Hi,
So I normally do long term rentals for my apartment in NYC. Guests normally stay a month or longer. I had one guest stay over this summer for 2 months and began complaining about bed bugs 6 weeks later. I have never had a bedbug problem during my entire time in NYC so I was taken aback to learn about this considering the apartment is clean and renovated. Upon bringing an inspector, the exterminator informed me that this was a fresh infestation *10-20 days* and I was out $1500 to cover the extermination fees. The guest gets reimbursed for the unused days and I'm shut down.
This is a highly asymmetric outcome that clearly favors guests. Not only do I lose the fees for the remaining days he had rented the unit but I am forced to pay up 1500 to clean the place. On top of that, I am shut down (which is understandable given the apartment has bugs)
I have spent a week with Airbnb trying to resolve this matter. At first they said, they would reimburse 500 because that was the normal cost for extermination fees. They then came back and said that they would be unable to reimburse me because the amount was too high?
Does this make sense to anyone? I am at the point where I will no longer use Airbnb as a guest or a host given their lack of care and consideration. It seems they have a support team in India working in a noisy call center, and are simply instructed to not give money back to anyone.
