb hotels' are NOT hotels/aparthotels/legal rooming houses. They are like the large house recently shut down in a suburb near me. They are full time, short term rentals that the owner does not live in, never has, never will. They just churn through a slew of renters . . .

menachem

Or maybe not book AirBnBs or similar.

rialtogrl

not gonna happen. Had great experiences in two owner-occupied Airbnbs and will return.

menachem

I can't fathom how people willingly invest in companies whose purpose is to strip those "liveable European cities" of their affordable housing, but that's me.

kja

That would seem a bit of an overgeneralization.

rialtogrl

aha. So it’s Airbnb that you object to, not the owner who is renting the room in their home to me. Got it. If I don’t I am sure you will let me know.

Traveler_Nick

Not really. Understatement maybe.

Italy is proposing a new crackdown on anybody renting more than three units. How anybody could claim that somebody renting even three units isn't a business is beyond me but AirBnb is fighting .

Around here most of the smaller shops are closing. It makes more sense to rent during the high season to tourists than to rent year round. Not only does that mean no shoppers eight months of the year but the few months the tourists show up they don't buy the same sort of things locals would.

People make noise about the pollution creating by flying then force locals out of city centres leading likely to even more pollution.

Heimdall

I’ve stayed in AirBnBs a few times when travelling with my family and we wanted a house. While my experiences were positive, I still feel that AirBnB is not a good thing in all cases. Residents on some Greek Islands report that since AirBnB came along it’s very difficult for teachers and seasonal workers to find temporary accommodation at prices they can afford. I can understand why owners of expensive central London apartments don’t wish other units in their building to be treated like hotel rooms, especially when the guests are using the AirBnB for parties.

annhig

My friends who live in Venice had to leave their apartment as the owner was selling it and finding another one was murder, because so many are now let out on Air BnB. This exacerbates the existing problem in Venice of a reducing number of permanent residents - it is down to 50,000 now from 120,000 30 or so years ago.

lrice

Thanks thursdaysd for posting the article in Wired and thanks to the author for his investigative reporting. I like VRBO and AirBnB but had so many warnings about it in London when I was planning my trip there last summer that I used London Connection. They were fantastic but more expensive than I had hoped for.

That said, I hope AirBnB and VRBO finds a way to get the scammers off the platforms. We typically book apartments with loads of reviews but is getting more and more difficult to discern fake from real reviews.

My DD booked an AirBnB apartment in Paris for 4 months a couple years ago for her university study abroad program. It was a rental agency on AirBnB. Three weeks into it, they claimed a leak and the girls had to move out. I called the rental agency, French friends called the rental agency, AirBnB called the rental agency, but in the end, the girls had to move. AirBnB reimbursed them everything and took what they could from the rental agency to give back to the girls. But getting a new apartment for 20-year old girls who were half way around the world from home at the last minute cost us a fortune!

Michael

According to Google 261,905 (2017) is the population of Venice, but the majority lives on the mainland. Regardless, given the declining population of Venice, it should welcome the use of short term rentals, unless these are groiwng faster than the population is declining on the islands.

We've had no problems with Airbnb rentals personally, although clearly a number of them were upgraded and furnished as short term rentals. In London we stayed with a couple who said that most of the apartments in the building were owned by foreign investors, which meant that many were kept empty; not much better than the short-term rental situation. In Scandinavia, we used local agencies and found ourselves either in someone's apartment (the furnishings in general indicated that), or in a basement apartment of an owner occupied house, or a room in the owner's apartment. Maybe the choice of pricing tends to separate the good from the bad.

kja

I believe you are referring to the effects of airbnbs, Traveler_Nick. I was referring to menachem's suggestion that their purpose (a very different thing) "is to strip those 'liveable European cities' of their affordable housing" -- and the suggestion that that is always the purpose is, IMO, an overgeneralization.

menachem

Yes, because their business model is total liquidity of housing, for tourists, such as you.

That's why my blame is not on the owners renting out, but on you, the renter.
You have a choice not to use that service. You choose to support the commodification of low rent housing. Because it is convenient to you, and you feel you have a right to "convenience".

menachem

No, it is their business model, just like Uber's is to commodify short distance car travel

https://bilgeserin.wordpress.com/201...ugh-the-years/

Traveler_Nick

Part of the reason the population has cratered is it's impossible to find housing. It's not just AirBnb. I've even seen timeshares. What a tourist would be happy to pay during low season is more than the vast majority of families could afford.

A tourist paying €300 a week is likely thinking it's cheap. But the family who might want to rent that apartment might find €500 a month expensive.

There is a reason you'll see signs around the city calling for a block of conversions or short term lets