Hacker News Reader

Comment by fuster | Hacker News Reader

This literally happened to me yesterday for a trip I'm leaving for in 3 days. The best part is that it's the second time I've been canceled on for this same trip. Naturally everywhere that isn't already booked up is 2-3x the price now. Just a huge hassle.

View on HN

> Naturally everywhere that isn't already booked up is 2-3x the price now. Just a huge hassle.

So the host can cancel, rebook at 3x , pay $1k and still come out on top?

Correct way to do this would've been start is exponential fines. Start with 100, 200 next time, 400 after that ect till an upper limit.

If that were a great strategy, they just wouldn't rent until a few days before.

Hosts don't necessarily know all of the events that will bring in crowds.

So they book early for a guaranteed $x. Then if they see that market rates for nearby units rose to n*$x, it makes sense for them to cancel and rebook at that rate.

This happened to me in Boston. I was going to run the marathon and knew that I needed to book way ahead to ensure I could get a decent room, whether hotel or AirBNB. I booked an apartment in Back Bay. Two weeks later, the host realized it was going to be marathon weekend and tried to triple my price. When I refused his offer, he canceled me.

Fortunately, it was still early enough that I was able to book a hotel near the finish line. Unfortunately, that hotel ended up be the host of all of the press and press conferences when someone bombed the finish area.

Or fine double market rate for nearby substitutes.

Bonus points if they make it so that the host can't book anything on the days on and around the cancellation date. After all, if the host cancelled, then it has to be because there's a major issue preventing the place from being use by guests, right ;). Maybe a two-week blackout period.

Or just prohibit the host from offering it to new guest when they cancel. If I rent a place for a week and they cancel on me the day before, don't allow another rental through Airnbnb for that week.

Airbnb isn’t the only platform, so it’s unclear that even if Airbnb started trying to do this (which they likely wouldn’t, hosts are their source if income) that the host wouldn’t rebook on VRBO, Homeaway, etc.

I think this is actually the majority of the cancels. A host lists their unit on a bunch of different platforms (sometimes the same platform) with different costs and cancels all but the most expensive one last minute.

Wouldn't have as big of an impact as you'd expect. A lot of airbnb's are dual listed on VRBO.

Or have fines proportional to the damage that cancellation causes. If I planned a vacation around being able to stay at your property and you cancel last minute, you've got to pay for reasonably comparable alternative accommodations. If none exist, refund me the cost of my plane ticket and any non refundable excursions I've already booked. If they can't guarantee their property will be available with high enough probability to risk those costs, why would I want to risk those costs while booking it?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com