I know other hosts/guests have brought this up in different Airbnb Community Forums, but I’m sure many hosts are unaware of this change and what devastating effect it will potentially have on bookings. We need Airbnb to listen to us. When guests search for accommodation on a computer they are no longer given a map view unless they input the dates (we get many enquiries from people who do not know their exact dates), instead they are given rows and rows of properties with no clue as to where they are situated.
My husband and I have used Airbnb for travel and like anyone else we first type in destination and then we zoom in on the map to the exact part we would like to stay in (eg near train station, in city centre, near wedding venue etc) so that we can view the appropriate properties. Now, because there is no map, you have to click on each property individually to find out where it is located and quite frankly no-one has the time or patience to do that when faced with 100s of properties.
I tested this by logging out of Airbnb and then searching for a property like ours in Bath (entire property, sleeps 8 etc) and was shown 100s of properties with no idea as to where they were situated or how far they were from the city centre - some of the houses were miles outside of Bath in villages. There was no order (ie proximity to the town centre) all the properties were muddled in together.
Our bookings are definitely down this year - whether this is due to the over-saturation of properties in our area, I’m not sure, but removal of the map view certainly cannot help the situation. PLEASE REINSTATE THE MAP AIRBNB.
(Apologies if this appears twice but I thought I had posted it earlier but am unable to find it!)