I have had the exact same experience, earlier this year a one night guest had 35 people over and completely destroyed my house, broke the kitchen table, holes in the walls, busted windows, human feces ground into a brand new leather couch, stolen items and the lot, airbnb gave me $80 for a missing blanket. Less than a month later another "qualified" one nighter did the same exact thing expect this time instead destroying all my stuff they decided to steal it. After knowing how the almighty trust and safety team functioned we succesfully filed a claim with police reports and receipts and were able to recoup $750 of the $1100 we were looking for, but the shady thing their was that we had added a security deposit after the first debacle and the guest agreed to release the security deposit as we charge each person over 8, totally separate deal from the insurance claim and Airbnb tried to lump the $150 security deposit into the $750 payout, which took months to correct. Which brings us to our most current **bleep**storm (literally, we've had people crap all over our house on four seperate occasions, it is beyond comprehension). These last folks got wasted trashed the back bedroom vommited and **bleep** all over a 1 week old $400 comforter set, with such massive volume that it straight soaked therough the mattress and was dripping into the carpet beneath the bed, mattress had to be trashed along with the comforter set and three brand new calvin klein pillows, the guest is on record admitting guilt and offering to help reimburse the sitation and that was almost three months ago. I was getting calls from somebody at Airbnb who stated my insurance claim was denied because I couldn't provide receipts for the replaced items and I'm like do these people have a clue, I can't replace the items without the insurance money. Finally I called for a new case manager and the guy at Airbnb says that this claim hasn't even been registered through Airbnb at all, so i had to resubmit everything, despite having all the correspondence with the phantom Airbnb customer service rep. and still not even a call a month later. I had guests show up at my house with shotguns and cases of ammo, i've had quests smashing car windows (fortunately it was their own cars), destruction beyond imagination and this is what i think. Airbnb knows that if youre renting out your house, in most cases you're likely doing so because you need the money, and that being the case despite buckets of vomit and crap you'll do what you have to do keep the doors open, they give all the power to the guests becasue they're the ones that pay out and it's totally unfair. I am in the process of filing a law suit myself and would love to chat with anybody else in the process. I firmly believe a class action lawsuit, while time consuming, maybe the right avenue to handle these situations, right off the bat I am very confident that Airbnb's security deposit policy is fraudulent. They have told me that they never the guest the security deposit upfront, it's that the guest agrees to pay that amount in the event of damages or surcharges, the problem is that that if the guest is non-responsive and closes the credit card on file, guess who gets hosed...the hosts. How can you not deposit a security deposit it makes absolutely no sense and it lends itself to the false sense of security that Airbnb uses to lure hosts in one by one. I firmly believe that it will only be a short matter of time before we are all reading about a real tragedy like a murder or some burning to death in a fire because airbnb doesn't do a **bleep** thing to actually validate who these people are that rent our homes, they don't even know who's showing up here, it could be anybody. The one time I caught guests in a situation that was going south quickly so i called airbnb for help to cancel the reservation and get these people out of my house and they told me I was on my own and i might want to call the police if I thought things were getting hostile, gee thanks for that wealth of information. Personally I am filing for a claim above the maximum for small claims court, in my experience once a company like Airbnb has to deploy a legal team to address the lawsuit its costing them far more than it costs me (I file pro se - without representation), just the process of getting to a trial could cost them upwards of $20,000, find a valid claim for an amount above the state small claims maximum and below what they'll spend on legal and you have a reasonable chance at getting some money out them, but the key is it has to have legal merit, it doesnt just have to be physical damage, stress, sickness, lost revenue can all count and when you tack on false advertising and fraud that number can be upwards of 4x the total. Airbnb provides a wonderful opportunity for creative and hardworking people to make ends meet, i couldn't have gotten back on my feet after my divorce without them and I am very grateful for that. But with Expedia coming up from the depths like a great white shark the Airbnb community needs to watch out and address some very serious issues or this whole deal will get gobbled up like all the other travel websites have. Expedia has 100x the marketing power and once they figure out where airbnb can be improved they will steamroll the competition. A host in Austrialia was murdered by his guests (or possibly it was the other way around) but it didn't make the news in the states but a couple of bad press deals and Airbnb will never be the same. I am not a lawyer but I am fairly well versed in the law and can possibly help point people in the right direction if they wanted to file a claim in court, but most people are better off hiring an attorney, should the damages support the expense. Oh and by the way, I've been on hold for AirBNB customer service this whole time, 1:06 mins and 44 seconds and guess who just got hung up on. Sernity now...serenity now...
