Stop Illegal Airbnb listings

[Le63]

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1/5 of Airbnb listings in LA are reportedly illegal. The rate can be higher in similar large cities:

**[Link removed - Community Center Guidelines]**

**[Link removed - Community Center Guidelines]**

Airbnb undoubtedly benefits from these illegal listings, because they make up a significant portion of its inventory and its 10 billion dollar revenue. The platform is very incentivized to hide such problems, and it causes stranded guests and hurts legitimate hosts in the affected areas.

My family and I were recently denied access to such an illegal Airbnb listing, a unit in an apartment complex. Airbnb did not actively seek a solution for us, leaving us stranded middle of the night. For 2+ hours we waited in our car for Airbnb's actions, but in the end, we still had to book a much more expensive place on our own. During later investigation, Airbnb even told me that they confirmed with the leasing office that the individual contract allows the listing. Calling up the leasing office, I very quickly confirmed myself that it indeed was illegal with written proof -- the contract for that unit.

This whole interaction and investigation involved about 10 Airbnb customer representatives, about 3 different levels of escalation, several days of my time, and Airbnb wouldn't even admit that their process is to be blamed. They wouldn't even remove the host's review on my profile lying about the situation, not to mention the lost time and money due to their fault in not properly dealing with the illegal listings.

This is just one example of how it hurts one particular guest. Given the prevalence of the problem, think about all the guests who were impacted, all the honest hosts who could have hosted these guests. (This issue deserves a class action suit, but it is cleverly prevented by a no class action clause in Airbnb's terms of use.)

Because Airbnb has very strong incentives to hide this illegal listing problem, the users of the platform (hosts and guests) should get transparency about the problem, the statistics around illegal listings, and external oversight to make sure this is handled properly and promptly. Existing users should also get compensation for everything lost due to Airbnb not properly handling the problem.

I welcome more people who were hurt by this problem to come out, and welcome ideas on how this problem should be addressed fairly and properly.

[Jenny]

Hi @Le63

I'm really sorry that this happened to you.

I've passed information about the situation over to Airbnb as an escalation, explaining a bit more detail, and I've asked if they can review how things were handled.

Hopefully someone will be in touch with you soon.

Jenny

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Le63good luck with your petition.

[Sudsrung0]

Maybe you should post in a few FB groups you would get a quicker response than here

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Le63I suspect the best way to get Airbnb to change their minds is to find a Newspaper editor willing to bring bad publicity down on them. The damage caused to the guests who get caught out is clearly not changing their minds.

[Bes175]

Welcome Le, and sorry to hear you had to go through this experience, however this merits a proper reply 'from the ALARMING tone' [+other problems we present here daily] a/any new members will take you/ at your words and reach some v. bad conclusion. Not many from us, would know better than you [an engineer] that raising a Scale Model from 1 sample/ experience & few links; is not a functional idea.

[1.] home sharing, lack of some licences and so on; [for reasons I am not going into right now] happens but calling/ supporting a CLAIM that worldwide 1 in 5 airbnb hosts is doing ILLEGAL ACTS, is not a nice thing to say nor can we check 4.000.000 hosts now to satisfy the 800.000 illegals according to you. Even if it happens in one city, 1 state or 1 newspaper.

[2.] If you are so concern about illegality, before you arrive at a host's door, check the papers.-legality. Doing it later [which is your right] while a bit upset won't help your trip/ stay.

[3.] A Host also accused you about 'illegal things' 'Bring an Extra Person without telling us' she said...What is the NEXT host to deduct? Believe her, or your genuine suprise: 'I didnt know we should have informed you about our 2 years old son'??

[4.] I'M WRITING in spaced sentences but LATELY THIS FORUM

is a mess and it will make ALL COMPACT FORMATTING - just bear with me.

[5.] This is what the other party said about you :

Never made it in the building. Didn’t follow instructions. Security didn’t all them in the building. Failed to follow procedures. Didn’t answer my call to get back access. Nightmare guest. Very frustrating. The Collective, Los Angeles, CA.

[6.] It was to make sure they exist, have 2 gr8 reviews as guests and most >30 good reviews as Hosts [10.10, great place, great area, great hosts - except you and someone else, others love them] I took that via copy/ paste so others can See it; the word ILLEGAL means many things; a BOOKING that is a SCAM completely, building does not exist, jsut Pictures -take money and run away, this is a full CON etc [while 40 others clearly stayed there] and so on...NOT CONDONING THEM [if they sub-rent, are not allowed for Airbnb etc] just STATING THE FACTS.

[7.] Here while you try to base Your Experience as 'think of other guests who might get hurt' in this case you are jumping a bit to several conclusions. If it was me, I would 'fight for the difference in money I had to pay to stay in other accommodations rather than put world to right'

[8.] But even this is not enough and you want 'a class action; like this: (This issue deserves a class action suit, but it is cleverly prevented by a no class action clause in Airbnb's terms of use.) IT IS NOT CLEVER AT ALL - LE, you are the clever Guy here [able to investigate illegality of FLAT/ HOST] and can't see this? Focus a bit or take it from me [u seem to be USA citizen] Airbnb to you or Argos/ Tesco to me in UK, say so many things - problem being No private ENTITY can have any restrictions HIGHER THAN LAWS OF SOVEREIGN STATES. They say, you sing it, IT MEANS NOTHING, no one can deny you access to COURTS/ LEGAL RECOURSE [find 15 guests who suffered like you and >80% chance Airbnb will offer to settle at stage 1] WE DO NOT SIGN OUR RIGHTS AS HUMANS to Online Platforms or Private Businesses- next time they 'might ask us to renounce the RIGHT TO VOTE' but you think that stands in any COUNTRY'S law??

[9.] Problems happen, glitches, mistakes, fraud even and some experience few things more [damage, suffering, and maybe danger - as all is based on TRUST TO STRANGERS] but Airbnb can do as much as they can, they are not some omnipotent entity, 'to check it all, overview everything and fix it all' Airbnb has 'plenty of SINS' but we do not wish them 'out of existence' for 1 or 1,111 not-so-good-experiences.

[10.] In Customer Service, one often finds that semantics and how a problem is presented matters; because while we deal with humans out passion [at times anger] carries through and the other person feels it; and it affects them too. G.luck next time and enjoy Airbnb, with respect - B.

[Le63]

Airbnb charges each transaction.  Even Google and Facebook, who do not charge any transaction fee, handles disinformation.  Don't you think it's proper that Airbnb should deal with this issue more promptly and more properly?

[Le63]

Thanks for chipping in.

The 1/5 illegal listing number was for LA in March 2022 reported by LATimes.  Other places could have even higher rates (reported by other reputable sites).  This forum doesn't allow links, please do a google search, and you'll find them.  If I've known this, I would've been much more careful.  Most importantly, Airbnb support is simply brushing this away, instead of dealing with the issue head on.  They benefit from such listings if they are really 1/5 of the total.

(The particular listing was a repeat offense.  No reviews on the listing, but one review on the host also claims illegal airbnb.  The guards at the gate of the community didn't allow us in and guessed the apartment number, K 210, even before I told them anything.  I later found out with help of the leasing office, that the lease for that unit shows no subleasing including Airbnb allowed.)

Anyhow, the point is, it's a much larger scale problem than we would've thought.

Here are some concrete suggestions and details:

For catching and preventing illegal listings:

1) Airbnb should actively confirm and chase down illegal listings, instead of leaving guests stranded.  (Currently, even when we offered to provide evidence, Airbnb simply ignores it, forcing us to rebook on our own.  It also refuses to admit that their process if faulty.)

2) Airbnb should actively detect fraud and illegal listings by monitoring messages and reviews.  It's very easy to detect fraud from address mismatch, suspicious check in instructions, and past reviews etc..  (This particular listing agent is a repeat offender.)

3) Airbnb should do sampled manual checks on all its listings, to get a reasonable estimate of what percentage of the listings are illegal, and report back the process and the numbers.  This transparency and oversight is necessary because of the huge conflict of interest with illegal listings and Airbnb.

Host side improvements:

4) Airbnb should fine confirmed illegal listing owners up to 10x the transaction price and use that to compensate impacted guests and fight against future violations.  (If Airbnb wants to show more seriousness, then increase it from 10x to e.g. 100x.  If Airbnb cannot get enough funds from the illegal listing owners, then it should find other ways to compensate affected guests.)

5) Airbnb should trace back all earlier earnings from those illegal listings, and distribute to all legitimate hosts in the affected areas, and use the fund to detect and catch future cases as early as possible.

Guest side improvements:

6) Airbnb should educate guests and Airbnb support personnels by clearly laying out the process to handle potentially illegal listings, what evidence is needed, what to expect, how long it will take to get it resolved, instead of ignoring the guests and misleading them to rebook on their own.  (Currently multiple agents simply left us there, or said they'll be back in 24 hours, even though a dispute specialist said that there in fact is a proper process to handle rebooking from Airbnb side.  Several Big Disconnects within Airbnb and between Airbnb and guests!)

7) Airbnb should compensate the impacted guests for lost time and money spent in rebooking and talking to Airbnb support due to illegal listings, and any increased fee incurred due to last minute booking or lack of inventory.