Another drug fueled party in Calgary

[Chris69]

Hello,

I got an inquiry for a 2 night booking last weekend. The woman said she was bringing her parents into town for a funeral. It turns out that this was all a lie. I showed up yesterday (about 24 hours after they checked out) to find my house a filthy mess. Words can't describe the feeling of disgust that I had when I walked around to see what had been left behind. Fortunately there was no serious damage to the property aside from a makeup stain on one of my mattresses (for some reason the sheets and cover had been pulled off!). There was, of course, all the obvious signs of a party. Puke in the sink and on the toilet upstairs and downstairs, a condom wrapper on one of the beds, sheets covered in makeup and towels covered in puke, plus brown stains and gum on the area rug. The guest brought a dog. This was obvious because the back yard was full of feces and there was dog pee on the hardwood and on one of the carpeted landings. Oh and I'm almost certain a person urinated on my front step...

My neighbor confirmed my suspicions saying that there were 20+ people in the house partying for 2 nights straight, until 7:00am each night with cabs coming and going. Apparently it sounded like someone was jumping on the bed at 4:00 in the morning.

I immediately contacted the guest through resolution centre and charged them their full damage deposit of $1,000 which the paid immediately and without so much as a word. I'll be bringing in professionals to deal with this mess. I will also be putting up cameras at the front and back doors so that in the future I can monitor traffic in and out of the property. I'm so embarassed that my new neighbor had to deal with this and I've encouraged him to call the police immediately if anything like this ever happens again. As an added measure of security I'm increasing my damage deposit to $2,000 to further discourage these activities. 

The lesson: don't think that everyone has good intentions. The story seemed legitimate, I even talked to the guest over the phone, but I got scammed, and I don't want it to happen to anyone else.

[Donna15]

@Chris69, what a horrible experience! You're so lucky you got the full Security Deposit without a problem, and good for you for having a hefty one to begin with. I don't blame you for planning to make it even higher now. 

Have you decided how you intend to handle the Review?

I'm so often amazed to see new hosts arrive with a whole-house listing and neither a Security Deposit nor a rigid set of house rules in place. As you say: 'Don't think that everyone has good intentions'.

[Chris69]

@Donna15 I'll be giving the guest a poor review but I suspect that they'll simply make a new account and try to pull this off again. I've reported the incident to the police and I've asked that they press charges against the individual. After reassessing the damage today I will be following up with AirBnB to recover additional damages to replace all the mattresses and linens, to repair some damage to the cabinets and furniture, to sanitize all the carpets, and to get a full deep clean on the entire house.

[Clare0]

Oh @Chris69 I am so sorry this happened to you!  Some funeral, right?  I'm sure this meant the death of this user!  

It is not unheard of that people will book an entire home listing for the sole purpose of throwing a party and then trashing the place.  The rate of these instances goes up especially over New Year's.  I typically don't rent over that holiday since I'd rather lose the income than have to clean up a disgusting mess.

Last year Airbnb picked up on this tweet since it mentioned them.  Pretty scary, don't you think?

The understated response from Airbnb is priceless!

For sure, leave a review if you are able.  I wouldn't be surprised if your guest has been removed from the Airbnb community. 

Good idea to install exterior cameras.  I know many hosts have them especially to spot guests who try to sneak in extra people. 

Wish you the best of luck in the future!

[Chris69]

@Clare0 thanks for your support, I really appreciate it. A party is one thing, but this was on a whole new level. My neighbor described it as a brothel. The thought of it disgusts me to the point where I don't even want to go to the place.

I've found that hosts are always faced with a trade-off: do you filter out a huge portion of your market (new AirBnB guests with few reviews) and suffer from missed opportunity or do you take chance of allowing new/unreviewed users to book? I've hosted numerous guests with no previous reviews and new accounts who have been wonderful to host.

I was out of town for the weekend and was unable to check on the place. I plan to get together with other Calgary hosts in my neighborhood and come to some arrangement where they'll check in on my guests when I'm gone, while I'll check on theirs in return.

[Clare0]

@Chris69 Getting a group of hosts to help each other is a really good idea!  

I don't know what else you could have done to screen this person.  You do have Verified ID set as a reservation requirement, right?

I also have had newbie guests with no reviews and they've all been great, sometimes even nicer than the veterans, so that's not really a predictor of future behaviour.  I know some hosts who do a google image search on the profile picture to see where else they are on social media.  A Facebook page or twitter account (like the one I posted) might come up giving you more info.  I would only do this if I felt uneasy.

I clearly state in my listing that I live on the property...perhaps you could say you live next door.  Doesn't matter whether it's true or not. Perhaps that might deter this type of person.  I hope you didn't tell your "guest" that you were going to be away. 

Bottom line, you just have to follow your gut feeling and ask yourself if the reason the person wants your place makes sense.  I'm sure your antenna are well honed at this point. 

Wish I could give you a hug for all your trouble.  If anything more comes up, please share!

[Gabriela168]

Hi Cris , we can help you with the mess we are co host and also offer cleaning services.

[Personal information hidden for safety reasons]

[Annette33]

@Gabriela168 , he has probably cleaned up by now, that was over a year ago. It's confusing when Airbnb resurrects older posts, best is to always check on the date.

[Linda601]

 This has happened to us several times usually when it slows down. I have called Airbnb when I have a suspicion and they suggest to carry out the booking as we are protected. Unfortunately a couple times now we have not been covered   We just had this happen to us two weeks ago as well where they have burnt the carpet downstairs and the burn hole cannot be repaired so the entire floor level needs to be replaced we will see how this goes. They also put two burn marks in a coffee table which also needs to be replaced as it cannot be fixed.  This particular party our neighbours called at 4:30 in the morning to let us know what was happening and we called Aaron B&B immediately and called the police to shut it down  

We had mentioned a particular party to one of our clients where we had close to 10,000 in damage we were covered for some of it. We were notified by our clients daughter who was actually at the party where the damage had taken place.  She came to our office and showed us pictures and asked if that was my house which it was I was absolutely horrified by these pictures . She  said that there is a group of people that are booking parties in Calgary.  These parties are so large that they actually have bouncers at the front entrances of the homes, I believe there’s a cover charge and this particular party was last December 23rd and when our hired staff went to shovel there was about six Mercedes-Benz parked in the garage on the driveway and in front of the house  in the afternoon but no party had started at that time . We had a back to back booking December 24 when We entered the home we were welcomed to an entire mess they flooded the flooring so the walkout ceilings was all water damaged, they broke the faucet We were never covered for the Faucett, they destroyed all the dining room chairs we were never covered for the dining room chairs and this is a high-end set up so I was very upsetup. They threw up in all the cupboards so linens that were not used had to be thrown  out etc, it was a horrible experience for Christmas Eve.  We had amazing guests coming from Saskatchewan and I called them and they gave us a couple extra hours to clean up but this is not how I want to welcome our guests into our home as 90% of them are awesome .  Our clients daughter has refrained from attending these parties moving forward but last May she did alert us that they were booking one in the south east of Calgary and we called Airbnb immediately so hopefully someone else didn’t have to go through this nightmare .

[Victoria567]

Hello @Chri0s

Im sorry to hear what happened to you, a similar experience also reflected here in the UK, where a month or so ago a high end flat in a Kensington London in the U.K. was trashed after a rave and police were called in by concerned neighbours.

One thing springs to mind.....prevention is better than cure.

Make your house rules draconian.

Request a security deposy

Finally ALWAYS welcome your guests in person on arrival.....if you can’t do this......we’ll be prepared for problems!