In this day and age of climate change, weather is becoming more and more unpredictable. Because of weather emergencies, hosts or guests may have to cancel reservations. This is through no fault of our own and the circumstances are beyond our control.
As it stands, if a guest or host cancels a reservation due to weather, the host gets nothing (but AirBNB still gets paid). Weather should be a shared risk. I have stayed at lodgings in hurricane-prone areas where they have policies where hosts and guests share the risk. Meaning if the reservation cannot be honored or if the guest doesn't want to risk coming due to a potential weather situation, the guest receives a refund of 50% and the host retains 50% for their efforts of making the lodging available.
Guests have the option of purchasing traveller's insurance to cover such circumstances for them so the savy traveller would only be out the cost of the insurance. We, as hosts, do not have that option. If someone cancels due to weather, we get nothing. (But AirBNB still gets THEIR fees).
I feel strongly that AIrBNB should adopt such a "shared risk" policy to help support the hosts that are allowing you, (The Company known as AIrBNB) to actually make money and collect those fees. You should be looking out for us as much as you do the guests.
