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Post by byfly on Dec 28, 2015 16:12:29 GMT
Hi Kristi & Deborah,
I just read this thread now after sending you both long overdue updates and thank you notes for your support as I am enjoying great success with 2, going on 3 airbnb listings, that I just started in the last couple months. I'm going to remain positive, like Deborah!!, and continue preparing for the best in the future. In my city, recently-proposed legislation to harm airbnb was knocked down for now. I see from this thread, I may need to look into getting more informed and involved to keep abreast of things. I sure appreciate this forum and your clear, informative, helpful comments Deborah. Sorry to hear of your recent struggles Kristi!!! I think Deborah offered excellent advice and I bet with patience, planning, and your upbeat attitude you will be back in business soon.
Happy New Year!!!!
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Post by renata on Mar 10, 2016 15:01:38 GMT
If you search for the financial history of AirBnB you will get a very long list of mini-entrepreneurs who've written articles or are trying to 'sell' their success with multiple AirBnb rentals. You .. get rich quick.
It's very possible any municipality considering serious restriction on vacation rentals sees a lot of the same spin I did, which does not accurately represent the typical vacation rental host with one property. Even my reaction was .. would I really want this happening close to where I live?
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Post by lambada on Mar 12, 2016 1:25:46 GMT
Very funny Deborah, just when I was re-reading your above post and nodded in agreement, I got a notification from Airbnb about a Webinar and here's the title:
Event Information: How to be a Hostrepreneur
Registration is required to join this event. If you have not registered, please do so now.
Airbnb has been de-listing hosts who they assumed are making money and they have been telling people that hosts are just those who are making ends meet. And don't you dare making money out of hosting! And now it is teaching hosts to be a Hostpreprneur... Speaking of hypocrisy.
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Post by High Priestess on Mar 12, 2016 3:24:24 GMT
Yes, it does seem that there is this contradiction going on there --- though I do not blame Airbnb for giving the media and city governments just what they want to hear. THis game is after all starting with the media and city governments, who began to attack Airbnb, accusing it of being an illegal company. So Airbnb is being forced into politics and is engaging in politics. And in politics, it seems it's common to tell people what they want to hear. Cities want to hear that middle class people are keeping their homes. So tell cities that. This is definitely part of what happens in Airbnb -- and actually a good chunk of what happens, though it isn't all.
I would venture to guess that the kinds of hosts who attended the Airbnb Open in Paris are not actually a true cross section of hosts -- the hosts who are middle class people renting out space in their own home, are probably overall too busy and hardworking and unable to take time off or afford a trip to Paris. But the hosts who can go are those who own 5 or 10 or 25 properties. There are your "HostPreneurs", I suppose....
I think the "dont' you dare make money hosting!" actually comes from city governments and the public, who too often consider it rude and somehow verging on criminal that people should profit from their property. I dont' think Airbnb actualy feels that way -- but I do see Airbnb as struggling to respond to political pressures.
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Post by High Priestess on Mar 13, 2016 20:54:14 GMT
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Post by Maria Lurdes (Milu) on Mar 14, 2016 2:58:32 GMT
I can't wait to hear what the Host Preneurs (or whatever it's called) webinar will be about.
A few years ago when all kinds of crap was going down in New York and Airbnb was asking us for help on a monthly basis, Brian and the big boys were coming to town regularly. That was back when we were also part of many brainstorming sessions going on about what a "host community" would even look like. That seems so long ago! I was lucky enough to sit and chat with various Airbnb people. They knew, and seemed excited about (and I think a bit impressed?) with the success that my husband and I had made of our Airbnb business. Douglas Atkin in particular always was very supportive, and loved hearing about how I was making things work and how we were supporting our own opera company. In one brainstorming session about how we could help our world, I threw out a crazy idea about successful hosts offering loans to hosts who wanted to expand but wouldn't qualify for a traditional bank loan. I offered up $5k of seed money for anyone in that room that wanted to grow. Brian was in that brainstorming session and I thought he was going to wet his pants, he was so excited - he loves big crazy ideas, and a "host banking system" was one of them. We talked about it a bit more and then New York drama took over the airspace and my microloan banking idea went nowhere. I ended up lending two local hosts money to set up their business and was repaid within a year, so while the idea had legs, it ended up being a bit too much for me to take on in any bigger way.
Anyhow, I tell this story as a personal illustration of how the mood used to be - I was absolutely never made to feel that I was a necessary evil, and that the traditional shared-home host was any better or any worse.
Now? Well I don't feel like a pariah, but I certainly don't feel particularly loved....but you know what I do love? I love the money that I make that allows me to live the life that I want to lead. I think the company has changed so much in the last three years - it's evolved in the same way that any successful company does. I came to the US from Canada to work at a small music company that David Bowie started, and nine years later there was no trace of that cool hip company anymore as it had grown and grown and grown and soon it was a mega massive company and every bit of its individuality was gone and we no longer recognized it. Rinse and repeat!
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Post by helgaparis on Mar 14, 2016 12:57:43 GMT
I don't expect a company to have any moral ideas. If they have good business ideas, keep most laws even if they challenge some regulations and are are not actively immoral, that's fine, it's a company not a chuch. The moral and Better-the-World announcements are hypocritical decorations anyway. When circonstances change, either the strategies change and moral annoucements of yesterday be damned or they don't and the company will go down. The question is only how close will they stick to laws and to moral objectives announced for image purposes, whilst they can afford it.
Seems I have a cynic day. Maybe I should do something useful instead of posting, like finish my creative accounting to get as much tax refund as I can ;-)
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Post by Maria Lurdes (Milu) on Mar 14, 2016 13:04:25 GMT
Whether it's cynical or not Helga, your posts are always interesting
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Post by renata on Mar 14, 2016 21:22:39 GMT
My long-term, and even possibly short-term concern, with Homeaway/VRBO now charging a traveler's fee, that the providers of the listings will scoop up when they can on the shirttails of the multi-property owners or property managers who consider hosting a 'job' rather than a profession. Pursuing the get rich concept in popular locations inevitably becomes a burr in the heel of any municipality who is receiving complaints, realize the likelihood for tax income lost, or just really don't like the concept overall. That problem isn't going away.
So many potential guests and I wind up developing a communication style, we 'click' because of something personal we are able to share about one another. Even though I rent a whole house sans owner present, it's a more enjoyable, memorable experience if I'm had more than minimal communication with the owner.
As a traverler, not a host, the prospect of booking a rental becoming 'just a business transaction' is a bummer.
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Post by Maria Lurdes (Milu) on Mar 14, 2016 23:11:57 GMT
Here's another change (post from AirHostForum) that I doubt anyone was made aware of....ok, so maybe it's not necessarily the type of change that we'd need to vet, but it would be nice to have a monthly update email with new features, new amenities, etc. This is a filter by cancellation policy. Is this a known thing? I'm on the site for hours a day and I never noticed it!
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Post by helgaparis on Mar 15, 2016 12:41:04 GMT
Over the ladt months, the search filters either don't work and crash the page or don't show up for a few common browsers on Macintosh. (Not Safari, but Google and Firefox). Any filter but the price and date/kind of place/number of persons. I gave feedback to that several times. I'd prefer they fix that issue first before they add more filters and take them back again.
It can't be a very demanded filter anyway. As Andrew says, for known threathening emergencies when pressured for time, it could be useful and for the ever shifty kind of persons. But if you book the trip on not exchangeable tickets, what's the use to filter for flexible? Maybe filter for strict to find serious offers?
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