patrick.net

zzyzzx says

https://www.surfacemag.com/articles/airbnb-losing-its-appeal/

Its overburdened with too many fees. I rather bypass and shop around such as use Expedia.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Airbnbust/comments/yedqlk/share_your_airbnb_horror_story/

ad says

Its overburdened with too many fees. I rather bypass and shop around such as use Expedia.

I just stay in hotels. Never had an issue.

zzyzzx says

ad says

Its overburdened with too many fees. I rather bypass and shop around such as use Expedia.

I just stay in hotels. Never had an issue.

I'll look at vacation rentals if it's if it's a 7-10 day trip and has a shit load of good reviews. Can cook your own food and have a kitchen or grill, so cheaper vacation. Otherwise it's resorts or hotels for 1-7 days. Plus we get rewards and free nights. Ends up being cheaper, room service, turndown service, pools, activities, etc.

My biggest beef with many hotels is check in. A hotel for one night for a wedding you can stay at a Hilton brand hotel and just go to the room with the app. Other places it takes 15 minutes sitting at the front desk. You'd think they'd streamline it by now. Vacation rentals you generally just get a code or lockbox and you're in. I've flown in to Puerto Rico at 12am and sat at the front desk giving ID and CC for 15 minutes. No one else there either. It was literally just a bed for 6 hours to catch an 8am flight to St. Thomas.

If you "have" to check in it should take 1-2 minutes tops. Key should be ready. They have your CC info 99% of the time when booking. Then they ask for an ID and CC again? Then they scan the room key in front of you? Have it fucking ready before I get there. Otherwise hotels are the way to go. With kids though, once you crack 3 of the little shits, adjoining rooms become a thing. #more$$$$ So for that reason vacation rentals are appealing for us for longer stays. Always search for the property name if they have one. I've been eyeing a place on St. John for a group trip and it's a $1,200 savings going to their site versus VRBO.

https://www.surfacemag.com/articles/airbnb-losing-its-appeal/

WookieMan says

A hotel for one night for a wedding you can stay at a Hilton brand hotel and just go to the room with the app

That's becoming the norm, online check in, or using a Kiosk. Atlantic City Casino hotels have them. I have used kiosks at The Tropicana and at Bally's and recommend them. I will see about using them at Hard Rock at Oceans later this year.

Possibly unrelated, but used the Delta Air app to check in twice recently and would use it again, and recommend it.

WookieMan says

With kids though, once you crack 3 of the little shits, adjoining rooms become a thing. #more$$$$ So for that reason vacation rentals are appealing for us

If it means less annoying kids in hotels, then I guess it's all good.

zzyzzx says

WookieMan says

A hotel for one night for a wedding you can stay at a Hilton brand hotel and just go to the room with the app

That's becoming the norm, online check in, or using a Kiosk. Atlantic City Casino hotels have them. I have used kiosks at The Tropicana and at Bally's and recommend them. I will see about using them at Hard Rock at Oceans later this year.

Possibly unrelated, but used the Delta Air app to check in twice recently and would use it again, and recommend it.

I know. But even some of the major chains still make you check in at a desk. It fucking takes forever for something so basic. They already have my info. Give me a key and a fucking room number. 1-2 minutes.

zzyzzx says

If it means less annoying kids in hotels, then I guess it's all good.

That's debatable. I'd say it's annoying/lazy parents and not the kids fault. You wouldn't notice my kids at a hotel or resort. They'd be in deep shit if they caused a problem with another guest. I get your sentiment though. Most parents now just let their kids do whatever the fuck they want when traveling one time a year. My kids complain about other kids on flights. They're at that level. Oldest just turned 12. It's a parenting problem, not a kid problem.

Not a brag, but I have 3 foreign trips in 2(ish) months coming up. 90% of people that travel it's a one off big trip every 2-3 years. If that. When you do it a lot you know who hasn't done it. Kids don't know any better if you haven't trained them. I could drop my kids unattended at Midway or O'hare and they could get to their gate and flight 100%. Pop their headphones on and chill. I'm confident they could figure out arrival as well.

https://news.yahoo.com/too-many-rich-people-bought-205754619.html

Too Many Rich People Bought Airbnbs. Now They’re Sitting Empty

WookieMan says

That's debatable. I'd say it's annoying/lazy parents and not the kids fault. You wouldn't notice my kids at a hotel or resort. They'd be in deep shit if they caused a problem with another guest. I get your sentiment though. Most parents now just let their kids do whatever the fuck they want when traveling one time a year. My kids complain about other kids on flights. They're at that level. Oldest just turned 12. It's a parenting problem, not a kid problem.

I agree completely. But if I'm going to a hotel with intent to use the pool, I'm going to want to go to one with an adult only pool anyway. Like the one at the Water Club at the Borgata Atlantic City.

zzyzzx says

https://news.yahoo.com/too-many-rich-people-bought-205754619.html

Too Many Rich People Bought Airbnbs. Now They’re Sitting Empty

Yes, they will likely lower rates as 2021 rates were sky high for renting vacation homes. Can't hurt to lower rates to reduce vacancy.

Better to rent at lower rates to make a slight profit or just break even then to keep empty.

.

ad says

Better to rent at lower rates to make a slight profit or just break even then to keep empty

Clearly you have not been listening to some of Louis Rossmann's commentary on NYC vacancies and pricing.

zzyzzx says

Clearly you have not been listening to some of Louis Rossmann's commentary on NYC vacancies and pricing.

Thank you for the feedback. I'll check into that. I did read this though:

"More than 60,000 Rent-Stabilized Apartments Are Now Vacant — and Tenant Advocates Say Landlords Are Holding Them for ‘Ransom’
The number of empty regulated apartments nearly doubled between 2020 and 2021, a state memo obtained by THE CITY shows."

https://www.thecity.nyc/housing/2022/10/19/23411956/60000-rent-stabilized-apartments-vacant-warehousing-nyc-landlords-housing

.

zzyzzx says

Clearly you have not been listening to some of Louis Rossmann's commentary on NYC vacancies and pricing.

Rossmann talks about this on his show: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-10-31/us-small-business-rent-delinquency-rates-rise-sharply-in-october

I will finish watching his show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=mCycDJ4BxwI

I read this in the Bloomberg: "More Than a Third of US Small Businesses Couldn’t Pay All Their Rent in October" and I wonder if Biden's economic statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, etc. are all bullshit. I wonder if they are going to look a lot worse starting after this midterm election.

Enough investors and traders see a major downturn ahead and ignore the Biden admin economic propaganda.

Stock market is the true or better economic barometer. That's why Google is down 43%, Amazon is down 52%, and Apple also is down 25%. Advertisers have been cutting back from spending on Youtube, etc. and consumers cutting back on Amazon purchase and less are buying iPhones, Apple iPads, etc.

.

How is AWS doing? It costs 10X the competition, and is going to take a hit at some point.

I couldn't imagine our company or the 3rd party platform companies we integrate with discarding AWS without hiring more and it would take years.

Hotel corporations create additional buildings and units without affecting residential supply and demand. They add to an area. They create jobs and always make a positive impact. Even if they go out of business, a building remains, that may be renovated and turned into residential units. This is done without driving up housing prices to unacceptable levels. Hotels themselves do not affect residential house prices.

No offense but at this point, every day people bragging about how smart they are, because they can borrow money to mortgage a house make money on AIR-BNB really bothers me. These AIR-BNB motivated purchases gobble up the supply of existing homes and apartment units - for renting purposes. Far more existing units are gobbled up vs. new units being built in respect to AIR-BNB. And people are not selling their homes/units when they can rent them out on AIR-BNB further restricting the supply of additional units, driving up the prices.

Why? So people can sit back on their lazy asses and collect rents without working, inventing, creating, facilitating, improving, solving, contributing or doing anything. It's called parasite economics and it really bothers me.

I can't comment on this thread because I'm emotionally compromised when it comes to this subject.

Michael Cooke says

These AIR-BNB motivated purchases gobble up the supply of existing homes and apartment units - for renting purposes. Far more existing units are gobbled up vs. new units being built in respect to AIR-BNB. And people are not selling their homes/units when they can rent them out on AIR-BNB further restricting the supply of additional units, driving up the prices.

Why? So people can sit back on their lazy asses and collect rents without working, inventing, creating, facilitating, improving, solving, contributing or doing anything. It's called parasite economics and it really bothers me.

I can't comment on this thread because I'm emotionally compromised when it comes to this subject.

Very true, as I was looking at how AirBnB not only has an affect on a tourist town like Panama City Beach, FL but also on towns like Buena Vista, CO an Salida, CO.

And these small towns like Buena Vista have a working class housing crisis; that is the main reason they can't get enough help for their local businesses.

With Panama City Beach fortunately its different, since there are nearby cities like Panama City and Springfield that have more affordable housing.

That is not the case with Colorado mountain towns like Buena Vista due to various challenges or factors like geography/geology, water availability, etc.

Granted, I knew when all those beach condo towers (over 20 stories) were being built in Panama City Beach back in the late 1990s, that at least 90% of them would be vacation rentals.

/
.

Airbnb's are just illegal hotels.

just_passing_through says

I couldn't imagine our company or the 3rd party platform companies we integrate with discarding AWS without hiring more and it would take years.

I was comparing AWS to other cloud providers

Right, but you can't just 'switch'. I left out that all of our customers use AWS as well. I've never worked anywhere that didn't just try a cursory try-out of anything else and I haven't see that in about 4 years.

But perhaps you're thinking of non-developer cloud stuff. When I think of aws I think of aws cli / api etc.

Then again I'm in biotech so who knows what devs at other types of companies use.

If you don't use api gateway and vpcs/nats then aws is reasonably priced.

mell says

If you don't use api gateway and vpcs/nats then aws is reasonably priced.

Running a database on AWS is expensive.

Booger says

mell says

If you don't use api gateway and vpcs/nats then aws is reasonably priced.

Running a database on AWS is expensive.

Any specific ones? Can't talk much for rds/aurora otmr anything self hosted, i.e. dedicated ec2 instance, but you can run a midsized company on auto scaled dynamodb for less than 5k / month, no db admin needed. Granted dynamo db is rather simplistic, but you can always work around its limitations and it forces you to keep it simple. Plus the event streams are nice

https://www.wsj.com/articles/airbnb-cleaning-fees-rates-departure-11667779247

Airbnb to Make Cleaning Fees Clearer on Searches After Customer Complaints

https://nypost.com/2022/11/04/nyc-proposes-strict-airbnb-registration-rules-to-take-effect-in-january/

NYC proposes strict Airbnb registration rules to take effect in January

zzyzzx says

/

Fuck AirBnB and Fuck Joe Biden !

/

Exactly - it's already a horrific surprise for AirBnB when the price nearly doubles right before your eyes.

Patrick says

Exactly - it's already a horrific surprise for AirBnB when the price nearly doubles right before your eyes.

We use it on family trips as I've said. Never had a problem just one shitty unit one time. Adding a 3rd kid has fucked up the hotel room thing. We need adjoining rooms and as the kids are getting older they don't want to be in the same room as mom and dad anyway and the feeling is mutual.

The fees are retarded. The taxes are even more retarded. My fucking property, I can do what I want with it. Airbnb and VRBO are an MLS type system/database. They provide a service that out of pocket costs them "maybe" $5 annually per listing. The fees they charge is exorbitant. Always search the property name if it has one. Odds are you'll save hundreds if not thousands if you're booking a big house.

WookieMan says

The taxes are even more retarded.

It's not the owners that want to charge that. They are even higher in Maui - over 17%. State Transient Accommodations Tax, State General Excise Tax and last year Maui threw in a county General Excise Tax.

The cleaning fee looks high vs. what I charge on VRBO for ocean front condo: 150.

However, because taxes are on gross rents even though I pass the cleaning fee on to the customer I still lose money on it due to taxes. I also pay taxes on the taxes.

Yeah, the platforms take their cut too - way too much for way too little.

just_passing_through says

It's not the owners that want to charge that. They are even higher in Maui - over 17%. State Transient Accommodations Tax, State General Excise Tax and last year Maui threw in a county General Excise Tax.

I understand. I'm on your side as a vacation renter and potential owner of one regarding taxes. It screws both parties over, owner and renter.

There's got to be a way around it. Like signing a 6 month lease that is able to be cancelled at any time. A lot of trust would be involved with randoms, but you could lower your rate and probably get close to 90-100% occupancy because you'd be the cheapest game going. Not sure if people have tried this, but seems logical to me. You can have a separate agreement that states the day they have to leave. As long as you have a long term lease agreement, I'm uncertain of how the government could tax it. Otherwise they need to tax all landlords at the same rate as hotels and vacation rentals.

just_passing_through says

WookieMan says

The taxes are even more retarded.

It's not the owners that want to charge that. They are even higher in Maui - over 17%. State Transient Accommodations Tax, State General Excise Tax and last year Maui threw in a county General Excise Tax.

The cleaning fee looks high vs. what I charge on VRBO for ocean front condo: 150.

However, because taxes are on gross rents even though I pass the cleaning fee on to the customer I still lose money on it due to taxes. I also pay taxes on the taxes.

Yeah, the platforms take their cut too - way too much for way too little.

Shit like this is why I've been going to Fiji for my beach vacatios fix for the last 5-6 years. Still love Hawaii but for a family with kids the value is not there.

RWSGFY says

Shit like this is why I've been going to Fiji for my beach vacatios fix for the last 5-6 years. Still love Hawaii but for a family with kids the value is not there.

Fiji is a fucking flight for me from the Midwest. Best case airfare shopping I'm at $4-5k for 5 tickets. I can fly to the Caribbean for under $500 to any location for all 5 of us. I do want to go to Fiji or Southeast Asia though. Easier for the west coast folks.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AirBnB/comments/yt3kxv/help_please_my_guest_is_a_prostitute_giving/

Help please. My guest is a prostitute giving services from my apartment

Off course I cant know for sure, but I received complaints from building administration that she is receiving 5-6 male visitors per night.

WookieMan says

RWSGFY says

Shit like this is why I've been going to Fiji for my beach vacatios fix for the last 5-6 years. Still love Hawaii but for a family with kids the value is not there.

Fiji is a fucking flight for me from the Midwest.

So is Hawaii.

Booger says

https://www.reddit.com/r/AirBnB/comments/yt3kxv/help_please_my_guest_is_a_prostitute_giving/

Help please. My guest is a prostitute giving services from my apartment

Off course I cant know for sure, but I received complaints from building administration that she is receiving 5-6 male visitors per night.

CHARGE MORE!!!

Eric Holder says

So is Hawaii.

Domestic. $11.40pp to Hawaii. International fees are killer. Just booked a flight to Phoenix for $5.60 one way in late January. Don't have my plans laid out yet. Might fly up to Bozeman, MT after. No lodging or car. Food, golf, beer and snowboarding. I'm spoiled.

Would love to go to Fiji though. Need to explore that points realm. All this shit can be done for free basically. I'm a Caribbean guy though. Short flight. Minimal points. I do want to see the southern Pacific and Southeast Asia.

Hotel corporations create additional buildings and units without affecting residential supply and demand. They add to an area. They create jobs and always make a positive impact. Even if they go out of business, a building remains, that may be renovated and turned into residential units. This is done without driving up housing prices to unacceptable levels. Hotels themselves do not affect residential house prices.

No offense but at this point, every day people bragging about how smart they are, because they can borrow money to mortgage a house make money on AIR-BNB really bothers me. These AIR-BNB motivated purchases gobble up the supply of existing homes and apartment units - for renting purposes. Far more existing units are gobbled up vs. new units being built in respect to AIR-BNB. And people are not selling their homes/units when they can rent them out on AIR-BNB further restricting the supply of additional units, driving up the prices.

Why? So people can sit back on their lazy asses and collect rents without working, inventing, creating, facilitating, improving, solving, contributing or doing anything. It's called parasite economics and it really bothers me.

I can't comment on this thread because I'm emotionally compromised when it comes to this subject.

No need to be upset or jealous of those who borrowed to buy their AirBnB units in the last 2-3 years. Soon many of them will get foreclosed due to cashflow difficulties. In the process, between the buy and the liquidation sale, they will essentially have provided liquidity for releasing those units from previous owners who wanted high sale prices, funds for renovating the units, and buyers who will want low prices after foreclosure and liquidation.

Hotel buildings can not be easily converted into apartment buildings due to most hotels not being extended-stay hotels with kitchens. The floor plans are entirely wrong, plus electricals and the plumbing. The high rise buildings efficient for hotels are also not desirable for most residential purposes. Not sure why you think hotels provide jobs whereas AirBnB etc. units requiring the same cleaning and booking would not result in jobs. If anything, the latter would result in more free labor, instead of unionized labor and/or illegal labor, both of which are essentially forms of unfree / semi-slavery labor due to economy of scale of hotels making unionization and slave-labor trafficking profitable. There is a reason why the governor of the ganster state of IL is from a family hotel fortune. The need for building hotels and tearing down hotels as a region's tourism fluctuates is quite a waste.

Besides remote-working allowing travel while working remotely, a big part of the drive for building/house owners to turn to short-term rental in the last 2-3 years is due to rent payment moratorium imposed in many cities and states. Instead of letting dead-beats wear the building and use utility while not paying, renting to travelers who pay make a lot of sense. Compared to long-term rental, short-term rental is actually a lot of work for the owner, so it's not at all "sit back on their lazy asses and collect rents without working."

For some regions of the country that have a lot of old housing stock (while suffering from housing shortage, like the Northeast), a big part of the problem is housing-stock vs. demand mismatch: a lot of the housing stock was built more than a century ago when typical households had many children so many bedrooms (typically 4 or more) whereas today's typical household only requires 1 or 2 bedrooms. In many locations, there are literally laws against more than 3 unrelated people sharing an apartment; plus section-8 housing where there might have been children years ago but now the single mother continues to stay in a 4BR house after the children have grown up and left simply because she is only responsible for paying a pittance if she stays with Section-8 paying the rest, whereas if she moves she would have to pay much more out of her own pocket even for a much smaller apartment. So it is a situation of both housing shortage and under-utilization of existing housing stock taking place at the same time, largely due to government regulations. The AirBnB wave in some ways provided the incentive for owners and/or new owners after purchase to convert some of that housing stock into extended stay BnB housing, which make them closer to what 1BR, 2BR and studio units are like. In many cases also utilizing parts of existing buildings that could not be legally rented out long-term, such as basement, attic, guest suites, etc.. The AirBnB wave provided the incentive to turn them into habitable space while avoiding the local drugged and/or criminal population that would otherwise be attracted to sub-prime housing (which normally is a big reason why landlords don't find it worthwhile to finish those subprime parts of the house in the past; providing housing service is not just "sit back on their lazy asses and collect rents without working" either; there is a lot of executive decision making that can not have bad consequences handed off to shareholders or tax-payers while taking a golden parachute like running hotel corporation or public housing project). To the extent that many government bureaucrats got involved in buying AirBnB's in the past half decade, that also give them some training on how to survive and prosper in the competitive economy instead of their habit of "sitting back on their lazy asses and collect" economic rent via government sinecures.

WookieMan says

Eric Holder says

So is Hawaii.

Domestic. $11.40pp to Hawaii. International fees are killer. Just booked a flight to Phoenix for $5.60 one way in late January.

These are bus ticket prices. You aren't taking Greyhound, are you? I mean, it's possible for Phoenix but could be tough for Hawaii...