Covid-19.....lets help each other

[Robin4]

Reading many of the posts on this hosting board almost all correspondents are critical of the way Airbnb have handled this current pandemic situation.

What disturbs me is, some are trying to whip up hysteria by creating scenarios of their own which is not helping.

One host here  @Sheila22 has claimed she as a guest has double dipped on her travel insurance and also got a refund from Airbnb and then goes on to talk about price slashing, guests cancelling and rebooking at cheaper rates and even looting!! She then backtracks and says she is a host and just trying to put different ideas in the mix!

Sheila, I appreciate that you are simply trying to play the part of 'Devils Advocate' with your comments, but this is seriously not the time to be doing it! 

The hosting community are going through hell at the moment......as it stands this will cost me $20,000 this year if there is no short term remedy to the current pandemic. And all 3+ million of us hosts are going through the same thing.

I am also concerned that this pandemic could spell the end of Airbnb! To suddenly lose $94m in invest-able funds is not something a service company with few tangible assets can handle. Airbnb depend on cashflow and, that cashflow has stopped. The company may quite possibly not recover from this.

We are a community of hosts who collectively have a mass of experience and ideas to draw on. This is the time to be constructive and support each other and think of alternate ideas that may help us get our hosting wagons back on the tracks again once the worlds medical brains get on top of this. 

Please folks, can we be creative, not destructive!

Cheers........Rob

[Sandra126]

I've read 9 days, but I really don't know. It depends on the material, @Kath9 

[Lisa723]

@Sandra126 @rebecca181 @kath9

https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2020-03-11/tests-show-coronavirus-lives-on-some-surfaces-for-u...

[Cathie19]

Go with your gut @Kath9 , it usually is instinctively correct.   Keep smiling, doing and take care.

[Sarah977]

@Kath9   I started Airbnbing my guest room/bath because the room just sat empty for most of the year. I never once considered a full-time roommate and I never would- Airbnb was perfect, guests would come and go, I've met wonderful, interesting people and I could just block dates if friends or family wanted to visit. If Airbnb ends up not being viable when we get through this pandemic, I would just find other ways to rent short-term, maybe on Craigslist, or notices on local bulletin boards. Or go back to the room being empty. Airbnb was never a major source of income for me- about $3000/year. I loved that it enabled me to be generous with my kids and grandkids- they started getting bigger birthday checks and I paid for the daughter I hadn't seen in a couple of years to fly over and visit for a week last year. 

So I am missing that income, even though I'm not dependent on it, and this would normally have been my high season- I almost never get booking from mid-May through October, so I guess i'll have a lot of time to get all the projects done I need to do around here.

I have one guest booked for April 5, but I just messaged her to see if she really still wants to come. She's in California, and the governor just announced lockdown there, so I hope that seals it and I don't have to cancel on her if she still is planning on making the trip.

[Jessica-and-Henry0]

@Robin4 @Lawrene0 @Kath9 

So good to see you guys and glad you are all well. 

I will always appreciate the opportunity and platform Airbnb provided for Henry and I to become home-hosts. I've also been critical about a lot of Airbnb policies,  the lack of consistency in the way rules and policies are often implemented by Airbnb is a joke and I never liked the EC clause.

BUT...... I have no problem admitting that the covid-19 pandemic is exactly the type of situation where the EC clause finally makes sense and IMHO cancelling/refunding bookings is the RIGHT thing to do. 

It took a little over 1 month for the crisis level to go from a level 1 Blue to the highest level 4 Red in Korea, and evidence shows it only takes a single super-spreader who goes to a crowded church or a seminar or conference or restaurant or the office for covid-19 to explode in a local community or town or region. While I am personally not too worried about Henry or myself, we do worry about our parents. Most of the people I know expect this pandemic will continue to affect how we live our daily lives at least for the next 6 months, maybe a whole year. Not only as hosts, but as individuals, we all need to think long-term. 

On a different note - as someone who has lived in large cities most of my life, I am very envious of your stars and night skies and lack of light pollution 🙂🙂

Stay safe~! 

[Cathie19]

@Jessica-and-Henry0 

Sending love and positivity to you both..... stay safe and I’m glad you are back chatting! 

[Linda108]

@Robin4 @Branka-and-Silvia0 @Kath9 @Lawrene0   You all are some of the most informed, cogent and reasonable hosts on this forum.  Thank you for seeking to quell the hysteria.  While I understand the underlying feelings of those very upset hosts, I am not sure trying to bring down Air BNB is the best solution to very valid concerns.  

I came into this business as a gig, that is, as an adjunct to my primary income.  Thus I am able to weather ups and downs without threatening my primary income.  Those who developed a business plan solely based on this platform and dependent on only success are most vulnerable.  I feel for them, but do not agree that ruining AirBNB is the answer.

I do not have another platform to go to but I am not going to sink if I never have another guest.  What I will miss, if all this goes sour, are the wonderful people who have come to my home, enjoyed this area or event and shared a small time in their lives.  I am currently self isolating as required by my president and govenor so I am wandering around my home missing the energy and excitement of those who book my private room in my home.

I agreed with all the extenuating circumstance cancellations I experienced.  Of course I did not like the loss of income, but I thought of what was happening from the perspective of the guest.  I did not feel anyone was trying scam me.  I am glad that I did not have any experience that made me wary.

I hope all of us come out of this experience wiser and kinder. That is the best outcome of a difficult time.

Again, thank you my fellow hosts.  You are great contributors to this forum.

[Robin4]

@Linda108 

Linda, you echo my sentiments entirely, thank you!

Cheers......Rob

[Cathie19]

Well said @Linda108 , @Robin4.

If the negative and angry continue, then those needing comfort and some positivity will switch off the forum. I like you, use it to boost my income, but call me old fashioned, but I am placing humanity before economics. Stay safe. 🙂 

[Sara-and-Ian0]

That’s all very well if you use Airbnb to boost your income, but for some of us this is our income.

We work so hard to keep our 2 tiny places full, it’s devastating to us to have Airbnb refund 100%.  

We’re not saying we’re putting economics before humanity... but where does fairness towards hosts come into play here? 

We list on several platforms, guests of which have contacted us to cancel.   They’ve simply asked us what policy their booking falls under and state they’ll claim the rest on insurance. No problem. 

Surely you can see how Airbnb could have acted differently, fairly, to act with fairness towards both hosts and guests? 

[Sarah977]

@Robin4  Thanks for this post. Definitely on board. It's been very interesting to see which hosts are jumping up and down screaming about their lost bookings and 100% refunds (the majority of which have never participated in this forum until now) and which are coming from a different place. Home-share and on-site hosts seem to be taking a much more "Hey, this is an unprecedented situation, let's not freak out and let's do our part to be responsible" attitude. And we also say we'll miss hosting guests, on a personal level, whereas I haven't seen that mentioned at all on the myriad class-action suit type threads where hosting seems to be exclusively about money.

Your starry sky photo is beautiful. I remember reading once that the majority of children in Tokyo had never actually seen real stars- only pictures in books. It was one of the saddest things I've ever read.

[Robin4]

@Sarah977       

I know it will be seen as a trifle condescending to dismiss the monetary gain as a host but, as you know Sarah, my interaction with my guests is at least as important.....if not more important than the dollars involved.

We are lucky enough to have just had three + weeks away with our family, and I am glad I did that when we did. The number of people we encountered with face masks over that entire period I could count on one hand. The situation is vastly different now and a sense of panic is spreading! Supermarket shelves are becoming more and more empty and.......for a country whose specialty is, throwing out the hand of welcome, we are becoming much more distant with each other. 

I have 5 years of wonderful hosting memories and some great stories that have become the subject of polite dinner conversation. I will miss hosting like hell if the flow of guests does dry up.

But realistically my feeling is, a new market will open. I am sure the majority of Airbnb's hosts listings present a miniscule safety health risk compared to a hotel. I do not have 1,000 random people trooping through my property every day. My cleaning regime is intense, and my cottage air filtration is as good as a hospital operating theatre....in fact it is Hepa filtration just the same as an operating theatre uses.

I have total control over who walks through my door, and at the moment I think that is a marketable commodity for those who simply must travel. I have a guest tonight in that situation! He booked this morning to stay tonight and felt my location and property would expose him to the most minimal of risks.

Maybe this is not doom and gloom, I have bookings for the next three nights and I am hopeful that by promoting a thoroughly clean quiet and safe environment we may be able to claw back a few of those holiday cancellations. 

If hosts like us succeed in making something out of this, Airbnb will survive...and that is something I desperately want to see happen! We help ourselves by getting on with what we do, not blame others for what they do!

Hope you're all good there in Mexico Sarah!

Cheers......Rob

[Sarah977]

Thanks, @Robin4. I'm actually somewhat concerned here- Mexico has not been taking this seriously enough, although some state governers have closed schools and resturants, etc. But there hasn't been any appropriate federal response yet, which is worrisome. Tourism is such a huge part of the economy here that I think it's going to be hard to get people to comply with social distancing and foregoing all the major economic boom at Semana Santa (Easter).

I had to go out to buy a few things today and was in the pharmacy and there was an American guy there looking for  mask- he said his Airbnb host was insisting he wear one, as it's a home share. But all the masks in town are sold out. And if his host expects his guests to wear masks, he should have provided them, not sent his guests out looking for them.

My most recent Airbnb guest checked out a couple of weeks ago. She then moved to another entire apartment Airbnb she'd booked for a month in the next town (I gave her a ride over there). She was such an awesome guest and I called her today. She was supposed to go back to the US on the today for a few days for work-related stuff, then come back to her rental here. But she said she's not going anywhere. She's staying put, maybe until June, and not going out much and trying to educate others in the community about safe practices during this, as no one here seems to be much clued in.

I have one guest still on the books- for April 5 and she hasn't cancelled yet. She's coming from the US and I plan to message her tomorow to see if she is still feeling like travelling and if so, I'm going to send her some guidelines I'd like her to follow when she's here so she doesn't expose me to anything.

[Lawrene0]

Wow, @Sarah977 ! Interesting to hear what is going on in Mexico. Stay well!

[Jody79]

@Sarah977 I was just talking to one of my team members yesterday in the central part of Mexico that basically said the same thing.  He was was telling me the government wasn't taking this seriously and not promoting any guidelines to help contain the virus.  He also said that it was felt the government was under reporting cases.

With that said, I feel here in the US the actual cases are much much higher than what is being reported.  We don't even have enough test kits to go around.  I also read a report where hospitals and clinics can't even get enough first aid type supplies such as swabs.  I fear it's going to get much worse here before it gets better.