Angry Airbnb hosts threaten to quit rental platform over new rules

They take their spare keys and go home.

Airbnb hosts around the world are furious at the short-term rental giant’s sudden and sweeping crackdown on onerous guest demands – a move that appears to have sparked a global revolt, with many owners threatening to leave the platform for good.

The new rules put in place by the tech titan will go into effect on November 20 and will generally prohibit hosts from requiring guests to complete household tasks like washing dishes, removing beds, starting laundry or carrying trash off-site. Airbnb’s message to operators was brutally simple: stop making vacationers do the work of housekeepers, especially after you’ve pocketed money for cleaning fees.

“When adding a request, remember that most guests want to avoid unexpected tasks,” the company warned. “Asking them to do things that a housekeeper should take care of can negatively affect their stay and your reviews.”

Rather than pay attention, owners are getting upset on Airbnb’s internal community forums, lamenting that the new rules will turn their rentals from cash cows to pet stores.

“They will steal toilet paper from us, destroy our towels and sheets, leave holes and dents in the walls,” wrote one Airbnb host, first reported by SFGATE. “And now you ALLOW guests to come in and be rednecks.”

As a result, some say they are ready to expand their activities elsewhere.

“I feel like Airbnb is asking me to leave the platform and look for alternatives, because everything is getting worse,” fumed a host from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, during an Airbnb community discussion.

“We do NOT agree with the new house rules and ask Airbnb to remove them,” wrote another host in Switzerland. “Every day we ask Airbnb in writing how we should deal with mice, rats and vermin when trash is left in the house. How do we maintain kitchen hygiene if the dishes are dirty?”

“We already pay professional cleaners to prepare our house for the next guests,” added a host from Fair Oaks, California. “Your new policy will increase cleaning costs, create additional work and ultimately contribute to higher rental rates.”

The hustle isn’t just about cleaning pots and pans. As part of the overhaul, Airbnb is limiting hosts to seven categories of standard house rules: Any additional instructions should be considered a reasonable request, the company said.

However, guests will not be completely forbidden from lifting a finger.

Under the new rules, visitors may be asked to put dirty dishes in the sink, gather used towels, separate recycling and turn off the air conditioning before leaving the property.

The rebellion comes as sentiment has increasingly deteriorated around the once-beloved home-sharing platform.

What was initially launched as a budget-friendly way to travel has over time become known as a corporate juggernaut. Costs have soared in many cities, extra fees have become the norm, with commercial operators listing dozens of expensive managed apartments flooding many markets, crowding out the family energy that once fueled the site and made it so popular.

None of this seems to have stopped the company from excelling: Airbnb just announced one of its best growth quarters in years.

But even if bookings don’t evaporate, the way people view the experience has changed significantly; Many welcomed the recent announcement, saying they were tired of paying resort prices, only to be treated like unpaid concierges before they left.

“This is what gets me,” one disgruntled guest wrote on Reddit. “Either ask me to clean OR charge me a cleaning fee. Don’t do both and expect me to come back.”

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