I booked a house recently. I don’t want to name names or share links, because I don’t want Airbnb retaliation. The host sent me a convoluted message about the cleaning lady but she’d try to fix it to make sure it was ready. She then followed up with a convoluted message about how she couldn’t have it cleaned, and now there was some other problem that would prevent us from staying (again, I’m avoiding details). My guess is that she added this new issue because she didn’t want me to say “Hey, no worries, we’ll find a way to clean it and change the sheets.”
She asked me to cancel the reservation, which I did not. I made her do it on her end. Of course, I thought this was all suspicious. I’m a person of color. I had my white wife attempt a reservation at the same place on the same days, an hour after the cancellation (we added two extra days to the end to make it slightly different). Guess what? She approved the reservation. And contacted my wife. Airbnb was informed, but we have no idea what happened. She’s a Superhost.
This is sickening and against all rules. Why are you being vague about it? Please post an update of the outcome.
You did the right thing by making the host cancel.
Airbnb takes discrimination very seriously and they don’t retaliate against guests that report discrimination in good faith. If all of the communication was on the Airbnb platform, they will investigate.
The host’s behavior does sound suspicious, but your story that “avoids the details” is a bit weak, too.
What happened with your wife’s’ reservation? Did you show up, or plan to show up? I hope you did (or do) and if you confirm your suspicions, you get the host banned.