***WE CANNOT PAY OUR RENT WITH BIG IDEAS: AN OPEN LETTER TO BRIAN CHESKY***

[Rose123]

On March 14, 2020, Airbnb changed policy to allow guests full compensation for cancelled bookings as a result of the current COVID-19 health crisis. This policy overrides existing policies hosts have in place to protect their homes and livelihoods, placing the responsibility of an entire global health pandemic on their shoulders.

Brian, you say your hosts are “heroes”, but everyday heroism can take many forms, and among these is corporate social responsibility. You tweet that Airbnb is concocting “big ideas” to help hosts, but we cannot pay our mortgages, rent, staff and bills with big ideas.

The impact of your March 14 policy change will be rapid and far-reaching. The diverse individuals who comprise your host community will face the very real prospect of eviction. This impacts individuals who may not have another source of income. Or, they may have a hosting income, but are also active participants in creative industries. They are poets, painters, artists, writers, academics, musicians, dancers, ceramicists, bloggers and others who balance the economic precarity of creative work with hosting as a matter of necessity, not luxury. They are the same individuals who, reliant on a gig economy, do not have access to health insurance, nor the protection of employer benefits and sick leave.

Your guests have a refund at stake: your hosts, their homes and livelihoods. We ask you to protect hosts as well as guests. We urge you to reimburse hosts for cancelled reservations according to their cancellation policies. We as a host community do not believe that guests should be traveling in the current health crisis. We also do not think that hosts should suffer crippling losses. We ask you to acknowledge the loyalty – and the revenue – of the hosts who built you. And we ask you to consider how to best support your most precarious hosts, those who will soon be on the verge of eviction.

*** Airbnb hosts, feel free to copy, paste and share. Use the hashtag: helpyourhosts ***

[Rose123]

@Donald28 I don't think you've read my post properly. This is about creative (and other) individuals who rely on extra hosting income not being able to make rent/mortgages at the end of the month.

It's not about professional hosts per se who have huge profit margins. It's about keeping a certain band of hosts from eviction. It also doesn't sound like you've lived in New York, LA, Paris or anywhere else where it's very much the norm for creative individuals to use their homes to offset their creative income - and where those creative communities are essential to the life of the city. You might have enjoyed their art at some stage in your life. Now is the time to back them up.

I think there will be people in this community who agree with you, and others who disagree. But I mostly think it's important to share our thoughts, and to also to be accurate about what we are actually saying here. This is about Airbnb helping their hosts, not about guests losing money for whatever reason. It's about total losses that may result, very soon in eviction. I don't think that you can ethically take a stand against that.

For anyone who wants to find me off this platform, my instagram is @rose vickers (all one word) and I'm posting a lot about this.  

[Donald28]

 I don't think you've read my post properly. This is about creative (and other) individuals who rely on extra hosting income not being able to make rent/mortgages at the end of the month.

I don't think you read my reply properly. No one should RELY on income from airbnb to make the rent or mortgage. What did these people do before airbnb? Airbnb is relatively new. 

If you would get evicted or foreclosed on if the airbnb income stopped, then you're clearly in more home or a more expensive geographical area than you can afford. Like NYC.

It's not up to brian chesky to make sure that extra bedroom in your loft apartment or the couch in your tiny studio is occupied so poets, painters, artists, writers, academics, musicians, dancers, ceramicists, bloggers can make the rent. This letter you wrote is plain silly. Since when did poets, painters, artists, writers, academics, musicians, dancers, ceramicists, bloggers start relying on airbnb to make the rent or mortgage? That's downright scary.

[Kristin108]

@Donald28

You are entitled to your opinion, but you are way off base here! You need to be careful when you judge people... It will come back around to bite you...

You obviously have no idea what it is like to have been living and working in places like San Francisco or Portland and get priced out of the market it just a few years. 

I own (no mortgage) a large farm that I have chosen to make my living through renting out my glamping units and the main 'Guest House' to make ends meet. The key work here is 'chosen'... 

I have huge overhead, with insurance and electricity, investments and improvements... 

Sure I could sell the property and have several million in the bank, but that could take a few years!

I am dealing with NOW. And now I am going to lose what I knew to be a guaranteed income...

Thank god not all my bookings are through airbnb. 

Maybe I will turn it into a retreat for poets, painters, artists, writers, academics, musicians, dancers, ceramicists, bloggers who can't make the rent...

They are the most interesting people to be around anaway!

[Donald28]

I'm not "judging" anyone.

It's an absolute, obvious, concrete fact that if you're a small time STR  player (like most of us here) and you're doing this "for extra money"... which is exactly what airbnb was created to do 11 years ago... and your airbnb income stopped tomorrow... you'd lose the roof over your head, then you are doing airbnb & life wrong. 

Brian chesky did not start airbnb so he could "employ" people who choose not to have a conventional job. It's not his fault that a few cancelled reservations could mean your rent or mortgage can't be paid.

It started just 11 years ago and could be gone tomorrow due to 100's of unforeseen events (like a pandemic). DO NOT RELY ON AIRBNB for the roof over your head folks. And if you do, please don't write letters in all caps, yelling at the founder of airbnb because you can't pay your mortgage or rent. That's silly. 

[Yamileth-And-Jimmy0]

Sorry Rose to disagree. You really need to read your own post. You clearly said "This impacts individuals who may not have another source of income" and creative work with hosting as a matter of necessity, not luxury"  Those words indicate that people is relying financially on Hosting and i had been reading many threads of other conversations where many hosts express that they depend only on Airbnb. 

But i noticed @Donald28 already explain the point. 

Now i want to bring something else. You talk about creative people. Then this creative people have to look for ways to go around this situation. Yesterday we post a Facebook page on the conversation that is before you so we can act instead of keep complaining to deaf ears as Rob said. 

And Yes Big Ideas will help you pay the rent and mortgage if you put them to work of course.

All the best.

[Wendy1071]

Also, there are many other platforms to rent your place on a short term basis.  You can start using them, but I have a feeling no one is going to be getting bookings STR and its not because or Airbnb policies.  Its because no one is travelling.    I'm in Canada.  No one is allowed across the border who isn't deemed essential or are returning Canadians ; ie tourists who book Airbnb's.  People in the county have been told to stay home, so no internal bookings are going to be happening either.  This could go on for 2 or 3 more months so everyone better get a contingency plan

[Danielle476]

'If you're relying on an income, you're doing it wrong.'

Pardon me, but if you lost your employment income tomorrow, would you have the same sentiment?  Just because you don't deem AirBNB to be a proper 'job' doesn't mean nobody's allowed to rely on it for income.  Plenty of people rely on the 'gig' economy for their income - Uber, freelancing (web design, graphic design, what have you), photographers, etc.

I hope you're passing your wisdom to them as well about how they should have known better and have over-leveraged themselves.  This isn't the time to be condescending towards one another, it's the time for supporting each other and offering constructive solutions.

[Donald28]

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@Danielle476 wrote:

'If you're relying on an income, you're doing it wrong.'

Pardon me, but if you lost your employment income tomorrow, would you have the same sentiment?

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You just get another job. 

[Danielle476]

What an over-simplified, ridiculous statement to make.  

[Yamileth-And-Jimmy0]

So Simplified and Yet so easy and better to do... Life is short we can't waist it complaining for losing our jobs or source of income. Act. Look for another job and be creative on the way. And if ones can't pay the mortgage or rent is because ones decided to get a beautiful, comfortable, big and expensive place to maintain, and not because other people or companies forced them to. Be a little responsible for your own actions and decisions will help on many situations.

Besides. We are here to give ideas not to insult other hosts. And one idea is that you do not rely only on a company that will not pay you un-employment or has any insurance for you. Something to consider as well on jobs like uber and so, which by the way its our own decision to do because it give us the freedom and a feeling of control of our time among other personal reasons. 

My other idea is to start a Class action against Airbnb. Which is talked about on the conversation before @Rose123 . Unfortunately i do not keep too much track of the names. but you will find there is Facebook page and info about it. 

Best wishes

[Danielle476]

@Yamileth-And-Jimmy0 You sure are making a lot of assumptions in your post.

'...ones {sic} decided to get a beautiful, comfortable, big and expensive place to maintain, and not because other people or companies forced them to...'

Yes, everyone on this platform is running a 12 bedroom mansion with clawfoot tubs and curtains made from Venetian silk.  Give me a break.  There is no 'one size fits all' solution, and telling people to 'go get a job' is incredibly helpful.  Alert the masses!  You've both solved world hunger!  Homelessness!  The mental health crises of the world!

Kindly get over yourselves.  There are real people here facing real challenges.  The person who relies on the extra cash from a spare bedroom in their home is not the same as the person who owns 48 properties and runs them under an LLC.  The person who uses a summer home left to them by family to generate enough income just to keep it in the family is not the same as a person who rents out an entire floor of a condo building.  The world isn't so black and white - your 'advice' is condescending and not at all helpful.  You're assuming everyone here is both financially negligent and too stupid to try to find other means of income?  Bye, Felicia.

[Donald28]

danielle it sounds like maybe you need to move to a smaller place on the outskirts of toronto and give up that "luxury condo minutes from everything"? Life would be so much less stressful not having to worry about renting that extra bdrm just to pay the rent.  

[Angela714]

That doesn't invalidate her argument, though...does it?

The person who relies on the extra cash from a spare bedroom in their home [...] The person who uses a summer home left to them by family to generate enough income just to keep it in the family

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[Rose123]

Oh, wow. This is what privilege looks like @Donald28 

[Donald28]

No, this is what "not getting in over your head" looks like.

"Privilege" is when you think airbnb is absolutely responsible for paying your rent. Airbnb paying for the roof over your head is not a right, it's a privilege.