We booked a lovely Airbnb Plus with a Superhost for New Year’s. We booked early since this place is very popular. We were so happy to be able to snatch it in time this year.
After we booked, it was confirmed. Later, the owner messaged to inform us about the possibility of future cancellation because the local community was banning Airbnb. Why was this not mentioned in the description?
The owner should also have not put this up for grabs why ahead of time if there are these known risks. We were not made aware of this risk in the description. Now that we are trying to cancel, we will lose some money due to the service fee.
This is neither reasonable nor fair since the owner did not inform customers of this and still put the listing up. We would have sought other accommodations if we had complete information that allowed us to make a sound booking.
After knowing this new information, that our place may be potentially cancelled and we would get our money back, who would go through such risks? I tried to cancel and we couldn’t get everything back because of the service fee. I reach out to Airbnb several times and they agreed with me that the owner should cancel and I would get the fee back as well.
I reached back to the owner who had given no apologies whatsoever until this point. They refused to cancel. How irresponsible. We had to do it. They offered to pay half of the fee which was better than nothing, but it still sucked that we had to cover for something for which we had no wrongdoing. I also told the owner to fix and be transparent in the descriptions so that no one else would have to face this. We just wanted a happy relaxing holiday — it turned out far from it.
second the reply here… its the platform to blame not the host…
Your host notified you of what was brewing. HOAs, Cities, & townships are changing things everywhere. He tried to keep you informed so you could make an informed decision to keep the reservation or cancel.
Hosts do NOT have ANY control over the fees Airbnb charges.
If you had kept the reservation and the legislature shut down short term rentals, there is a chance Airbnb would’ve refunded the fees because the cancellation was neither the host’s or guest’s fault.
The host was trying to keep you from having any surprises. I’m not sure what else you expected the host to do.