Dear Brian and the rest of airbnb team worldwide,
I wan't to start by thanking you for creating airbnb for us, it is amazing.
Uncertainties about the future have hit the entire world, and we are obviously all affected and loosing out in different ways. I feel it is lame for people to complain about their problems as we are all in the same boat and all have problems now... But I really feel I have to pass this feeling of disappointment to you as I am your "employee"....
My name is Luis and together with my wife Sofia, we have been proud super hosts since 2016 and ambassadors of Airbnb since we started using it.
It has been our only source of income for the last 3 years and it is how I provide food and all the essentials for myself, my wife Sofia and our lovely 23 month old baby Diogo.
We started with one listing in 2015, a bedroom in our house, but as you might imagine it's obvious that wasen't enough to make ends meet. We used to have a bucket in our bedroom to use as a toilet so our guests could have the only bathroom for themselves and feel more comfortable, this is the type of hosts we have been....
We have continually invested, improved and adapted and last year apart from 3 small bedrooms in the house where we used to live in, my wife has a caravan listing that we bought specially and turned into one of the most beautiful glamping caravans I have ever seen. We were also co-hosts on various other Airbnb listings. Since the end of 2018 we have lived in an annex next to our house to have a bit more privacy.
We have tried to follow all your guidelines and be the best hosts we could, you can read this in our reviews.
One of the "messages" that I have always felt from your part in the last years is that cancellation policies should be as flexible as possible, this way we would get more bookings and guests would feel more comfortable in booking with us. I started with flexible but last year upgraded to moderate, I also used instant booking, automatic prices for a while and all the other tips and tools you provided for me.
On various occasions I gave last minute guests the benefit of the doubt and issued them with full refunds when they requested it, for what I felt were valid reasons, even if they were not entitled to them.
During my career with you, I also created various hosts in my village using your referral scheme, I was one of the first Airbnb hosts here back in 2016, I followed them the entire way, gave them all the tips and info I had, and stayed with them until they become super hosts like me, some of them became business partners with me and I co-hosted their properties. They have all maintained their super host status until now.
This year we had decided to slow down a bit, as 2019 was a very busy year, and with a new baby we were having a tough time managing 9 listings with beds for 26 guests. So we quit all the listings that were not our own to adapt once again.
In 2020, we were going to have our 3 small bedrooms in a shared house, the caravan we already had, plus another one in December and also a brand-new High quality 5 meter bell tent that we also bought and that would have become a beautiful glamping tent.
We made these changes as the tendency in this area seemed like it had become 1 night, last minute bookings and alternative accommodations such as caravans, tents, etc, and we wanted to keep in with the trends.
This year was going to be awesome, we got bookings much earlier than in the years before, and we could also work out how much we expected to earn, so we were comfortable borrowing money from family members to make the improvements that we needed and using some credit cards because by the end of July all those debts would have been paid off....
And then COVID-19 hit us all and took the ground away from under our feet....
After saying all this I want to get to the point of my message to you, The Super host Relief Fund... and other compansation schemes. I thank you very much for your generosity and wiliness to help but..... The eligibility criteria for these are so unfair...
Being such a good host that have bent over backwards for this buisiness in ways that are even hard to explain... reading it and realizing that I am not entitled to anything makes me so sad and disappointed...
To qualify, hosts who offer a place to stay must:
.Only share their primary or secondary residence - no more than 2 active listings
.Show a reliance on Airbnb as a vital source of income
.Have a verified identity
.Have been a Super host for 1+ years
.Have lost a significant percentage of their earnings due to COVID-19
I must say that I consider myself very lucky, my wife is an only daughter and when her grandparents moved into a care home, we were given the opportunity to move into their old home, we later improvised and built an annex onto the house as having a baby in the home and sharing our private space became too much.
My listings are our primary residence, and the caravan is in our back garden...
I don't pay rent or have a mortgage... but, I do pay Council and Government Tax, Electric, Water, Gas, High Speed Fiber Optic Internet for my guests and also Cable TV in the bedrooms and caravan. Always thinking about our guests needs.
I can't make enough money to live on with just 2 private room listings, if I could I wouldn't have more than that, we moved to the countryside to have less stress as my wife has Multiple Sclerosis and this health condition is very affected by stress.
We have verified Identities and have been super hosts for 4 years....
I haven't lost a significant percentage of my earnings, we have LOST ALL and are drowning in debt.... failing credit card repayments for the first time in my life!!!
I waited to see if maybe our profiles might have fallen on someones' desk while your are reviewing applications but this was obviously impossible due to your eligibility criteria, and I read yesterday that you have already issued help to 6000 super hosts, I think hosts like me deserved some help also and that's why I am writing to you.
Also you said that you would pay 25% of cancellations according to the cancelation policy, but as I am a nice host with a moderate cancellation policy I would only be entitled if cancellations happened 5 days before the bookings.
But all this said we are once again investing energy and money we don't have, and moving back into the house with the 3 bedrooms to free up our Annex as a possible Airbnb listing as this seems like it would be more suitable to rent due to the current situation. Having various guests sharing a same house is no longer seems possible.
Thank you for reading this message.
Yours truly,
Luis, Sofia & Diogo
(Super hosts and Airbnb "employees" in Algarve)
