AirbnbReviews 2,101

Airbnb is terrible because it allows hosts to lie on their profiles. Several hosts' profiles say they have 1 night minimum, but when I messaged them about it, they either blocked the days I wanted to visit, so I couldn't book or they told me they suddenly had a 2 night minimum stay. And as many have mentioned, they have teaser prices and then tack on large fees making the price triple the original. I'm quickly found this is a service I should never use.

I only got onto the airbnb website after being redirected there from bringfido.com when I was looking for pet friendly accommodation for a couple of nights. I couldn't believe what a disastrous setup for renters/consumers this website is. After teaser prices of say $80 per night, once fees had been added the total was three times the advertised rate. That's right, practically every offering was three times the initial price listed thanks to all the fees. It's practically fraud. Airbnb and the property owners must be laughing all the way to the bank, passing along fees to the customers like that. The risks and costs are all on the renter who could end up out of pocket and with no place to stay (or worse), I don't know why anyone would use it when they can get a budget hotel with guaranteed room and pretty much guaranteed safety for the same price or less. I understand airbnb may be part of the hookup culture and useful for being more immersed in a place, that's all very nice if you want the social side but still why pass the cost to the renter? I'm just waiting for there to be airnbnb murders etc (like the craigslist murders). Still, my biggest issue was the price gouging. Savvy travelers will take their business elsewhere.

So many issues with them I do not know where to start from!
To start with anyone ever notivced than the price is lower when you are not logged in compared to when you login? Yes, that's a first trick!
My main issue has been with the horrible customer service. I needed to urgently book a room for 10 mights, I went throught the process, and wala!, they need to validate my card. I call them, as it was urgent, they assured me the dates would bve blocked, but no, they were not, and someone booked part of the days I needed. Yet, 24 hours later my card was not validated and I needed to urgenbtly find a place.
Do not trust them! It stinks from all sides.

Found a place we wanted to stay and gave credit card info, etc. Then had to "verify" my existence by posting a photo that looked like my Facebook photo. I did. Then there was no place, none, nada, to send it. I kept getting emails from airbnb that I had 9, then 6, hours to verify. No way to contact anyone to see why my photo id didn't register. Finally, got an email saying my reservation was cancelled and the depost refunded. Yay! I booked on Homeaway.

We are trying to list our property on Air BNB and it has been TERRIBLE. Website is not intuitive (VRBO and Flipkey super easy) and cannot reach anyone at Air BNB - I had a hard time even finding a phone number and once I did, was disconnected 2 times (again, unlike VRBO and Flipkey. Although VRBO has long wait times right now, at least you can speak to a person who will actually help you). Can't imagine being a traveler using them.

I've been using the page for a while. Never had any issues after booking confirmation.

Sometimes hosts cancel but you can't blame Airbnb for that. Money is always returned within minutes.

Pros: Available everywhere, easy to book, funds protection

Cons: Can be a bit pricey in some cities (2x hotel price) yet very cheap in others.

In general I recommend Airbnb to everyone. Great alternative to hotels and money stays within local community :)

The idea is swell. The implementation is horrible. The infrastructure to their service is non existent. My host confirmed two months in advance of my overseas trip. I checked two days before departure to learn the host had cancelled my lodging without telling me. AirBNB did not alert me either. That is a product, infrastructure issue. I tried to book with another host who showed immediate confirmation. I discovered not only was that not a true confirmation, but that host had not owned that property for two years. Again, an infrastructure issue. No one is monitoring the lodgings and the hosts. PLUS there was no way to write a review on that host because the lodging was cancelled.

Now let's get to customer service. They were useless. All they did is send me emails to dwellings I had already discarded. They would not offer more than a standard $200 to help with my booking which was for two weeks. $200 wouldn't even cover two days of any of the other residence. So, I could not afford any of the appropriate last minute lodging and Air would not help.

There was one host who had 7 appropriate lodgings. I asked Airbnb support to contact that person to see if any of her lodgings were available ASAP. I was about to depart. They said they would and two days later, they still had not come through. I was already in country staying in a hotel.

My third week was to be in another country on the beach. The night before arrival, the host sent me an email saying the sand fleas were over abundant, bring bug spray. Don't lounge on the beach. There was limited and poor wifi, almost no taxi service and no restaurants in the area. I was supposed to taxi from the airport, go to a supermarket, then get to the lodging with all my cooking supplies for four days. I had to cancel but was financially penalized. Air would not intervene or even address the issue. I lost over $500.

To make matters worse, any refunds took four contacts to initiate. The company needs to fix their software application to do the checks and balances on hosts and cancellations. The company needs humans to monitor and work with hosts to provide a standard level of service. The company needs to allow disappointed travelers to comment on hosts even if they don't stay at the lodging. But mostly, Air needs to monitor their hosts constantly and penalize those who damage their brand by misbehaving.

After easily setting up as a host on VRBO and TripAdvisor sites with ease and the ability to standardize my policies identically, I began to set up on Airbnb and oh my what a mistake! They will not allow you to use your own policies, you have to use theirs which are directly designed to screw you over. Instead of being standardized, you now have to make exceptions for every single booking which creates extra work, frustration, and a waste of time and money. On top of not being able to use my own cancellation, booking, rental policies, rates etc., they also will not allow you to communicate with potential guests outside of their horribly crappy platform and claim that it is for "safety reasons" (Yeah right, we all know you are just trying to handcuff users into using your platform). That means you cannot coordinate check-ins, answer phone calls and questions which creates tremendous frustration with potential guests. In addition to that, they make the guest pay 100% of their stay up front and they even hold the guests money and do not pay the host until after check-in. WHAT? I am guessing that this is due to the fact that they are a money-leaking start-up that is basically using guest funds to fund their scam of a business, basically creating an interest free loan for themselves. I'm sorry, but I am not willing to put my reputation on the line for this chaotic, horrible start-up. Airbnb is FIRED and will never earn my business back.

As a host I have been subjected to their underhanded and unprofessional behavior coming from their "Trust and Safety" team e.g. blocking my listings from being booked WITHOUT informing or advising me in advance etc, and keeping totally quiet about it - resulting guests also being unable to book without any reason provided.

Their customer service team can be rude and very inconsistent with the quality of service e.g. one person says their policy is this, but another agent advises something totally contradictory!

Avoid Airbnb at all cost.

I been a airbnb host for 5 years. I had mostly good experiences. Some bad. They really try and make you pick Instant booking as a host. I was apprehensive because I don't really want to be overloaded in my apartment. So in the rules I just ask for 1 single person or 1 couple per bedroom. I got 4 men that instant booked a 2 bedroom and over the phone I asked them if they planned to have girls over they said yes. So now that's going to be 8 people in my condo that has 2 beds. I don't want that I wouldn't want this for my worst enemy. I asked Airbnb to cancel. They charged me a $100 to cancel. Then a week later they deactivated my account without as much as a phone call. They canceled all future bookings. Kept this weeks worth of bookings but have not paid out on any of them. I go to the site its locked. I try to contact the guest the extranet email has been turned off. I try and call airbnb and get no where. They say write us. I did. Nothing. They told me I was breaking the policy against discrimination against same sex couples. Never in my life would I ever do this. I simply don't want 8 people in a 2 bedroom. This is insane. They canceled $29,000 worth of bookings. I would go to other sites but airbnb has a strangle hold in this department. Flipkey is nice but are no where the foot traffic of airbnb and sad to say lately neither is homeaway or vrbo. Very sad I have 700 + stays 400 + 5 star reviews. Not even a second chance to correct it.