Air Bnb has ruined my life

[itsafan]

There is literally no way out of this situation 😢 other than for us to give up our jobs and relocate in the hope that we can find new jobs and a place to live. There are literally no other rentals available in the area even if we could afford the rents. A mortgage is out of the question as we would need at least a hundred grand deposit.
There are at least 1000 properties listed on Airbnb within a 5 mile radius, many of them would be ideal but the rents on them are extortionate and aimed at tourists we are talking at least a grand a week.
We have lived here for years in a residential complex (well before Airbnb and booking even got popular) we have jobs here and friends here and a life here. It is on the whole fine for 9 months of the year mainly local people living around us who all respect that we are living and just trying to survive.
Then the Airbnb people turn up and every week it’s new people above us below us next to us. The noise is horrendous and probably the worst problem. Being woken at all hours with people rolling suitcases along floors, lifts going up and down, shouting in the corridors and doors banging. It just goes on and on like this for months.
My anxiety with it all is now so bad that I’m having to take medication. The noise just feels constant.
Do people even realise when they are booking Airbnb that these are people’s homes that they are disrupting? Why don’t people go to hotels anymore ?
So yeah there is a huge housing crisis due to the airbnb situation and I’m just a small person in a situation that I can’t change other than to leave somewhere I call home. I suppose my AIBU is am I being unreasonable to feel like a company has ruined my life ?

Your home should be a sanctuary OP so I do feel for you.

We bucked the trend by buying a house that had for the previous few years been an AirBnB in a seaside town. Our new neighbours were SO grateful when they knew we were going to live there full time, be part of the community and not keep arriving with wheely cases at all hours squealing and getting pissed in the hot tub.

Ironically, the reason we moved from our previous home in a city centre was because the area had become a 24/7 noisy, transient, filthy hell due to the conversion of multiple office blocks into student accommodation.

It seems wherever you live you are at the mercy of people who want to make money at the expense of the quality of life of local people.

I feel your pain, OP. I don't have it so bad, but since our neighbour's elderly mother died she's marketed the annexe the mother lived in as AirBnB and was complaining to me the other day that she can't keep up with all the bookings, cleaning, linen etc. She has had guests most weeks since the start of the year and has been almost fully booked since mid-June. It's a small double bedroom with a small shower room off it and a small seating area with two armchairs, a short run of basic kitchen units. Two burners, an air fryer, a kettle, a toaster.

Because we live in a desirable area near beaches she is able to charge £120 a night, more at weekends, so she's getting £3k+ a month on top of her other earnings and on top of having inherited from her mum. Fortunately she's there much of the time and so the guests are relatively quiet, though they all want to barbecue and use the fire pit, so we have to have our windows shut much of the time. My neighbour is sick of all the smoke too, though, and says she'll remove the BBQ and fire pit at the end of the summer season.

It always seems to be the wealthy people who are raking it in from making others' lives a misery.

Some holidaymakers are so inconsiderate. We’ve stayed in Airbnb’s several times and would never dream of causing distress to the other residents. We also own a flat (UK) it’s in the leasehold that we aren’t allowed to use it as a holiday let, it’s in a purpose built block which was built in 1996, very forward thinking of them.

I think it’s time for local authorities to step in and reduce the amount of properties used for Airbnb, tourists can’t book them if they aren’t there.

Some Holiday regions in the UK charge double Council Tax on holiday let properties, that’s deterring a few investor’s and causing some owners to sell up.

I love the freedom of a self catering property. We stayed in a beautiful traditional apartment in Valencia and one of the neighbours had band practice at midnight, we wondered why there were earplugs on the side tables 🤣, then you could hear the guy snoring, still enjoyed the holiday though, revenge on the tourists 😝

👏👏👏brilliantly put @Tabitha005.
There seems to be so many more assholes everywhere too. In fact there are 100%.

This

The level of disruption that you refer to cannot be acceptable surely?

Yes, that’s it , every single hotel is in that situation. No hotels to book anywhere.

We hate hotels. We prefer cooking facilities etc and for families it’s more affordable

Never stayed in an Airbnb though

Really it seems your issue is tourists. Tourism brings a lot of money into the economy
People moved into investing in rentals etc because private pensions are unpredictable and if there’s a crash you lost it completely
If pensions were backed up by the tax payer like Govn pensions are perhaps we’d all feel more secure in our future

I agree having empty properties for most of the year is creating a lot of problems and shouldn’t be allowed though
I don’t agree that tourists are the problem

YANBU the air b&b situation has become ridiculous. In Edinburgh it’s incredibly difficult for people who are working in the city to find properties to rent. The communal doors are covered in these stupid key boxes. It’s destroying the city and that’s before you get to the disturbance it causes for permanent residents.

It comes down to what it always does. Money and greed.

Why do people choose airbnb - because it's cheaper and because when you have young kids access to a kitchen is a godsend.

But OP, if I were you I'd move regardless because you have stated that you won't be able to buy a house there, and I'd want to own my own place at some point.

Another side of AirBnB that I see in our seaside town is people who inherit a parent's house and then let it out on AirBnB without doing anything to it to make it appealing. I have to wonder what people think when they arrive for their stay and find the place was last decorated in 1988 and the three piece suite was chosen in the year Chas and Di got married.

Hotels have to pay staff. They have to have cleaners, change bed linen, provide breakfast, etc etc of course they can't compete with Jen and Bob's flat!

You’re still contributing to a housing crisis. Doesn’t really matter if you don’t shriek in the garden.

OP I do think the spanish government are going to have to take some kind of action around airbnb. It’s tough though in holiday resorts where there is very little year round rental.

I have stayed in a couple of places like that in Brittany! Some of the furniture and ornaments had to be seen to be believed.

I can only imagine your pain . We are on holiday in an Airbnb it’s on a complex but not only holiday I don’t think . Most villas are full of families with associated noise but it’s on and off but reasonable ( I’d be able to live here !) but one property was let go an all male group who partied hard ( music so loud we couldn’t here our tv and could hear through mouse cancelling headphones) for 4 days ( 10 am- 3am ) any request to be quieter resulted in increased noise .
nearly broke me so can’t imagine how you feel .

we use apartments and villas due to family size and make up and the fact I hate pdolle around me . I do always try to be considerate and live as I would at home. I can see the argument against Airbnb though

I wonder what country you live in. In UK, Scotland anyway, there are regs relating to late night noise etc. Does your city have some such regs relating to Airbnb? Basically, as others have suggested, you should think of moving even though it might be tricky.

Also, on a practical level, invest in a really good pair of earplugs, put a heavy rug or curtain at your front door etc.for sound proofing....

Is part of the problem an increase of tourism overall in line with an increasing population.

Overall there is just a shortage of property full stop and it’s ever more expensive to buy or rent.

Airbnb is just a platform. It’s like being annoyed at EBay.

@pinkstripeycat are you a Spanish mortgage advisor? If you are could you message me please ? Thanks

Ah, nice one. Get the dig in about "immigrants'. You'll be glad to hear that the OP is not in the UK so your Faragesque opinion is not relevant.

Plus, they pay taxes. I really hate this modern feeling of entitlement, that everybody deserves a fabulous holiday with a bedroom each and a nice cosy sitting room - and so what if that means they're making life intolerable for other people. What happened to people who couldn't afford / didn't want hotels going camping, or to a caravan park? Two weeks overseas in a big villa with a private pool is not a human right, ffs.

Honestly I think air b&b should be banned. If you want to go on holiday, then pay the hotels or bed and breakfast places and leave others to live in peace. i have never rented one nor would I.

@Nichebitch that’s great. The problem is so many have them already granted and I don’t think they can be revoked although I’m not sure on that.

You’re conflating the cost of hotels with the housing crisis that’s been caused, in part, in many communities by companies like Airbnb.

The cost of staying in a hotel is what it is - it’s not driven by hotels being greedy or purposely choosing to be more expensive than an Airbnb stay.

The problem is that the exponential growth of individuals and commercial enterprise buying up HOUSING (because that’s what it absolutely is) and turning it into holiday or short-term let accommodation has contributed to people having to leave areas where they have jobs, family and support networks. It also means that local employers aren’t able to recruit locally and businesses suffering because the revenue generated by Airbnb and other ‘homes-as-holiday-let’ businesses doesn’t come back into the local economy.

We ALL have a part to play in considering how tourism is contributing to housing inequality - as well as ecology, local resources and lots of other issues. But, from everything I see and hear related to tourism and holidaymaking, very, VERY few us actually do.

Jen and Bob also have to pay someone to clean and change bedlinen.

Airbnbs are very expensive now due to the 15% or so service charge (it used to be a fraction of that) so hotels are often the same price.