Tag Archives: terrible airbnb host

False Advertising Keeps Guests out of Beach House

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The ad claimed that it was a private room with its own bathroom close to shops and the beach. Upon arrival it was evident that the host had just rented out one of his bedrooms and everything else was shared. Furthermore, he had other tenants staying in the same house. The bedroom was so tiny my wife and I could not even move. The ad claimed the beach was a 3-minute drive; the beach was so far from the place that I presume you need a 10-minute car drive to get there. It was definitely not walking distance. After about 30 minutes my wife and I decided we couldn’t stay there so we left and when I contacted the host and explained why we left (false advertising) he refused to refund me any of my money.

In summary:

  • The smallest room I have ever seen.
  • This was not a private bedroom; everything was shared
  • The host was completely unreasonable in terms of the cancellation policy. I now realize why he has a strict cancellation policy. I am sure most people would leave after seeing the place… total disaster.

Host cancelled at checkin, airbnb was useless and didn’t allow me to review her

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I booked a trip to Boston for a convention about 3 months out. Hotels in the area had convention rates that made it affordable to stay in a downtown hotel but we wanted an interesting Boston experience. Well we got one. The host cancelled as we were standing outside trying to check in. My phone pinged with the alert, the host chose to ignore my repeated phone calls and attempts to contact her. Her explanation was a single email stating that she could only accommodate one person and not two but we were renting her whole apartment that is advertised for couples or small families. So 4:30pm on a Thursday, major convention downtown and a triple header Yankees vs Red Sox weekend. All hotels booked for at least part of the 4 nights at rates 5 times the airbnb place (all convention rates no longer available), and all the replacements that airbnb could find us were at least 3 times the cost and nowhere near downtown (had to be at the convention 7 am so staying close was important to us). We had to stay in multiple places to piece together the trip and spent a ton of money.  I get that hosts are human and things will happen but Airbnb has no legitimate system in place to help travelers when a host doesn’t honor their commitment. And they don’t allow you to review the host if you didn’t actually stay at their place, so their star rating and reviews mean nothing. Never rent from Phoebe Fleming at 63 Melcher st Boston MA, and probably don’t ever book a trip with airbnb that you aren’t prepared to have go totally awry!