I sometimes use booking.com rather than airbnb if I just need a single night somewhere and am not bothered about it being "lovely".
Last summer I had a bad experience where a host cancelled at the last minute and mucked up my summer plans, but I coped.
This summer I just have a single night booked somewhere where I am going to see a friend. I booked it about 5 weeks ago and I have just had a message from the host saying "please can you cancel the booking as there will now be building work because of a leak".
The booking is still over 6 weeks away.
Tbh I doubt the "leak" story and suspect that actually they want to take a 3 day booking from someone else and don't want my 1 night booking.
Do hosts get punished/fined by booking.com when they muck people about like this?
I don't want to cancel my booking, I need a night's accommodation in that city on that night.