Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So there's a company called Airnb where people rent out rooms or entire houses/apartments to other users of the service. Now, this would make sense to me if you were just renting out an extra room while you're going to be in the house, that's basically just having a houseguest, but apparently people use it to rent out their whole place while they're gone. It just boggles my mind that anyone would think this is a good idea, even without hearing anything bad about it. From reading some of the articles, a lot of people don't even bother to meet the person, check ID, or even question why they keep misspelling their own name!

The thing that's been in the news is this blog http://ejroundtheworld.blogspot.com/2011/06/violated-travelers-lost-faith-difficult.html . Woman rents her apartment out, people who stay completely trash it in weird ways and steal stuff. There's another one where a guy rented out his place and ended up with meth pipes and an extra cat http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/another-airbnb-victim-tells-his-story-there-were-meth-pipes-everywhere/2011/08/01/gIQAlGiEnI_story.html .

On the one hand, I feel bad for anyone getting their apartment trashed, but on the other hand this seems like walking through dark alleys stark naked with a hundred dollar bill taped to your forehead and being surprised that something bad happened. Anyone think renting out your home (not investment property or beach house or something like that) while you're not going to be there is a good idea? I just don't see how you could get into this and not expect something bad.

There is little I know at this stage, but I am slowly putting the pieces together. Someone named Dj Pattrson (was it a guy? A girl? I still don't know – but I have noticed much too late that the person misspelled their own last name) came into my home earlier this month (apparently with several others, according to witnesses) and set out on what I believe to be the carefully-planned theft and destruction of my home and my identity. With an entire week living in my apartment, Dj and friends had more than enough time to search through literally everything inside, to rifle through every document, every photo, every drawer, every storage container and every piece of clothing I own, essentially turning my world inside out, and leaving a disgusting mess behind.

Well yeah, people treat property that isn't theirs particularly bad.

Loads of people do holiday house swaps without trouble.

It works because both partners in the exchange are in each other's homes.

This isnt the first time someone started a company based on providing a mediation for a business deal that entirely works on blind trust in a stranger.

eBay has done very well out of it.

Oh wow, I'm not even going to list all the awful things people can do when you let them. I know this won't turn out well.

they make hotels for a reason... and yeah, the fact that airbnb doesn't let you exchange personal information until it's a done deal is pretty sleazy. So, renter and airbnb are at fault. Airbnb is just making it worse by being stupid.

Kilkrazy wrote:Loads of people do holiday house swaps without trouble.

It works because both partners in the exchange are in each other's homes.

Well, also don't both parties talk to each other a lot? I know the neighbors behind me did one of those with an English family when I was a kid, but both families mailed and phoned with each other for a good while beforehand. It definitely wasn't 'well, we're leaving, someone who's name I don't know will be staying here all summer'.

I'll always remember the time they said 'oh, we've got a 3-day weekend, we're going to drive to see the Redwoods', not quite realizing the size difference. It would only have been a 5000 mile trip, what's the big deal?

Ah, Europeans tourists kinda get lost like taht.

*drives for a few hours, passenger then asks*
"So are we out of Dallas yet?" "No." "What."

Admittedly, I can hardly blame them for wanting to get out of Dallas.

Orlanth wrote:This isnt the first time someone started a company based on providing a mediation for a business deal that entirely works on blind trust in a stranger.

eBay has done very well out of it.

Then there was the era of caveat emptor.

Well, I could expect to find my gunsafe forcibly opened the contents in unknown hands, my electronics pawned, and my models trashed or sold for 1/10th their worth, and my fridge and pantries empty.

The moral of the story? Don't let strangers stay in your house for a week. Certainly not without first sterilizing the house of anything valuable and putting it in storage. Even then expect something to be damaged, unless it was agreed beforehand that damages would be paid for by said strangers. Take lots and lots of pictures of any damage already present, and the state of the rooms as-left, so that in the ensuing "discussions" they cannot simply go "It was there when I got there! HA MY WORD AGAINST YOURS!"

It just boggles my mind that anyone would think this is a good idea, even without hearing anything bad about it.

Generally people don't THINK at all. Lot of them compound the problem with naivete or inexperience with the world. On the bright side, an experience or two like the above will get them to fix that real fast.

While the internet likes to pretend it's a wasteland of immoral scoundrels out there, most folk are pretty straight up honest. And when you narrow the field to the people capable of taking up these offers - homeowners looking for a quiet holiday in another part of the world, you've only increased the proportion who are going to be honest, and take good care of your house.

That said, I'd never take the risk that I'd end up with one of the bad ones.

sebster wrote:While the internet likes to pretend it's a wasteland of immoral scoundrels out there, most folk are pretty straight up honest. And when you narrow the field to the people capable of taking up these offers - homeowners looking for a quiet holiday in another part of the world, you've only increased the proportion who are going to be honest, and take good care of your house.

Are you talking about the 'house exchanges' or Airnb? Airnb doesn't require you to be a homeowner to rent a place or rent out, the woman in the story rents her apartment.