From terrible to completely ridiculous.

[Robin4]

Having just read the 'Summer Release' update link I thought I would check out how much feedback had been taken on board from the first month of the changes to search criteria.  I wish I hadn't....searching for a listing is now complete chaos!

When I bring up a search page now, this morning 12/06/2022 I can't even search my country of Australia any more, let alone a specific area.

Here are my search options..........

The only search box I am faced with is 'Where',  and clicking that brings up 6 general region boxes.

and clicking on the area boxes does absolutely nothing but at least now brings up a destination option. But it took me a while to find that option....guests are going to find this hard to tolerate, particularly those who have used the booking process before.

My bookings have fallen away to zero over the past few weeks and I can't see that there will be any improvement until we get back to the situation where a guest could simply search an area, availability, nightly price without having to jump through all these hoops.

Cheers........Rob

[Fred13]

@JJ48 Is not the only one that has questioned the ~why~ this is happening, why for some the bookings have disappeared and for others ??. The first question that comes to my mind is - are bookings for Airbnb on the rise now or decline, after all ~~IF~~ on the rise then guests are going somewhere or more elsewhere and the benefactors are listings that where not so easy to find before. The fact that the new search function has glitches (what else is new) let us pray they are  a hopefully-short-term calamity.  For some hosts the fact their listing can't be found too easily or at all is of course very spooky. And yes, when dealing with a limited guest supply the distribution of it influences everyone, for better or worse.

I have found tons of articles like this thus far: https://news.gtp.gr/2022/03/30/airbnb-bookings-for-summer-in-greece-up-by-232/ which leads me to think Airbnb bookings are indeed on the rise, but not absolutely sure. If so where the heck they are going, new places because new exposure? 

Either way I caution some of you that have copped an aggressive attitude toward anyone thinking out loud but different than everyone else. This is why this forum is here to express ideas without hesitation.  It is for enlightenment not popularity. At any rate be fun for us to connect the right dots for Airbnb. 😉

[Nancy1633]

@Fred13 

Check the date on the article you posted. It was published in March, prior to the 2022 Summer Release. 

That said, I believe travel is on the rise, which makes the linkage between a sudden dearth of bookings timed with the Summer Release clear.   The AI is error-ridden, the new search is a muddled mess, descriptive titles removed, arbitrary weeks offered, properties omitted from the map or listed in the wrong cities-- even countries! and on and on.  My own sister tried to book on AirBnb, didn't understand why the map zoomed hours away from her destination or why she couldn't book mid-week, so gave up and went to VRBO. 

Perhaps you've been (hopefully) unaffected,  so it's easy to lecture on the "aggressive attitude" of those who have. Many of us  rely on this income to feed our families, for retirement income, or pay college tuition (me) - and when we aren't booking, our cleaners aren't working either.  In my rural area, that is another person's livelihood. 

We know our own properties. Mine is in the Catskill Mountains, a very popular getaway destination for the nearby NYC metro region- a huge market.  Well, I'm also on VRBO now, and just got my first booking. Hopefully, VRBO will become the "go to" site for short term rentals and pick up the slack from here. 

[Fred13]

It is a bit of a royal mess and it is serious, especially to those most affected, which I am also; I have never seen so many inquiries but such hesitation to make a commitment. 

Maybe is your style, but your aggressive nature towards another poster was uncalled for, here we tend to treat each other better. You could have made the same points without the nastiness, it only takes away from your valid point. 

I know the Catskill well, my family had a cabin in Phoenicia for 25 years so we all spend our entire summers there.

[Lorna170]

@Robin4   I can’t agree with you more.  I added Airbnb 3 years ago in order to diversify.  Prior to that I advertised via “V” aka Homeaway (who bought up all the little guys) and my personal website, and I started 20 years ago when you could pay to be in the first 20 listings in a town.  People used to put in our town, see our listing and book direct.  Now that the OTAs have stuck their grubby paws into our pockets, we have to put up with their harebrained marketing.  Airbnb’s summer update has resulted in no bookings for our Leaf season, which is typically when I am booked back to back.

Back to the self marketing for this survivor.  God bless all the Airbnb stalwarts.

[Fred13]

@Robin4 "They are not the slightest bit interested in how many types of accommodation Airbnb make available!"

Why not? Are they compelled to only stay (and only be aware of) places that fits the old  home-share original model? 

Actually that is the million dollar question - to what degree is Airbnb's now massive-clientele interested (or would be) if they are made aware of the incredibly wide range of new potential places they can stay in via Airbnb today.  

Airbnb started with a model a mere 14 years ago, it is one that is very complex and chancy and I bet Airbnb has been dying to move somewhat away from it for years. Every company goes through this evolution; they start with a small cumbersome highly-catering model usually requiring a lot of high maintenance (aka cost); in time they move to more efficient and profitable models where they can achieve higher economies of scale. A new company will take over its original customers, empty space are quickly filled by others.   

So the latest from many hosts is: "I am not getting any bookings since (because) of this new campaign"  because "they now can't find me"  or "get lost (or distracted) trying to"  - it is "awful and should never have been started";  but ~IF~ Airbnb is doing just as well with bookings after it started this campaign, though now coming from different listings and is making its clientele aware of its new array of attractive inventory, isn't that a plus for them? Doesn't that help them combat the hotel industry that can't match such a diversity of choices? If so, that is what they will do. Yes, they need to address quickly unintended consequences, quickly; of course they will loose some original modelers no matter what they do but gain from new ones, especially with higher-priced ones and with places build in the last 5-7 years with an eye of sub-renting in Airbnb. **

I could understand their intent but not entirely a fan of their methodology, but they will work on the latter as they get rid of the unintended. 

P.S.#1 ** I have talked to many contractors lately and many tell me they are now building entire house complexes  already with sub-renting in mind as to their bylaws and the models they are actually building for it. Imagine that; the slices of the pie will get a lot smaller in the future.

PS#2: I am on electrical with the new boat but yesterday I pressed the button for the tower lights to come on, but the Autopilot came on and the VHS radio went off; I think my 'model' needs some work also.

[Mark116]

@Fred13  Doesn't it depend on whether Airbnb has correctly read the room and that a large percentage of travelers want very non-traditional accommodations like yurts, windmills, super luxury or OMG listings?  I'm not sure that is the case, but maybe.  What I suspect is going to happen is that Airbnb's bookings will increase slightly or stay the same, and the hosts whose listings have disappeared will be the losers in the new paradym. 

I will say that every time I have tried to search for something that I might use personally, it's too complicated and there don't seem to be anything but a handful of places, which I suspect is a weakness in the algo and there are dozens of places that should be showing up and don't.  I expect that our next trip will not be booked via Airbnb but VRBO or a regular old Bed & Breakfast from Expedia.

[Fred13]

I find the same thing, it has complicated searches; bummer too, would have been so simple to separate the two in parallel not make it like one leads to the other. The 'weekly' thing is so unfortunate also, heck my place is like #2 or #3 in front page for islands in this part of the world, yet says next time can book is in November 2023 (5-day minimum). We are also a National Park, ok, if you say so. 

[Huma0]

@Mark116 

Who knows? I am guessing they can't be total idiots so there has to be some sort of research and logic behind this... 

Is a large percentage of travellers wanting to book yurts, windmills, super luxury or OMG? I doubt it very much. However, perhaps Airbnb has done the maths and thinks there will be enough bookings of expensive listings to more than compensate for the lost commission from the more bread and butter listings that are screwed by this approach.

I think a lot of this is to do with marketing also. The whole idea of the OMG Fund is to draw attention to the site, get people interested enough to have a browse and then maybe book something that's not necessarily OMG. I worked in PR for years, and that completion is clearly just a PR exercise.

The problem though is that this has all made the search function so annoying. When I have booked an Airbnb in the past, it usually didn't take me long to find what I was looking for. The last time (a few weeks ago), it was a nightmare. I eventually found something but I think if I didn't have a Superhost voucher to use that was near to expiry, I definitely would have given up. If I didn't know about all the glitches with the new search functions and therefore made the effort to figure out how to get around those, I definitely would have given up. A lot of guests really aren't going to go to that much trouble. They are going to go elsewhere.

Or, maybe I am wrong and Airbnb's onto something and their profits will soar. Only time will tell.

[Helen744]

@Fred13 I believe you are to an extent correct but the 'model ' really does not differ much from 'holiday condos ' or large hotels . Its a way for hotels to 'bite back possibly at small Airbnb owners who they believe are stealing their 'market share. Lack of respect for the 'little guy ' who simply cannot now or ever compete  we are fighting Goliath at the moment and groups of individuals who are pretending to be 'little guys' while hosting twenty units at a time long distance.Actual Airbnb owners will survive and really do not care about this battle but we are affected and are still educating our guests ,one at a time. H

[L94]

I agree.  North America isn't even an option on the search.  How does a searcher get to the US, let alone a specific state and city?  (by typing in the city and state you want... but since the navigation starts as clickable icons, that's not intuitive at all).  What good is an "anywhere" search if they want to come to a city for a wedding?  Have the AirBnB host product management folks completely lost their minds? Our bookings went from 3-5 per month March through June 2022, to zero for August.  We're new, so we were thinking that was normal summer fall off, but our house has a pool, so it should be in high demand during the hot months here in Tucson, AZ.   We rely on the bookings to pay for the house, which we can't afford to sell because of how much money we put into it.  This is not good. 

Everything went really well for a few months, and now it's a mess.  Time to look for another platform?  That would make me sad because it was rocking for a minute. 

[Robin4]

OK, it appears some sanity has prevailed, or maybe it was a temporary glitch of some sort in the system.

The last time I tried to search my area the default search page showed....... Islands.

When I typed in my destination area of the Adelaide Hills the next screen informed me that there were no Islands in the Adelaide Hills, refine my search or pick another category. I had to search using a defined type of accommodation, aka those 56 category boxes at the top of the screen.

Not one of those boxes relates to 'Entire space/Apt' or 'Guesthouse'....they all related to Caves, Earth houses, Yurts,  Camping, OMG, Stunning views, the Acrtic . The nearest I could get to my category was 'Bed and Breakfast' but there are so many other dedicated bed and breakfasts that I am suddenly pushed down the rankings in search pages, I had to go down to page 5 to find my listing.

Well it looks like some notice of our dilemma has been taken because....... I suddenly got a booking!! When I did a bit of research doing an incognito search I find that, as of this morning I no longer have to use one of those category boxes!  From the drop down regions box if in 'Search Destinations' I just type in my area,  suddenly the options are back to what they were a month ago. The first page features 15 listings.....Farm stay, Houseboat, Guesthouse, Cabin, Homes, Bungalow. We are all given a fair go again. 

I am glad that commonsense has prevailed and the programmers have got onto this and fixed it.

Just because someone has come up with a good idea does not mean that it can't coexist with what we already know works....the two can live side by side and it may be that can get the best of both worlds.

Whoever is responsible, thank you, maybe I can start to open my Airbnb calendar again.

@Gillian166, you and I are back on page one again, your at No3 and I am at 12!

Cheers.......Rob

[Matta1]

Mexico isn’t even an option on the regions for travel.

[Fred13]

Now all they have to do is NOT default to 5 days minimum, as is now going to categories is a dead-end. They are not keeping the calendar dynamic, meaning still useful after clicking a particular listing under categories. Awful.

[Mark116]

LMAO.  I just searched usibng the map for Italy, apparently there is not a single f. Airbnb in Florence or any of the surrounding country or towns and only about 25 in the entire country.

Absurd.  

[Michelle1851]

You may need to try vrbo but I ended up doing that recently and found a terrific place I could not find on Airbnb although it was listed.