Tag Archives: airbnb with children

Family Vacation Ruined Over Airbnb Cockroaches

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I had never stayed in an Airbnb before. My sister and I planned a trip to the Smoky Mountains together. She got a cabin through Airbnb and I stayed in a hotel in Pigeon Forge. We got to enjoy one family day together. The second night they were in their cabin they came in to find roaches everywhere. If they didn’t have young children sleeping they would have just left that night. They got up in the morning, packed everything up, and drove back home, which is an 8+ hour drive.

They only got refunded two of their nights and still got charged for cleaning. They were told that they use pest control but can’t control those this time of year; that is unacceptable. Now they are home and don’t even want to take their bags inside because they are afraid they brought them home. Their vacation was ruined and our family vacation was ruined. I will know to not use Airbnb if this is how problems like this are handled.

Airbnb is a Total Sham when it comes to Damages

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I had a reservation which Airbnb failed to collect payment on and still allowed these guests to check into my place. I called and sent a message to Airbnb. I was told numerous times that everything was okay and that I should not eject these people.

On the second day of the stay, I discovered that my books had been torn and thrown all over the the apartment. Food and drinks had been spilled everywhere and the apartment was filled with the smell of poop and urine. I had no choice but to remove them to prevent them from further damaging my place. Feeling bad for her and her two small children, I paid for a hotel night for them.

I came back to the apartment to find that she had allowed her mentally handicapped child to poop and pee on my carpet, and bed. It took my cleaning crew of two people six hours at $25 an hour to clean the apartment. Stanley Steamer came in the next day and charged me $169 after I could not get that smell out of my carpet with my home steamer. My books can not be replaced as they were my culinary school books. The bed, which was purchased in February when we had an interior designer design the apartment for us, had to be hauled away because the smell was so bad.

I submitted a claim for $1500 for replacement of the bed, and absorbed all the other costs as I plan to write it off as the cost of business on my taxes. After two weeks of back and forth – submitting pictures, quotes, etc. – Airbnb responded with “Congratulations! We have approved the coverage of your damages: $183”

What a joke. Their statement for that was that the damages did not affect the functionality of the mattress. Are you freaking kidding me? My apartment cost us $90,000 to complete because we will have my mother-in-law eventually coming to live with us. I thought in the meantime we would use Airbnb. People are paying $100 a night for my apartment, and Airbnb doesn’t think that the smell of poop and urine affects the functionality of the mattress. What a bunch of idiots. Who is going to pay $100 a night to sleep on a bed that smells like that? What kind of reviews do you think I am going to get and how will that affect my listing?

The bottom line is Airbnb doesn’t give a rat’s ass about damages to their hosts’ property. After I complete my current booking with Airbnb I will be taking my listing elsewhere.

She Reserved for Two but Eight Showed up…

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I do like children. They are cute… like puppies, you know. However, I am allergic to pets, so needless to say I don’t have the kid-friendly option selected on my Airbnb listings. I prefer adults; that works best for me.

A lady intending to reserve my space wanted to know if she could reserve for her and her eight-month-old “baby boy”. I said to myself: “Okay, I can make a exception since the thing doesn’t walk….”

I went downstairs to open the door (I always meet folks outside of the house ) and saw a car full of people, some sitting on others’ laps and the “baby boy” was a little girl instead, about 6-7 years old. I said, “Oh f&*king s#$t. Let me play it cool. I am going to be home too, so this is going to be good.”

Two guys helped her with one piece of luggage up to the house. One guy was easily about 450 lbs and the other was an older male. I followed them in and they just stared right back at me. In the house, she said, “So who is going to be here?” Red flags went up.

I said, “Just you, me, and your baby.” I went to sit down. All the people that were in the car were let inside by the fat guy and they all tried to hide in the bedroom. Their problem was I did not have a lock on the bedroom and they couldn’t fit at all. They could not hide; I could open the door any time and see seven folks in one room.

Ten minutes later, they finally left. The noise of a herd of elephants was minimal compared to that foot traffic storming out my house. In the end I got to keep the money. It was only a miracle it ended with just the biggest scare of my life, instead of well… my life.

Unsafe Rental Under Renovation, Still Expected to Pay

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I requested to book a three-bedroom apartment in Paris. The pictures made the place look wonderful. It was described as having a rooftop terrace with 360-degree views of the Eiffel Tower. The host asked me to confirm the names and ages of the people traveling with me. I responded immediately with all the information; I am traveling with two young teenagers. The host then confirmed the reservation, charging my credit card.

Five minutes later he messaged me saying I will be using just two beds, the place is under renovation – unsafe for teenagers – and the rooftop is unsecured. I told him that was unacceptable and wouldn’t work for my family. He then tried to get me to stay in another of his listings and if I didn’t take it, it was my loss and there is a strict cancellation policy; I would still be charged. I canceled immediately as to not hold up any future reservations. Airbnb has not helped at all in getting me a refund and said if he rebooks it then I can have my money back. It was cancelled within five minutes of him confirming (charging my credit card). The place is under renovation and unsafe, per his own words, yet I am still expected to pay. This is a complete scam.

Airbnb Tried to Evict us the Night before my Husband’s Funeral

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I rented an Airbnb for myself and my adult children. The purpose of our trip was a memorial service for my husband/their father. He had passed away unexpectedly three weeks ago. We checked into the Airbnb on Friday, March 16th with my son’s trained service dog. Shortly after we arrived, the host started texting me about Levi (my son’s dog). I have saved all the texts, ugly messages calling me an indecent person for not disclosing ahead of time that my son had a service dog.

She was rude and demanded documentation, which I provided, even though that was out of line and she had no right to ask for it. We remained in the Airbnb Friday night. On Saturday, my daughter and one of my sons went out to do errands related to my husband’s memorial, which was to take place on Sunday, March 18th. My son remained at home with Levi (my son is 25 years old).

Shortly after we returned to the Airbnb, I had a call from Airbnb telling me that they were concerned about the situation, they had a call from the Airbnb host saying that Levi had been left at the home alone (he was never alone, not even for a second). I told her that he had never been left alone, my disabled son stayed at the house with him. The Airbnb “specialist” said that she would send me of list of alternate places that we could move to.

At this juncture, my husband’s memorial was less than 18 hours away, and we had dinner cooking already. We are reasonable folks, though, and looked at the other properties they sent us. There was only one property in close enough proximity to the memorial service; the rest were anywhere from an hour to two hours away. The property they suggested we move to was $3800 per night, and we were expected to pay it.

That was not possible; the $650 per night we were paying for where we were staying was already too much to spend. My husband had just died, and he was the sole provider. When we told Airbnb that was too much money, they said to both my daughter and myself “Well, I can give you an hour.”

I said, “An hour to what?”

And she replied, “An hour to get out!”

They were going to forcibly remove us from the Airbnb, myself and my kids and my son’s service dog. I became hysterical. Where would we go? We couldn’t even pack in an hour. My daughter is an attorney and was able to get on the phone with the owner of the house. I’m not sure how she did it but she convinced her to let us stay. Thank God. But the scary thing for me is that Airbnb was going to put all of us out on the street because of my son’s dog. It’s very scary that Airbnb has the power to evict a family who did nothing wrong.

Fight Breaks Out, Airbnb Does Nothing to Help

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Recently, my family and I visited the midwest. We are regular users of Airbnb and, most of the time, whatever issues we encounter are easily remedied by adjusting our attitude or expectations. But this stay was different.

The property was one of twelve hosted by the same person in a suburban area. Because our stay was only four days and we anticipated being tourists, we booked a basement with a bath and small kitchen. We arrived and things went smoothly: the beds were comfy, there was no kitchen (but there was a microwave and small cooler), and our check in was a breeze.

About 6:00 PM, we heard what sounded like a Dothraki horde running laps around the main floor of the place. We would hear loud bangs and even heard glass shatter. I quickly messaged the host and got a reply from a number not related to our host. The responder was, we think, his wife. In any case, she apologized and said they had three dogs and were pet sitting two more. The barking and noise was constant for nearly three hours. Finally, we heard the owner come home.

Night two began at 7:00 PM. We returned to the basement exhausted. The Kentucky Derby was in full swing upstairs. We tried everything we could think of, including purchasing a very large box fan, to dampen the noise. At 11:00 PM, I contacted the host. They said: “We’re at a concert… sorry about the dogs.”

In the meantime, we did our best to stay quiet so the dogs would stop barking. At 2:00 AM, the owners arrived home and it got quiet enough to sleep. They apparently kennel the dogs at night.

At 4:22 in the morning, a large bang jolted us awake. We heard swearing and footsteps and then someone let the dogs out (and not in a funny, rap song way). For the next three hours, we were subjected to bangs, stomps… think of a stampede. I texted the owner multiple times with no response. At 9:40 AM, I had had it. I went and knocked on the main door. No one answered. I did get a text saying that we had just woke them up. The wife of the owner apologized and said a friend had come home drunk at 4:00, so it wasn’t their fault.

Then, we started hearing a fight break out. Women were screaming. A man was ranting about losing money and we heard a woman say, “You f***ing turned our home into a hotel and those mother f***ers can go to hell!”

Then we heard shuffling and chaos and the lady screamed: “Help!”

I tossed my car keys to my kids and told them to go lock themselves in the car while I called the police and packed up our stuff. After calling the police, I called Airbnb to report an emergency. I was asked to leave my number and a rep would call me back. I never got a call back. My phone did ring, once, but no one spoke.

The host cancelled our reservation so I couldn’t leave feedback. The host told Airbnb there was no fight and that what we heard was a television. Ten minutes later, the wife, who obviously had left the house, texted us and said she was sorry for subjecting our children to a fight but we shouldn’t “expect people to walk on eggshells when we book a basement.”

Dream Paris Vacation Turned into Airbnb Nightmare

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My family and I (including our infant son) took a trip in September 2017 to Paris using money we’d been saving for a vacation for over two years. While we were in Paris, we experienced a taste of the terrible experiences that Airbnb has to offer, and a taste was more than enough.

Our first reservation was with a listing that had 42 four- and five-star reviews and was hosted by a French lady. We arrived in Paris around 10:30 AM after traveling almost 24 fours with a tiny baby. The host knew when we would arrive, had our flight details, and told us to call her when we landed. We called her three times with no answer. We went to get a taxi. She finally called us back, said something in French, and hung up on us.

A few minutes later her associate called us back and told us she was busy and to call when we were ten minutes away from the apartment. We called three times from the cab when we were ten minutes away. There was no answer; we left messages. The cab driver dropped us off. We waited ten minutes in the cold with our luggage and the baby before her associate called us back. She finally came after we’d been waiting fifteen minutes in front of her building in the rain.

Once we finally got in to the listing, absolutely everything was covered in mold and the fumes from it gave us instant headaches. This wasn’t safe for our baby so we weren’t going to stay there. We contacted the host via the Airbnb platform and called customer service. Airbnb had trouble verifying my account because their site hadn’t correctly synced my new email address that I changed via Facebook (I signed up for the service originally via Facebook and had never given an email directly to Airbnb).

We quickly found their apartment was full of bugs. Once the customer service representative finally explained a way to verify the email (after twenty minutes of talking) we were successfully verified. He said he would email me so I could reply with the picture evidence of the mold. It took me thirty seconds to find the mold in every room of the apartment. It was on all the curtains, and there was thick black mold in the blinds in the bathroom, water damage in the kitchen, and mold on the bedroom wall. There was no way I was going to spend any time in the apartment with my baby.

Airbnb said they would email us within five minutes. We waited but didn’t receive an email. I called back after ten minutes as we were taking all our suitcases out of the apartment. The representative explained he hadn’t emailed us yet because he was busy on another call, but would email us within five minutes so we could send him the mold pictures. We never received that email, and didn’t get help finding a new place to stay after that first moldy one. My husband, ten-month-old baby and I were sitting with eight suitcases and bags on the street of Paris, shivering in the rain, and trying to figure out where we could go next. We felt stranded, unsafe, extremely unsupported, and very concerned.

We left a review of this listing but it has yet to be posted. It makes me really not trust Airbnb. If I was looking at this place to rent I would really want to know that someone had problems with mold there. It seems like Airbnb censors reviews.

In our study (which I’ll get to) we also found many other reports of censored reviews including some a horrible case that involved sexual assault; Airbnb allegedly told the women that this had nothing to do with the property so it was not part of their policy to allow the review. We were stupid enough to take our chances with Airbnb again, thinking the first experience must have been a fluke.

The next experience was worse: after climbing six flights of stairs with all our bags twice, we got scammed by a shady host with multiple listings for the same property who canceled our reservation in order to force us to pay in cash off the platform. The property was extremely dingy and crappy with a broken bed and broken shower. We felt very trapped. The host managed to convince us to give him a cash deposit for that night and we had to agree since we had no other choice and no place to go.

We contacted Airbnb again and they told us we should leave the scam listing and go to a different Airbnb. They recommended we move to another nearby listing hosted by the same scammer. How bad could their customer service be if they’re recommending we move to another apartment in the same building by the same scam artis?

After a small amount of looking, we found that this host has multiple accounts with different names and the same listing photos over and over. To top it all off, my husband’s credit card information was stolen when he logged in to the wifi at this Airbnb listing after booking a hotel in order for us to escape the scammer. Because it was extremely unrealistic to find another available, clean Airbnb listing that late at night (and how could we trust an Airbnb listing again after the last two were dangerous and nothing like their pictures?), we were out of luck again. That night we were forced to stay in this scam place and got not a wink of sleep due to the broken bed, loud drunken neighbors, and our poor son crying in discomfort.

The next day we ended up having to fork out huge amounts of extra money and all of our 200,000 airline miles (equivalent to $3,000) to pay for a last-minute hotel in a safe neighborhood. In the space of a few days we experienced Airbnb scams, last-minute host cancellations, hosts not showing up, dangerous conditions at a listing, extremely poor customer service, broken promises made by Airbnb (they still haven’t given us our full refund, and it’s six months later), tech failures of the site and app, and failures of Airbnb’s policies to protect its guests all in one trip.

When my husband and I got home we had to ask: is Airbnb safe? This led us to do an in-depth (self-funded) research study (with the help of a PhD in user research) surrounding Airbnb and the experiences shared by over 1,000 other guests. We learned that 3% to 7% of stays go wrong (which means millions of people have problems) and that their customer service is absolutely terrible.

Most importantly, we found that Airbnb allows anyone to be a host, including convicted felons. Even after being “permanently banned,” hosts can just go ahead and create a new account under a different name. It only takes ten minutes and it’s completely unregulated, as there’s nothing in place to verify hosts’ identities – no ID requirement, and they don’t even have to use real names.

If you would like to read our article and our published study, you can find it on our website here. We also have a video exposing the scammer who got us and we have documented four different Airbnb accounts of his which were created within six weeks, all using the same listing photos. In this video we also show examples in London and New York of multiple accounts listing the same property. It took us less than ten minutes to find just these few examples, which leads us to believe that Airbnb is full of such scams.

Football Game Turned Disastrous for Host

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What was supposed to be a routine family stay for one night with two adults and two children turned into a nightmare for me, the host. The guest booked was coming from out of town for the evening to attend a Monday night football game. He was supposed to be leaving early the next morning.

First of all, they could not follow check-in instructions and attempted to get in the wrong door, resulting in an angry phone call to me complaining that they could not get in. I realized they were at the wrong door and instructed them how to get in – no big deal really. The next day I went to change the bedding, towels, etc, and the first thing I noticed was water dripping off the counter in the kitchen, running into a cabinet and onto the floor. The entire counter was flooded and the coffee maker was plugged in and immersed in water. It was a Kuerig and was totally flooded with water. It was ruined and had tripped the circuit breaker.

Next I found all the bedding piled in the center of the bed. I removed it to find a peed up blanket, comforter, sheets, and mattress pad; even the mattress was soaked. I decided to tour the entire house at that point and found surprises in every room. My entire home had been ransacked and searched –
every room, every drawer, every cabinet and closet.

The heat upstairs was left on at nearly 80 degrees. An unfinished attic space was entered, ransacked, and the lights were left on. This was a room no one should have any reason to go into (I have now locked that room down). I went to get the vacuum out of the utility room, and it was broken. It looked like it was ridden as a toy – not used, but just abused. The plastic parts could not be repaired and it was now junk.

I opened the blinds on the patio door and noticed my awning was half extended. It wouldn’t operate anymore. The remote for it had been hanging on the wall behind a TV and it was laying on the counter. It was cold and dark out when the guest arrived and there would have been no reason to even use the awning. It appears to be ruined.

All the while, I have been trying to get an estimate to Airbnb for a resolution. I began taking pictures and documenting. Everything pointed to my final conclusion that the parents arrived with fast food and several canned and bottled alcoholic beverages, left their 12- and 6-year-olds unattended in my home, and headed for the game. What could possibly go wrong with that? Who takes their young children to a strange city, in a strange home, and leaves them alone?

All of the damages were done by the children, unknown to the parents. They later said they didn’t even know about a vacuum cleaner or an awning. Of course they didn’t – they weren’t even there. After finding several used K-cup pods, I also concluded that the kids had several cups of coffee before they broke it. Kids jacked up on coffee and left alone in a home…

I was emailed by Airbnb yesterday denying my claim in full even after providing proof, pictures, receipts, and the like. I have been in contact with them multiple times, the whole time thinking they would settle for something with their host guarantee. I originally asked for $2,500 and got nothing? It is evident that Airbnb will not honor their host guarantee even with unrefutable proof of loss. I am now working out of Airbnb Hell and looking for other options for my house so this doesn’t happen again.

Stranded With Young Children At Night In London

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I booked a three-bedroom flat in Limehouse Basin on Airbnb about two months in advance of the stay. We were taking the three children to London as their Christmas present to visit Hamleys and do some sightseeing. We were in the taxi on our way to the flat when host suddenly cancelled the booking without warning, claiming the place had been ‘trashed’ by the previous guests. Amazingly this was only discovered at 4:00 in the afternoon. Airbnb did nothing whatsoever to help; they left me on hold for 15 minutes with a fast draining battery and wouldn’t answer messages or ring me back. You can imagine how we felt being stranded in central London, with three children under ten and the best Airbnb could do was offer an extra £30 and a link to the app. Be very very wary booking with Airbnb – their support and help has been non existent. I also discovered I couldn’t leave a review for the host (she has ten properties listed on Airbnb) to warn others.

Deceptive Profile Led to Being Charged for Damage

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This is regarding the Airbnb apartment listed at this link. The profile is deceptive, making the property look big enough for four people without any clutter. Due to this deception, I booked this place, but it was hell to stay there and inevitably my son broke an exposed light bulb by his bed. I would have been happy to pay for that lightbulb, but I was charged an unreasonable amount of money.

The host also made a questionable claim that we spilled something on one of his cheap kitchen chairs. The host asked for $118 for damages that were at most approximately $8. It went to Airbnb mediation and they basically split the difference, charging me $68. It’s still extremely unreasonable for $8 worth of damage. Because this dispute was “mediated” by Airbnb I had no recourse. They took the money out of my account and I could not object. All Airbnb customers are vulnerable to this type of mistreatment.

Furthermore, before this verdict was handed down, I posted this review to protest the awful place:

“I was deceived by the 5-star reviews when I booked this [property]. I wish I had read the written reviews more carefully. Most mention negatives even when they gave five stars. This place was horrible. First, when I showed the address to Israelis they all told me that it is a dangerous neighborhood full of drugs, prostitution, crime, and gangs. There is graffiti, dog poop everywhere you walk, and trash blocking the sidewalks.

Second, the apartment was tiny. Profile pictures are deceptive, taken from angles that make it appear larger, and crammed with more furniture than shown in the photos and lots of junk everywhere. There was an exposed lightbulb next to the bench that served as my son’s bed. Inevitably my son bumped it and then the host tried to charge us a crazy amount for his damaged exposed lightbulb (more below).

There are no closets or drawers to put things. The only place to keep things is in your suitcase, but no floor space. So you need to hop over your suitcases whenever you cross the floor. When we complained, he said to put everything on a tiny box that already had his own junk on it. There is no parking since open spots are immediately filled in this dangerous, overcrowded neighborhood. When you try to stop in front, other cars start honking immediately.

We had to hike in and lug our stuff from a long way away. The profile mentions the climb, but fails to say that the staircase is very narrow, dirty and dark with weird wires and pipes sticking out. Dog poop on the floor. The shower is unusable because the water is always cold and splashes everywhere.

Worst of all, the host is a first class jerk. He falsely accused us of breaking “house rules” when we are very conscientious and followed the rules scrupulously. He falsely accused us of taking his remote control that we left in his apartment and tried to extort an exorbitant amount of money from us for a spill on a chair that I doubt was ours and his broken exposed lightbulb next to the bench my poor son had to sleep on. Read the other reviews before booking and don’t rely on the stars.”

Everything I wrote was true and no one disputed the facts. Nevertheless. Airbnb removed my review and wouldn’t allow me to post another one, so other people could be warned about how awful this place was. I suspect that this host’s good reviews are likely the result of all negative reviews getting purged. This brings into question the integrity of all Airbnb reviews, not just the integrity of those at this particular place.