The Future of Airbnb Considering 2 Scenarios - The Future looks bright ahead for home-sharing. Not the same for Multiple Listing

[J-Renato0]

I have read many opinions in this community and I thought I should left my opnion here on this matter.
If by any chance the Airbnb founders and owners read this, maybe they can take it into consideration.
Other hosts that would like to give their opinion are welcome.

The Future of Airbnb Considering 2 Scenarios
1-The future looks bright ahead for home-sharing.
2- Not the same for Multiple Listing if Airbnb does not change its course regarding strict cancelation policy options. Airbnb must restore the control of the properties to its owners.

1- I think that the great majority of host that offer home-stay type accommodation (shared space in the same roof) will continue to trust in Airbnb.
It seems that most of them are happy and also praising airbnb.
So I think that the reputation as platform to offer home-stay is ok with the hosts that offer this type of accommodation.
It is very clear that a considerable number of home-stay hosts do not feel empathy with Hosts that has more than 1 listings!
What C-virus crises has reveals is an uneaseness that has been latent since a long time
Some hosts feel that they are not in the same boat.

2- As for the ones who offer entire space, that has 1 or more than one listings, I think that Airbnbn has destroyed their reputation to them.
I may continue using Airbnb in the future, but I do not trust in the company to fill completely my calendar. I will have to diversify by using some other platform, mainly to fill the most important dates and high season.

The biggest mistake Airbnb has done! 
Airbnb made a great mistake. They think that they can keep their guests by having them happy cos they did not have to share any loss.
What will happen when things returns to normal?
Maybe Airbnb will have lots of guest willing to book.
Is it good? Depends on some factors....!
Let us compare with hotels.
Imagine a hotel that has lots of previous guests wanting to book... however the hotel did not cared for its assets... half of the rooms are in ruins and the staff is new and not well prepared...
Imagine another hotel that has lots of good rooms and good staff offering good accommodation and less guests to book in the begining..... who is the one you think will have more chances to succeed in a mid or long run?
It is no use to have lots of clients if you can not deliver what they want...!
Too many clients and bad service is the perfect combination to destroy at once the reputation of some company.

Based on my thoughts I left above, I tend to think that, Airbnb will survive and will have success with their base of home-stay hosts.

As for holiday lettings/rental sector, I think that if another bold and good company appears in the market, Airbnb may have hard times.

To reconquest their base of off-site hosts, Airbnb will have to better and enforce the strict cancellation policy options to restore the confidence in the company that has been badly shaken.

Holiday lettings(rental) depends on strict cancellation policies. Once the renter has paid for some stay in the future, the renter must accomplish. It does not matter what may happen. The future is uncertain for the renter and for the owner. It is not only the owner who have to have losses in case by any chance the renter can not come to stay in the property.

PS - Post Script and Disclaimer text

I also have to say that I am a host that have multiple listing and I like earning money. I think there is nothing wrong with this if I offer a good stay. I have had tons of happy guests and it makes me happy as well.

As what I have said before, in the above lines, everybody has notice that there is an uneaseness that has been latent since a long time! The home-stay hosts would like to have a platform dedicated only to offer home stay or shared accommodation.
I also would like to say that, we the hosts that have multiple listings do not compete with you that offer home-stay. We offer a different experience of stay that existed since a long time. Long before Airbnb existed.
If we list our properties in Airbnb it is cos Airbnb became one of the best options of the holiday lettings(rental in US) sector to get bookings. It was not us the hosts who created Airbnb. We just list our properties here because Airbnb offer this service and invite us.

I also have to say that, this community is very useful for both type of hosts. To me it is good to read opinions of both type of guests. We have lots of things in common when it comes to reviews and how to deal with guests and etc.

[Sarah977]

@J-Renato0  I am a home-share host with only one private room in my home listed. I only had one reservation cancelled due to coronavirus, however, as this is my normal high season, I would have gotten many more bookings this spring if this pandemic hadn't happened.

I am not "happy", nor have I praised Airbnb- my hosting has come to an end for the foreseeable future. Nor does the future look bright for home-share hosts. It will be a long time, I feel, until things calm down enough with this virus for me and many home-share hosts to feel safe having strangers share our common spaces. The future is brighter for hosts who have one or two entire home listings, as those don't put their own personal health at risk.

I am also a host who feels that 100% refunds to guests due to the pandemic was the right thing to do, but that every host needs to make that call for themselves, and that Airbnb has handled this crisis very poorly and with no regard whatsoever for its hosts. I don't think the 100% refunds should have been Airbnb's call- I think that hosts who refuse to give refunds for COVID-related cancellations should have been free to chance their own karma and live with their own conscience on that- those that are intent on retaining 50% might find that their name circulates on social media as a host who was unfair and who guests slag publicly. In other words, let the market itself dictate the consequences.

I do have compassion for hosts to whom this is a major loss of income, but I also think that those who threw all their eggs in one basket without any back-up plan or savings, assuming that nothing would ever rock that boat, didn't have a very good business model.

But it is true that I have little sympathy for the hosts who own or manage scores of listings, due to them creating housing crises in many places, as well as often upsetting neighbors with a constant stream of strangers coming and going in the community, some of whom create noise or other disturbance. Those multiple property listings have also made things extremely difficult for home share and small time hosts, as our listings get buried- but that's not the fault of the multiple property hosts- as you say, all they did was take advantage of a platform that was offered to them. It's on Airbnb that they have refused to separate hands-on small-time and home-share hosts from property managed listings.

The division in thinking between the different types of hosting situations is not so black and white, or simplistic, IMO, as you state it here.

[Ute42]

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@J-Renato0 

• "If by any chance the Airbnb founders and owners read this,
  maybe they can take it into consideration."

Thank You for the good night laugh.

[Anonymous]

@J-Renato0  Your articulate insights are always appreciated!

I see the outlook for in-home hosts a bit differently. There's going to be a period this year where restrictions ease and some forms of tourism will become possible again, but social-distancing may be the prevailing social norm well into next year. Before the pandemic, the homestay experience was desirable for many travelers that could have afforded a more private accommodation:  they enjoyed the chance for social engagement, cultural exchange, and an environment with character. Now, being in close quarters with a stranger feels fraught with the risk of disease, and the psychology of that will alter the culture of homestays for quite some time. 

On top of this, the recovery of the travel business is going to be a slow one, and hosts serving the budget market will be competing with more cut-rate hotel rooms and cheaper Entire Home units than are normally available. Hosts who rely on homestays for income are going to have a pretty tough time for awhile. But while Entire Home hosts have several major platforms they can list on, Airbnb doesn't yet have a significant global competitor for homestays.  So it might not be trust keeping them with AIrbnb, but rather a lack of alternatives.

It is very clear that a considerable number of home-stay hosts do not feel empathy with Hosts that has more than 1 listings!
What C-virus crises has reveals is an uneaseness that has been latent since a long time
Some hosts feel that they are not in the same boat.

It's not the same boat, maybe not even the same body of water. Not to dismiss the fact that multi-property owners are taking some painful losses in the short term, but compared to the millions of newly unemployed people wondering how they're going to keep their one and only home, and the millions more with no home at all, I'm not worried for people who happen to own more homes than they need.

[J-Renato0]

@Ute42  Yes... the chances a minimal! 🙂 I like your sense of humour!

@Sarah977 

It is always nice to read your comments, ever balanced and honest.
I would like to reply 3 points.

What creates housing crises in many places are the laws that make things hard to the property owners to lett the properties long term. However in certain tourist areas, it is normal to have vacation rentals.

Every hotel and every host, being them home-share or off-site hosts generate a constant stream of strangers coming and going in the community... It is tourism... noise and disturbance are exceptions, it is not the common place.

I agree with you. If there were separate categories (or separate platforms) for home-share accommodation and vacation rentals it would be much better for both.
However Airbnb has filters. The ones who are searching accommodation can pick home-share or entire place. So the search results will display only the type of accommodation that they are searching for.

[Fred13]

Good interesting post @J-Renato0 

The way I see the future is like this:

1.  Airbnb will be trusted by the guest public because they did refund them; all the background intrigues of what they did to their hosts or how hosts personally feel about Airbnb now will find little sympathy from guests. Two different worlds.
2.  Home sharing, besides being the original idea will meet some 'hesitation' for a while because of the nature of this event, a contagious virus that so far has come across as ‘extraordinarily dangerous'; how dangerous it proves to be over time we will soon know.
3.  Hosts will once again flock to Airbnb because of their present market position, but of course with a more cautionary approach; and yes now entertain other platforms as a form of 'insurance’.
4.  Market forces will once-again dictate in the future who goes with who; if Airbnb delivers the most customers, as in the past, most will be at least with them, as in the past.
5.  This event will cause some ~hosts~ to re-consider how tenuous hosting could be not only because of this event, but because the practice has become too popular in most areas of the world (aka competition - the pie is getting split too many times nowadays in many areas).

Needless to say, those who do a good job in their hosting will be just fine, because of the reviews they will get and repeat customers that will return to their place. Airbnb needs to worry about those hosts primarily, they are the 'brand' really.

P.S., One thing that I also see from a macro-economics point of view is that - the STR phenomena (not home sharing) is increasing the possibility of a second coming of a 'housing bubble'; meaning a lot of new places are being created just because of the potentially lucrative STR practice. Perhaps too many private citizens once again are ’gambling’ on possible false economics; borrowing money and building places they have no plans to ever personally occupying, but ‘Airbnbing’.

[J-Renato0]

@Fred13  Great thoughts.
I agree, I think the "housing bubling" is a possibility.
In the city of Rio de Janeiro we have already had a peak of market saturation after the Olympics. In 2014 the World Cup took place here and two years later the Olympics came. Many people who used to rent apartments for long term moved to short term. Many property owners renovated apartments, spent money and invested on new ones. When the Olympics ended the market was saturated. The dream was over. Prices hit the rock bottom. Many of them put their properties up for sale.
Till the end of the Olympics, there were apartment buildings in the city that had 4 or 5 units for short-term rentals. Nowadays this has changed because many owners have given up.
I have been renting my apartments for many years, long before Airbnb existed. So I knew I was going to go through a bad phase, because of the saturated market. But I preferred to hold on and wait a little, as I knew that many owners would give up on short term rentals.
This is what has been happening. Most of the ones that flocked to STR came to know that it was an illusion.
They thought that everything was very easy, when in fact it is difficult to maintain a standard. More than that, there comes a point that there is not enough slices of cake for everyone.

[Fred13]

Here in Belize, I see tons of places being build to just STR rent in Airbnb. Oh boy.

[J-Renato0]

@Anonymous 

You always have great points. And it has consistency.

I agree that in a short or medium time, or perhaps by the end of this year, nothing will return to normal. But I still think that, when everything goes back to normal, Airbnb will be very successful in the home-share accommodation sector and this will be good for home-share hosts.

However, as long as a vaccine against covid19 does not appears, no one will feel safe to travel. All types of hosts will continue to experience losses.

When the vaccine is created, there will be a major revival in the travel industry. Imagine how many people are waiting to see new places and venture out. So there will certainly be a lot of demand for accommodation of all types.

As for empathy, you certainly have a good point. Yes, you're right. I understand your point of view.
However, I would like to say that, there is a difference between small owners and large owners.
When someone has more than one property, it doesn't mean that someone doesn't need them.
In fact, the owner must have worked and saved money to buy them, and to have an income in the future.
The property owner might have worked countless hours more than normal working hours. The property owner might have made great efforts to save money and buy more than one property. In this case, private property is the materialization of the owner's extra work and its efforts to buy and keep them. It is not a gift that came out of nothing.  It may be worth saving. If someone doesn't spend money on unnecessary things for a while to buy something that will bring him/her a return in terms of money in the future, it can be worth it.

[Fred13]

I always consider small multiple-unit owners no different than those with a single one; if they do a good job across the board, what is the difference really. I have 1 entity at $695 per night, but if had 7 at $100 per night and do a thorough job with all, what is the difference. I am never hung-up on the too-simplistic  'small vs. bigger' delineation lines.

 The 'corporate types' with a zillion cookie cutters that start being 'managed' by even third-parties I view as no more than separate mini-hotels. I am not so sure they are good for the brand, thus may hurt all in general.

BTW, I am keeping my eye on the 'home testing' apparatus that really may prove so useful for travelers, and is even re-programmable to keep up with future strains, now that be something.

[Mary4887]

I am reluctant to agree with you about the idea that the property owner who has multiple listings put in "extra work and efforts" to buy and keep them. No, rather, there are many hosts out there who simply take on a lease and are basically sub-leasing the property, without the landlord's knowledge.  And that is against the law.

[Sheila22]

90% of  Airbnb's income comes from 'whole-home super hosts' (many of them with multiple listings).  Airbnb would have remained a very tiny novelty business if it only stuck with 'home-share' Hosts.  If after COVID-19 Airbnb were only able to retain relaitionships with home-share Hosts, Airbnb would NEVER survive, having overextended themselves with multiple Billion dollar high-interest rate loans.  We'll see what happens soon enough.

[Helen3]

I'm rather surprised by your analysis @J-Renato0  Home share hosts on this community including myself are some of the strongest advocates in raising issues relating to Airbnb and its operations.

Airbnb has had a deliberate policy for many years of focussing on hosts like yourself who have multiple listings and large scale management operations,  which is why the homeshare host share of the market has dropped so drastically in recent years.

What evidence do you have for saying homeshare hosts don't have empathy with hosts with multiple listings. 

I'm not sure why you would try and create division between hosts who home share and hosts who have multiple listings. 

I'm certainly not an advocate of large scale management companies who often provide poor service to guests and the hosts who are their customers. This management companies are often responsible for managing listings where guests party and have anti-social behaviour which upsets local communities .

[J-Renato0]

@Helen3 

It is I who am very surprised by your post.
If you pay attention, this topic was opened on the 23th of March of 2020, when an issue dominated this community.
You are considerably late to this thread.

It doesn't make any sense to discuss this further, but I'll go back in time quickly.

We were at the beginning and also at the peak of the covid pandemic.
One of the controversial facts discussed at that time was about the strict cancellation policy that was not suppressed causing damage to many hosts.
And at that time, the future of Airbnb in a post-pandemic era was being discussed.

About your personal opinion about multi-listing I will not argue. You are entitled to your personal opinion.

I do not see any point in you asking for evidence of this or that. Before entering a subject without understanding the context, please, try to find out about the facts and discussions of a time gone by.
My comment then was made within the context of that time.

Sorry to say that, but your post makes no sense to me.

We are in another time where happiness and tranquility prevail again.

I suggest enjoying the current time, and forgetting the past.

We are againg in time of prosperity, for all of us, hosts, guests and Airbnb.

[J-Renato0 · Accepted solution]

Hello

If you reach this topic (that I considered an obsolete topic), I recommend firstly reading my comment in follwing lines.

If you pay attention, this topic was opened on the 23th of March of 2020, when an old issue dominated this community.

So this topic is now an obsolete topic.

It doesn't make any sense to discuss this further, but I'll go back in time quickly, just to let you know why.

We were at the beginning and also at the peak of the covid pandemic.
One of the controversial facts discussed at that time was about the strict cancellation policy that was suppressed causing damage to many hosts.
And at that time, the future of Airbnb in a post-pandemic era was being discussed.

Now, in the year of 2023, we are in another time where happiness and tranquility prevail again, at least in most of the countries where peace prevails and that are not directly affected by wars.

We are again in time of prosperity, for all of us, hosts, guests and Airbnb.

To summarize, this is an obsolete topic. Please, consider not to post here anymore.