Anyone else not really feeling “Categories?”

[Richard531]

I've always felt that Brian Chesky was a little out of touch.  But I gotta say: I’m starting to feel that way more now than ever. It’s the same self-righteous attitude on his latest video, but his time he went a little too far and is taking the direction of the company with him.    

That is, the continued pounding of the war drum: "People can work from wherever they want now."  And it’s been discussed 100 times, but let’s remind everyone that this line of thinking forgets ~80% of the workforce/would-be travelers! 

Teachers, plumbers, garbage men, electricians, doctors, gardeners, therapists, restaurant workers, retail workers, delivery drivers, general contractors, mothers/fathers, THE STAFF WE DEPEND ON, like house cleaners, handymen, and our very selves as property managers and project directors of new listings.  None of them/us can, "Work from wherever they (we) want."  And never will we be able to work from wherever we want.  So the whole entry point is flawed from the start.  I get it, a billionaire CEO can load up his pooch and get on a ferry to an awesome 3 BR/ 2 Bath listing.  He can hole up there for a week and “work” while he does a couple virtual yoga class, gets food delivered, and has a masseuse to come to the home.  But everyone else? Not so much. 

It makes me cringe when he deduces that just because a portion of a portion of the workforce can kinda/sorta work from home now on a more consistent basis that the entire market would say out loud "Hummm, where should I go?" when contemplating travel plans.  That’s just not how it goes in the real world.

99% of us have a TIME in which to vacation and a DESTINATION in mind that we'd like to go to.  THEN, we book flights, and THEN we find our accommodations based on those parameters.    

The more conspicuous problem for "Categories" and thinking that, "People can work from wherever they want," is that the WFH mantra is slowly eroding as Covid-19 gets deeper and deeper into the rearview (THANK GOD).  It's all going to get back to normal.  And sooner than we think. 

Meanwhile, we’ll be stuck with these "Categories" as our guests are being peddled treehouses in Brazil and castles in Ireland when all they really want is a decent/cost effective beach condo in Miami or a house to enjoy with their family in the California Hi-Desert. 

I'm not one to just resist change!  But I think Airbnb really missed the ball on this.  

[Anonymous]

@Branka-and-Silvia0   I don't think the categories are specifically for DNs. But they're mostly relevant to stays where the planning is centered on the rental home and its features, rather than the destination and dates. DNs and parties going to be overrepresented in this group, and I doubt most hosts will be happy about that. 

[Richard531]

@Ted307  Thanks for posting this article.  Very interesting stuff.  And let's remember, that as this article is positioned, Chesky is ONLY talking about tech jobs and drawing/keeping talent and how it relates to "working from anywhere."  Nothing more.  In keeping with the overarching subject of the article, it really resonated with me. 

I'm a former Management Consultant who commuted to a different city every week for 13 years straight (over 2.9M miles flown).  The lifestyle and the connections with my colleagues and clients was critical to the work we performed.  It also permitted this very much adored chapter in my life.  If I had to do all the great things we did from "home" or "wherever," I just don't see us executing.  Maybe that's a Consulting thing and Consultants must be on site?  Then again, if our clients were all working from home, though?  We wouldn't have succeeded, either.  It's very hard for me to agree with Chesky's crystal ball.  

Now, back to what I was saying earlier, let's assume that Chesky is correct.  Meaning, tech/creative/"Silicon Valley types" can work from "wherever. . ."  That's fine!  However, that DOES NOT mean that the entire traveling population can do the same thing!

I want to make a point I didn't make clear earlier: I really trust and believe in Airbnb.  I want them to be right.  But as others have pointed out: what happened to Plus?  That was a big miss.  However, at least Plus didn't have bad downstream effects for non-Plus hosts, right?  But can "Categories" affect us "regular listings" badly?  We still don't know, I guess.

Meanwhile, the last 24 hours just happen to be some of the best bookings/conversion I can recall in recent memory for our listings.  Go figure.  

I guess that's what message boards are for!  A little venting and like-minded people to support each other.  I just want it all to work out! 

[Ted307]

@Richard531 

I think the interview I posted lets us know how our CEO views the world. I believe he really does think a lot more of our customers will be working remotely. Look at the push for "dedicated work space" and the app for measuring our wifi speed. I have been hosting for only 2 years (we had the place ready just in time for summer 2020) and we have had only 1 guest who worked from our place for 2 weeks. Most our our people have regular jobs in Phoenix and have to go back for Monday morning. They stay with us for an affordable break from the heat on the weekends.

I did get a booking for Memorial Day yesterday, just after I sent my link to VERBO. I wonder if that could have given the algorithms a nudge? They copied the photos off of my Air BnB listing quite nicely, very good on-boarding experience with a nice English-speaking person with a Texas phone number. You could tell they were very busy by all the background noise.

https://airbnb.com/h/aspen-creek-bunkhouse

This is our place, pretty modest. Never getting those big bucks with our little backyard bunkhouse!

Chris

[Alexandra199]

I agree. I don't want long term stayers. Max stay with me is 21 days and I feel uncomfortable with that enough to deter it by not offering a discount! I want guest who are coming on holiday, likely to be out all day enjoying the local attractions and using my place as a comfortable place to sleep and have breakfast! I always think to myself that those guest who are slightly problematic will be gone in a few days...phew!

[Alex208]

As a traveler, I like it. It shows off places I would have never searched before, and shows off beautiful homes.

As a host with a  “regular” house in a “regular” city, I’ve seen searches, views and conversion drop significantly.

I wish I owned a architectural home on the beach or the middle of a national forest, I’m sure their rates have more than doubled.

[Kitty-and-Creek0]

@Alex208 

I have a Destination - an off grid architectural home in the midst of tens of thousands of acres of forested mountains with outrageous wilderness views,  no neighbors, dark sky, peace and quiet. It is findable under the old classic system, not the new one using categories. It hasn't shown up in any of the categories I would have chosen. My bookings seem to have dropped like a rock. So, it is not you. Perhaps the system has not found our region yet, though this area is a justifiably famous destination.

[Gillian166]

@Alex208  I'd say their views have doubled, I wouldn't assume their bookings have doubled. I got featured in "amazing pools" in my area, and I'm seeing the same drop as everyone else. 

[Stephan-And-Skye0]

I have a lakefront property, with amazing mountain views, 15 minutes from Yellowstone. I'm a super host with 1000 ratings and do instant book. My properties are much cheaper than local hotels plus we offer kayaks, a canoe, bear spray, etc! 

Under the all homes category, my places are always put in the top 10 and stay 100% booked.  But this month I have quite a few days not taken. My places do not show up in any of the categories instead places with no ratings, high prices, less amentities, or further away locations from Yellowstone are now showing up.   

This could be a problem for me moving forward! Hope it gets fixed soon!

[Alexandra199]

Yes I agree with you and I really do wonder how long it will last. A yurt or treehouse is a nice idea, not so great in reality. Us hosts with regular houses in regular locations just need to hold tight, it will come back once everyone had stayed in a mud hut and realised its not all its cracked up to be.

[Andrea-and-Glenn0]

I posted this elsewhere since it seems to be a hot topic. 

Our views and booking rate have not changed a bit since the rollout of the new design.  Seems our customers can still find us, AirBnb is our only booking agent/platform.

@Richard531 @Jenny Follow your daily, weekly or monthly website views and your booking percentage. Those are your real and important numbers. 

G&A

[Stephan-And-Skye0]

I thought the idea of categories was cool at first ... but its seems like hardly any of our listings are actually showing up in the correct places! Did they actually test this idea out? 

I have been hosting for 5 years just outside Yellowstone and have always been 95-100% full EVEN during Covid!  However this month since the change, I have slipped to 70%. My places don't even show up under the "national park" category! I'm a tad worried that they broke something and guests can't find my place! If a guest is going to Yellowstone and clicks on National Parks and see no Yellowstone he/she is going to book a hotel. 

Hoping they will fix this it soon and get our places under the categories! Hosts are not the only one that have noticed.  Investors have drive the stock down 33% since the launch!  It's below it IPO price!  Yikes!

[Patrick568]

I' have definitely seen a change in the bookings since this new push from Airbnb, and it hasn't been positive. Which unfortunately seems to be the norm.

[Richard531]

Quick update from us is that bookings have been overall holding steady and/or improving since the Summer Release.  Although when I do my (overly obsessive/incognito) searching, I still can't seem to find our listings.  It's strange!  I'm just glad that guests seem to still be finding us.  Also of note is that we have teased the prices lower and lower to keep us moving.  Maybe it's that? 

I have talked to some of our competitors in Joshua Tree and they have gotten clobbered.  But, I think that's a combination of not finding their way in the Summer Release while also having mediocre listings in the first place as competition has ratcheted up significantly.    

So then the question is: while so many of us have seen flat/reduced bookings, then where are people ultimately staying?  At all the yurt and treehouses (none of those owners seem to be on here) that we've been talking about?  Or is travel demand tapping the breaks in general as the frothiness of the economy cools down?  

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Richard531 I have seen reports that the US market has been overrun with STR properties and that with Covid retreating staycations are less in demand. This is certainly true in the UK with domestic demand way down and not yet replaced by foreign visitors. Thankfully we have just had a 3 week booking from Australia so I am hoping our foreign guests will start to return and fill the gaps. A lot of average, over priced accommodation is likely to fail in the coming months.

[Richard531]

@Mike-And-Jane0   The "US market" is a little too massive to make a blanket statement about really much of anything.  

Related to STRs, I think the US economy could absorb no less than a tripling of inventory in the coming decade.  One would assume that this would coincide with a tripling of travelers discovering/trying the platform (45M Americans have used the platform today, which is only ~12% of the population). 

Another perspective:  One of the more saturated sub-markets that I'm intimately involved with (Joshua Tree Basin) has thousands of STRs in a very small/extremally rural area.  And even as policymakers look to "cap" the number of STRs, those caps are still discussing 10-15% of local housing stock being earmarked for STRs.  This figure still leaves a doubling of licensed STRs that can come to this little sub-market.  All the sudden, as an operator in this market, I'm the one that's wanting a tighter cap!  But the free market continues to prevail.  

So the report of the US market being "overrun with STR properties" is a complete farce.  

Those of us deep in the STR weeds often see the infant STR concept as being a lot more mature than it is.  There's still a massive amount of room to grow.