Host making major renovation while guest is staying

[Mohammed214]

Dear Community Fellas,

I am staying at a house with 4 bedrooms. There are 3 rooms on level two, Living & dining on level one and one big room & laundry on the lower level.

I have paid for the entire house for 32 nights. After 17 days into my stay, the manager of the host (owner) came in and says they need to make a washroom where the laundry is and move the washer/dryer to under the stairs. I asked if they cant do it after we checkout? He said they had booked for the contractor 2 months ago and if they cancel, it will get further delayed. He said it will be a 3-4 days job. It has been 10 days now and the work is still in progress. They even put in a new door for the room at lower level. Basically its like a major renovation going on at the lower level, with noise & dust everyday and water cut off several times.

The worst part is the owner never spoke to me even once, neither informed me before we booked nor called or messaged to take my consent.

What rights do I have as a guest?

[Emiel1]

@Mohammed214 

It is offcourse unacceptable renovations are taken place in a house you rented via Airbnb without being informed of it at time of booking The host is violating the Host Reliability Standards and you should report this to the host and/or Airbnb and ask for some refund:

Host reliability standards

What if i need to cancel because of a problem with the listing or host

[Sarah977 · Accepted solution]

The problem with contracting for work to be done is that you ever really know when the contractor will tell you they are ready to start. You can book a job in for 2 months from now, and then it ends up taking 3 months until the contractor has finished his other jobs and calls to say he's ready for yours. So it's hard to plan. And the manager is right that if they postpone it, they'll go to the back of the line and probably have to wait another 2 or 3 months.

That said, what is happening where you are staying is unacceptable and rude. It's one thing to put up with some noise and dust for a couple of days, as long as you were forewarned (which you weren't when you booked), but 3-4 days dragging on to 10 and expected you to put up with it? No.

If I were you I'd first contact the host to say this is unacceptable and see if they offer you anything for your inconvenience- a discount on the affected days, for instance. Or perhaps they have another listing they can move you to. ( you also don't know at this point who is really responsible for this- maybe it's the manager and the host didn't really know, or the other way around) If they don't offer anything that is reasonable to you, contact Airbnb and explain the situation, asking that they find you a appropriately similar listing that you can move to with a refund for the time you have been affected by this.

And make sure to leave an honest review of this host's serious lack of consideration.

@Mohammed214

[Mohammed214]

Thank you for your kind suggestions @Emiel1 and @Sarah977 

I messaged the owner as suggested and he replies expressing surprise because his manager informed him that I had agreed for the renovation to be carried out and accepted the offered compensation. 

Whereas there was no talk of ANY compensation from the manager and he said it was a 3-4 days job (to which I had agreed) and today is the 11th day while the renovation is still going on. The only day off was on a sunday. 

The owner now tells me to take it up with the manager on phone and settle it as he has given him the discretion. He is kind of pushing it away on the manager.

Whereas I think having the discussion on Airbnb platform would atleast make it more transparent and traceable.

What should i do?

[Colleen253]

@Mohammed214  You are correct. Definitely keep the message thread on platform. That is the only way of properly documenting everything should you need to get Airbnb involved. Tell the owner/host that it doesn't matter to you who you deal with, but that the line of communication stays on Airbnb. 

[Mark116]

@Mohammed214   You definitely want to get it on the airbnb message platform and memorialize everything that has happened.  No advance warning of any planned construction at the time of booking, or even at the start of the stay, a construction project that was supposed to take only 4 days, which is now over 11 days and counting, etc. etc.  This will protect you.   I definitely think you are due a refund.

[Mohammed214]

Thanks @Colleen253 and @Mark116 

What kind of refund/reimbursement should I be expecting while I negotiate? Is it better if i negotiate directly or escalate this and get Airbnb personnel involved? Coz i feel the guys at Airbnb would be more just to me, as I have little expectation from the owner, given he's dodging it twice to settle with his manager.

From the 32 days i paid for, we go 17 days without a dishwasher (coz the previous guest damaged it and it took them 17 days to replace it) and the remaining 15 days there's renovation with all the cutting, whirring and hammering going around.

[Helen3]

Personally I would  have contacted Airbnb, when it first happened to ask them to cancel and help you find somewhere else. @Mohammed214 

You can follow up with them now to say there are major building works which have been going on for 11 days and the host /manager promised 3/4  days and the host and manager will not agree on an end date/compensation.

I would also ask for 25% per day compensation for the noise and disruption and missing dishwasher.

Do make sure you leave an honest review.

For sure the host should have arranged work to take place in-between bookings as they are not emergency works. Or at the very least notified you before your stay so you could have made alternative arrangements. 

[Colleen253]

@Mohammed214 Airbnb has been known to refund 50% for a missing amenity alone. I think you could reasonably expect anywhere from 25-50%. As a host, I personally think what you have had to put up with is egregious. The host of this place sounds very disconnected from their listing, with someone incompetent 'managing' it. You certainly wouldn't be out of line just going to Airbnb, given the run around you're getting. The thing with Airbnb CS currently is that they are outsourced call center employees whose only training is to end a case as quickly as possible while at the same time paying out as little as possible. Sometimes you can get lucky and get an agent who is competent. Perhaps try Airbnb while at the same time continuing to try to get somewhere directly with the host. 

[Sarah977]

You should document any verbal or phone conversations you had with the manager and the owner on the Airbnb messaging. "Just to reiterate our phone conversation yesterday, you told me...."

See how it goes as far as them actually giving you a partial refund.

If they aren't forthcoming with anything reasonable, then you can contact Airbnb- at the point you'll have written proof that you tried to work it out with the host first, which is the normal Airbnb protocol- a guest should always give the host an opportunity to deal effectively with an issue, and if the host won't, or can't, or their suggestion is unacceptable to you, then you talk to Airbnb. Or if you just don't want to put up with this any longer, ad would be okay with moving to another place, ask Airbnb to help you with that.

And even if the host comes up with something amenable to you, Airbnb should still be told about this- it's poor hosting on many levels.

It's hard to know what's going on as far as who has been responsible for this, the manager or the host. I suspect that the host is pretty hands-off, maybe just deals with the bookings and messaging with guests and leaves everything else in the hands of the manager. Who sounds pretty incompetent and may even have lied to the host about offering compensation to divert blame for managing things so poorly.   

@Mohammed214

[Lamide1]

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