Living Next to an Illegal Airbnb in NOLA

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I live next to an illegal short-term rental Airbnb. In New Orleans you cannot have an Airbnb in a residential neighborhood unless the owner lives on the property permanently. Yet the city of New Orleans does not enforce these laws. Therefore there are many, many illegal Airbnb’s in our residential neighborhoods. I live next to one of these “party houses”. The owner lives in New York and has never lived on the property. He lost his short-term rental permit in 2019, and I have been trying to get the property closed ever since.

The pictures of the property are fake, and the reviews are fake. Attached is a real review of the property which the owner has taken down. When I contacted Airbnb they told me to speak to the owner. He has been very nasty to me. His guests throw beer cans at my house next door, broke my fence trying to climb over it to get a ball, and they have loud parties into the early morning hours.

When a real customer is disgusted with the property and does not want to stay because it is not clean, nor meets any of the description, he does not give them their money back. He has thrown guests out because he has others checking in. He has seven listings on Airbnb when there are only two properties. I live next to one and the other is in the French Quarter, which is totally illegal.

Worst Airbnb Host Ever: Kicked Out for ‘Party’

Save yourself the time, money, and joy you will be stripped from. I’ve traveled around the world, stayed in hotels, hostels, and Airbnbs but have never in my life had such a terrible experience. What happened? Grab some popcorn, because this is a long one.

In all my years on Airbnb, I’ve only ever received five-star reviews from my hosts. Why is that? Because I’m a respectful, young adult that was raised with a sound moral compass.

The situation: I booked a stay at an Airbnb home in San Diego to take a break from work and relax for the weekend. The host had a pool, big backyard, and a nice home so it was the perfect scenario.

Little did I know that I was walking into a trap. From the moment I walked up to the house I was being watched and listened to on the ring camera and backyard cameras. Not only that, but within an hour of me being there, I get a text from the host stating that she was concerned because there was “a lot of movement” in the front yard. What was the movement? Myself and my friends unloading our groceries and bags going back and forth from the car.

Now I understand that hosts may get paranoid from time to time so I sent her a very nice text letting her know that we were simply unloading our cars. I even offered to give her a call so she could talk to me and have peace of mind that that was the case. After speaking with her for about 15-20 minutes, the host was supposedly relaxed.

The next day, we planned to sit by the pool, play corn hole, prepare some BBQ, and listen to some music from a small portable speaker. Just about what you do when you’re on vacation. To my surprise, I get a message from the host telling me that she got a noise complaint from the neighbors because we’re having a “party” and have too many guests. Keep in mind, I had let her know that during the day, we would have an additional two couples (four people) join us to hang out that were local.

If that’s a party, then don’t even bother bringing your family here because your kids might get arrested for having too much fun in the pool. Not only that, but I find it disturbing that we were constantly being watched through the camera. It felt invasive and weird. I felt like we were walking on egg shells the entire time instead of enjoying our stay.

I’ll finish with this. The host sent me a message on Airbnb mid afternoon telling me that we have to leave the property due to the complaint. No warning, Airbnb doesn’t contact me (which they have to according to their policies), nothing. So now we’re stranded in San Diego.

We end up having to book a hotel and still proceed to clean the house and grab our luggage so that it’s left in better shape that it was before. Our entire trip was ruined and on top of everything, the host is requesting $800 for “extra people and linens.”

P.S. She told us that she isn’t allowed to host vacation rentals in her neighborhood… weird.

Airbnb Neighbors Make Nightmare of a Summer in Palomares

I bought a house on a very quiet street in Palomares, Almeria, Spain. I was told the house right next to me was empty because the owner lived in Barcelona. I should have asked more questions.

My first night in the new house was a nightmare. Eight young men were staying in the house next door as an Airbnb for three days and were determined to create their own “Dream Beach” (a yearly electronic music festival in the neighborhood) with loud music, constant screaming and of course much drinking. I had to flee to a hotel.

The owner of the house responded and promised to “talk to them,” yet this made no difference. This nightmare continued throughout the summer, with some reasonable guests in between. The problem is that the house is very big — it sleeps nine. The noise goes through the entire street because the main terrace of the house is on the frontside.

This Airbnb next door has made my house uninhabitable. You cannot have any guests overnight. The worst thing is the uncertainty. Every time a new group arrives, you are worrying how they will be: would the weekend be bearable, or would it be a nightmare? You typically know in the first few minutes.

The owner tried to prevent me from filing a “denuncia” and appeased me by saying that the house was already sold and that September would be the last month of renting. This turned out to be not true and the house continues to list on Airbnb as a “Superhost” property.

I don’t know now to end this nightmare. I have started a petition with signatures of all affected neighbors but I don’t know where to go with it. The house has a license. I am trying to have that license taken away. I am trying everything. I am desperate.

Get a Good Set of Headphones for your Airbnb Neighbors

I’ve lived in my house for almost 20 years now. One by one, all of the neighboring properties were purchased by the same owner. All of them became Airbnb rentals, and because of the same owner and close proximity, frat parties are a frequent happening.

This has reliably happened for over two years now. They’ll bounce from house to house, the traveling jamboree. Trash scattered all out across the lawns, sometimes 12 cars rammed into the lawn, street, wherever they fit, other times a Greyhound-sized bus drops them off. The stereos blast well into the next morning, sometimes until 3:00 AM. Not just having fun loud: it’s rattle-the-toilet-seats-in-my-house loud.

The local community gets a $100 per night fee from the owners for any Airbnb in the town, so they’ll do nothing to stop it. The police will get things to stop for the night if they are called, usually when there’s illegal fireworks or some drunk guests start inconveniencing the golfers. It’s a neighborhood that is built around a golf course, and because each player pays over $10,000/year in membership fees, they actually have some sort of pull with the town’s “safety patrol,” but that’s about the only control there is.

Multiple times I’ve been late to work because overloaded driveways across the street would cause them to park across mine and block my car in. In addition to my daily driver, I have an old V-8 project car that has open exhaust, which happened to be the car that they didn’t block in. I retaliated by driving that to work instead of driving over my own lawn or pounding on a door for 20 minutes until someone answered. I gave it a few revs for the enjoyment of the sleeping hungover partiers. This was a 6:00 AM Saturday shift.

Sunday morning I woke up to find it pelted with eggs and my lawn had the night’s beer bottles thrown onto it. Lesson learned: I blame myself for that one and am glad that I wasn’t greeted by 24+ big angry guys half my age. The only way to combat this is to sit tight with a solid set of noise cancelling headphones. I’m really hoping the government decides that it could make money putting taxes and fees into this, that’ll hurt the profitability enough to discourage hosting six houses at once.

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Chicago Airbnb Listing Gone Horribly Wrong

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Even though I thought my host was attentive in the beginning, she dropped the hammer when it came to my noise complaint. She basically said that I was a light sleeper and that the refund policy is strict. I did feel that this was in bad taste. I don’t expect a full refund but I did want to check out early and not stay the month that cost over $2,000. I was disappointed in this since I approached the matter with kindness and gratitude for her attentiveness.

I lived in the downtown Chicago area for 15 years and came back for work and had to stay a month. This was the loudest building I’ve ever encountered in all my years of living there. I hate leaving negative reviews but the description is inaccurate and the host blamed me for not reading it. Airbnb looks out only for hosts since it looks like what’s in the listing is the golden rule (you will be held to this very strictly).

Here’s what was different from the posting. It was actually a studio, not a one bedroom. The listing said, and I quote, “Due to the apartment’s prime location, you may encounter some city noise, nearby train.”

That’s all it says. I’ve taken time to outline what this really looks like below. No CO2 detector as indicated. The smoke detector also did not appear to work (I saw no blinking lights) and it was loosely hanging by wires. TV remotes didn’t work. There were dirty walls with holes and splash marks and a dirty downstairs area with trash everywhere. No ethernet as promised or indoor fireplace as listed. No dedicated workspace as listed. There are two pop up countertop areas and one was broken. The other was not a “dedicated work area.” I tried to setup a workstation there but could not.

Here is the truth about the noise. There are multiple trains that run right past the building all day every day. The orange line, green line, and red line (underground). You hear every train announcement and the screeching and rattling. There are also multiple sets of tracks. Don’t forget the Metra train whistle that you can also hear. It basically sounds like you are living at the train station.

You also have the regular street noise which includes people shouting (and cursing), music, car mufflers, buses, horns, and sirens. I can even hear people skateboarding down the sidewalk. Roosevelt is an extremely busy street that connects to Michigan avenue. It’s like staying next to an expressway.

The building in itself is noisy and the lobby area is pretty run down. I heard loud music blasting at late hours and other hours in the day. There is also the sound of screeching chairs and the smell of marijuana that comes into the unit. I work from home so I had to spend a lot of time in the unit. If you are coming to sightsee (which you currently can’t because of COVID) and won’t be home often, then it could work. I myself had to sleep with noise-canceling headphones and constantly spray because of the smells wafting in.

To top it all off, the host basically accused me of vandalizing the unit and insisted that there was no damage before I got there. I had been there less than 24 hours when I sent her and Airbnb photos of the holes, scratches, and damaged smoke and CO2 detectors on top of the noise complaints.

I learned my lesson: report any and all damage right away. Because when issues start popping up, people will look for any way they can to make you pay the price. She also kept apologizing that I didn’t understand the listing and sent me screenshots of all of the good reviews. She then told me that her husband was a lawyer if I needed one. I was forced to leave the property because there were no working smoke or CO2 detectors and the noise. Airbnb customer service just said she did offer to fix it and expected me to continue to stay there and put my health and safety at risk.

Airbnb Party House Makes Resident Consider Moving

I live in a relatively quiet, residential neighborhood in Washington, D.C. Unfortunately, the house next to me is a year-round property used for rentals that caters to groups of 15+. Oddly enough, this is illegal in D.C., and the absent owner advertises how they use a legal loophole to get past this. The owner proudly states that you can sleep in”peace and quiet” in their rental, and “no parties or events” are allowed.

I am so fed up with the constant parties: the blaring music at 3:00 AM, the fighting, the screaming, and the disgusting lack of respect guests have towards their neighbors. Just last night in the midst of stay at home orders, a group took the liberty of renting the unit for a party and turned the music up. I’ve had to call the police numerous times; they are always prompt, courteous, and handle the situation.

Last night’s group decided to retaliate and begin screaming that the police can’t quiet them down. I’ve had to go to the patio numerous times to politely ask guests to quiet down over the last year. I’ve been cursed at, had beer cans thrown at me, and told that I’m inconsiderate because it’s 2:00 AM on a Monday and their group paid “good money” to be there.

The owner doesn’t care whatsoever. I realize that it was probably of no use, but I called the phone number for Airbnb, and the rep had to ask me multiple times to either move away from people in the room or turn down my music. I was in my bedroom with the windows shut and white noise machine running; it was the partygoers next door. I’m sad that it’s come to this, but I will most likely have to move from the home and neighborhood I’ve loved so dearly.

Pending Birth + COVID-19 + Airbnb = Stress

My wife and I have been living in an apartment inside a six-unit villa for 12 years now. Everyone else that lives here is an owner, except for the couple who bought the unit above us a couple of months ago.

The place was vacant and on the market for almost a year, which was great for us, but in saying that, we were delighted to meet the couple who bought the place, as we’re all friendly neighbours in the villa and look out for one another. Upon introducing myself, I kindly asked if they would be renting it out, or staying there themselves, to which they blatantly lied to my face saying it will be for them or family as they were yet to decide.

A couple of months went by. They frequent the place, often quite late to furnish the apartment, many times around midnight. It is around this time when the COVID-19 outbreak kicks into high gear and our state puts in strict rules and guidelines regarding isolation, interstate travel and social gatherings.

We didn’t even know it was an Airbnb until their very first guests mentioned it whilst on one of many loudspeaker calls on the balcony. The language these guys use would make a sailor weep. Every second word was either f*ck or c*nt.

It was during one of these loud and obnoxious phone calls that we overheard him say he had traveled from interstate and had to self-isolate for 14 days. We found this odd, as we had seen him out visiting the liquor store and take out restaurant around the corner just a few days earlier.

My wife is expecting our first child in under a week and we have been completely cut off from our friends, from our family and from our support network. Yet this asshole strolls about risking everyone in the community, laughing at the threat of a $1000 on the spot fine for breach of quarantine.

To top it off, this prick had two guests over last night, which is also against the rules that are needed to curb the spread of this virus. The blaring of Eminem and System of a Down at 11:00 PM is the least of my worries right now. The fact that this is the first “guest” is a worrying sign of things to come.

It’s not the dream we had when starting a new family. We now feel alienated in our own home. Screw the owner for lying to our face and not providing a phone number to contact her. Screw the asshole guests who aren’t taking this pandemic seriously and screw Airbnb. I shouldn’t have to feel petty about this.

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Monster Airbnb Next Door Ruining my Family’s Life

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Seven years ago my husband and I built our dream home in a nice neighborhood in Austin. When two large homes began construction on a single lot next door, we were bummed by how huge and close to us they were, but looked forward to having new neighbors in any case.

Once the homes were finished, we realized with horror that both were being used illegally as Airbnbs. Each home is nearly 3,000 square feet, five bedrooms, and hosts up to 14 people. Each unit has a hot tub that sits directly under our windows, less than twenty feet away from our home.

As soon as they began operating in October 2019, our lives were shattered. Groups of party goers began rotating through both units every weekend. Music, laughter, shouting and cursing came from both hot tubs at least once a week, usually more. A bachelor party brought prostitutes over and took turns having sex in the hot tub until 7:00 AM. Another group casually chatted at full volume about buying some cocaine for their party.

One of the units has two giant second-floor windows that directly overlook our property, including our outdoor spaces, and guests like to stand at those windows and watch us like we’re animals in a pen. If I were to list every instance of a disturbance, this post would be longer than the Old Testament.

Since October, we’ve filed 17 Code complaints, and called the police on five different occasions (though our police department is so understaffed, and noise complaints are so low-priority, they responded only once). We’ve written to our council member, neighborhood association, and exchanged several dozen emails with the Code Department.

After receiving multiple violations for operating illegally, and having their guests confronted by code officers, the investors applied for a license granted only to owner-occupied STRs, by claiming the units as their “primary residence”, and actually received them (for one). The Code Department admitted in an in-person meeting that they did not want to grant the license to these operators, and tried to find a way to deny it, but were forced to issue it according to regulations.

Today our nightmare continues. We can’t sleep in peace. Our privacy, comfort, health, and safety are completely compromised. I’m suffering anxiety-related health effects. We are at a point where either they stop hosting, or we will need to move. It’s terrifying to consider that we might actually lose our home over this, but the stress of living next to this nightmare is just not worth it.

I’ve been carpet-bombing Airbnb “neighbors” with complaints for months, but have received zero support. This week Airbnb actually “temporarily suspended” the listing, but the host just turned it back on immediately. When I asked Airbnb how this can qualify as a suspension, they said they can’t release details due to privacy reasons. We finally filed a case at the municipal court, and hope whatever comes of that succeeds in finally bringing us some relief.

Respect your Neighbors: Take Your Business Elsewhere

We moved into our neighborhood two years ago. We have dogs that bark, who we have always worked with and who we continue to work with. We always stand up and stop their aggression.

Our neighbors, who have never talked to us, let us have it tonight because they want to run an Airbnb in our neighborhood. They have let us know that they will call the cops, even with intermittent barking (which we address each and every time) because our daily lives disturb their guests.

We will not abuse or give up our dogs. We feel that they choose to run a business in a neighborhood. Therefore it is not our responsibility as neighbors to accommodate their business. Full disclosure: We run an Airbnb in another local neighborhood. We tell our guests that our neighbors live here and they don’t. This is not a hotel district.

Semiautomatic Shots Fired: Sounded Like A War Zone

Shots rang out in very close proximity to my home at approximately 10:35 PM, on the evening of January 31st. My wife and I heard a series of around fifteen rapid-fire gun reports that sounded like semiautomatic weapons discharge occurring just outside of my home. These reports occurred in rapid succession and extremely loud.

Shortly after the shots were fired, we heard a vehicle drive off to the south. We immediately called 911 to report the incident and were placed on hold for approximately three to five minutes until an operator answered. We described the sound of the gunshots and relayed our location to the operator.

We remained inside our home for approximately ten minutes, and when we heard no more activity outside we went out to look for any evidence of the gunshots. We noticed that there were some young people loitering on the sidewalk opposite a house. We also saw several other people leaving the house and driving off.

The street had over thirty cars parked up and down from the house when it occurred; it appeared that a large party had been going on. A neighbor said she saw over fifty underage teens at that party, and that they were drinking liquor.

After about twenty to thirty minutes, police subsequently responded to the incident and determined that multiple shots were fired across the street from the party house. This home has a history of loud, disruptive parties.

Around ten armed police officers responded to the scene. Numerous young adults were observed leaving the house after the shots were fired. These people drove away from the neighborhood, but we also observed numerous cars and trucks driving by the house, for about another hour.

We spoke with the drivers of a few of the cars and asked them if they were staying as rental guests at the house. All of them replied that they were not. Altogether, we estimate that around fifty cars drove by or were parked in the immediate vicinity of the party house immediately following the gunfire.

I was able to take photographs of several of the passing vehicles’ license plates and all of the vehicles parked on the street. The line of cars ranged around a third of the way down the block from the house in both directions.

One of the drivers who stopped in front of the house said he was looking for “Derik”. He had a heavy accent and he kept pointing to his cell phone, which had the name Derik and what looked like a GPS map displayed with the local neighborhood and the house.

I spoke with several of the people exiting the house and asked them if they were staying at that house. Not a single person I spoke with was actually staying there as a rental guest. They were all apparently there for a party.

Shell casings were found on the ground and the police requested that everyone remain in their homes. The police officers discovered shell casings at the foot of the driveway of my next-door neighbor, whose home sits directly across from the party house. By the shape of these casings, they appeared to have come from an AR-15 or a similar sized rifle.

My wife and I were very disturbed that this type of activity was occurring so close to our home, literally next door. This house has been a source of continually occurring disruption in the neighborhood.

Back on Friday, October 25th, I had heard loud noises coming from the vicinity east of my home. After going outside to investigate on that October night after midnight, I discovered that the noise was coming from the backyard of the home. I had noticed earlier that day that there were numerous cars parked outside of the home, so many that they had impeded traffic on the same street.

After receiving a message from the neighborhood watch block captain whose home sits across from the home, we continued in a discussion that lasted several days, gathering information about the disruptions occurring at that home we dubbed the “party house” due to ongoing unsupervised parties. I had a meeting with officials from the City of Albuquerque following the incident on October 25th but no action was taken because the city coordinator said there were too few police reports.

After the gunshot incident, my wife and I spoke with the neighbors across the street and also with the neighbors further east of them. I telephoned the next-door neighbor of the party house who also hosts an Airbnb rental and asked him if he knew what was going on or if he had heard the shots, but he told me that he was currently out of town.

One of the residents close to the party house captured the weapons report on their doorbell camera. Apparently the sound was close enough and loud enough to activate the ring recorder in the doorbell of the resident who was across the street from where the incident occurred. There were about fifteen shots fired.

The report was extremely loud, rapid-fire shots from what sounded like a semiautomatic weapon. Several neighbors have confirmed this. My wife was in the kitchen of our home only about 30 feet away from where those shots were fired and she was terrified about it. It sounded like a war zone in our neighborhood.

After the police arrived, we found shell casings on the ground which looked like possibly AR-15 or AK-47 casings. The police told us that they would be taking photographs and making an official report about the casings found. We were also concerned that the police took nearly a half an hour to respond to this situation, which was also the case at the Orinda Airbnb slaughter.

As concerned residents of this Albuquerque neighborhood, we believe that the Albuquerque Police Department should have a plan in place to rapidly investigate and contain active shooter incidents more quickly, before many people can be harmed. Also, of additional concern to us as neighborhood residents is the fact that an online police report cannot be made regarding noise complaints or other serious disruptions of peace in the neighborhood or community.

We request that the Albuquerque Police Department create an additional category for online police reports that include incidents such as this. This house where the party was taking place is known as an Airbnb rental that has been a continuing source of irritation for our neighborhood with loud, unsupervised parties.

Despite complaints directly to Airbnb, this home is still listed as an Airbnb rental as of January 31st. We have been in contact with the City of Albuquerque regarding past noise complaints. But this situation is now much more severe. We are only grateful nobody got hurt, but the entire neighborhood got a wake-up call about the party house.

This gunfire incident is extremely disruptive to the peace and safety of our neighborhood, my wife and I request that the city terminate all rentals of the property, which has been the host for these kinds of disruptive parties. The owner of the home is not present to supervise such parties, and our concern is that such parties could get out of hand, as has occurred at other Airbnb parties that were unsupervised, resulting in fatalities.

There are some other neighbors who host guests in their homes as members of Airbnb, but their conduct is respectful, considerate, and non-disruptive. I believe that the party house needs to be closed down and no more rentals allowed.