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Comment by xivzgrev | Hacker News Reader

Exactly. There was a time I preferred Airbnb but now I choose hotels unless I am looking for some kind of experience

Besides price, service is also worse during stay. At a hotel I can get towels, soap, whenever I want. Airbnb it’s maybe once a day the host can bring things to you.

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And you don't have to do chores!

I don't know what these cleaning fees are for if I'm doing all the cleaning! The last place I stayed had a "please, do everything" checkout policy. Take the trash to the dumpster, clean the towels, and run the dishwasher.

The disgusting thing is that they seem to take it on faith that these chores get done. Increasingly, AirBnBs are disgusting. Dirty dishes. Dirty counters. Bedding that I can't prove, but... I'm pretty sure hasn't been washed in a loooong time.

It's still something I put up with if staying for an extended period of time. Mostly for the (dirty) kitchens more than anything else. However, for short stays? Hotels all the way.

I have a ski cabin (not on AirBnB) and I don't think most people realize how difficult it is to get these places cleaned reliably. You can hire a very expensive cleaning service that brings in their own sheets and towels, but it's entirely impractical to have a regular cleaning service wait around while the dishwasher and 4 loads of laundry run. In terms of taking garbage to the dumpster, it's difficult to have someone take the garbage cans to the street and bring them back on garbage day. It's basically impossible if there are bears around. If the guests help out the cleaning fees can in principle be much lower. If you want to leave the place trashed like you would leave a hotel, don't complain about $400+ cleaning fees as that service is extremely expensive in resort areas.

My wife and I bought a unit in a Condotel in Florida where we stay half the year and we nomad the other half.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34821620

When we leave in the spring, we pay a $110 cleaning fee and the property management company takes care of everything - cleaning, finding guests, cleaning, replenishment, maintenance, and they have a warehouse full of furniture when they need to replace everything.

True they take 48% of the proceeds + 4% escrow to handle major repairs. But I don’t have to deal with anything.

It’s in Florida so of course it’s cyclical. But since we stay there during low season, it covers its own expenses the other half.

This is investment advice. This is not an investment idea. This was a lifestyle choice to give us a place to stay during the winter.

But I would rather get two anal probes than be a traditional landlord again.

Edit: I just noticed you said it was difficult in a resort area.

Our Condotel is very much in a resort area. Three pools onsite, three restaurants, a lake for fishing, a water park, arcade, etc.

Not bragging, we downsized from our the house in the burbs in GA we had built in 2016 (3200 square feet) to a condo 2000 square feet smaller, paid the same price and we saved over $12000 a year in income taxes.

I wonder if you've got that info in the listing for your place? "Listen, cleaning would cost me money, and that's impractical (and difficult!), so, y'know, might want to bring your own towels and check the bedding."

>If the guests help out the cleaning fees can in principle be much lower.

is it ever, though?

This cavalier attitude to, like, the basic overhead of running a hospitality business, is why I'm back on team hotel for most stays.

To be clear, my place is not on any listing service. Purely family and friends, I never rent it. I tell everyone "the cleaners are supposed to come but leave it so that if they don't the next person is not grossed out."

Ah, I misunderstood. I take back my excessive levels of disgust. Expectations are obviously different for private use between friends and family.

It's entirely reasonable to expect family and friends to properly clean up a place that you have kindly allowed them to use. But that is an entirely different domain (i.e. non-commercial).

I could be wrong, but it also feels like hotels have stepped their game up a bit with the rise of Airbnb. Prices are good, and even cheap rooms often have microwaves, fridges, and beds that aren’t absolute torture.

Mattresses, fridges, and microwaves have gotten cheaper. Space hasn't. Even 2 star hotels these days often provide similar amenities to 4 star hotels, just in a slightly less nice wrapping.

In some ways. Hotels can't get labor so they investing in things that don't require it.

I stay in alot of hotels for 2-3 day stretches. The lack of daily housekeeping really bugs me. But they seem to be building better midrange properties.

Hotels have gotten very haphazard about servicing rooms without, in many cases, being explicit about their policies. That said, I don't really care and, when they do come by to service, I'm often in the room trying to work on something.

When I stay in hotels - and I stay in a lot of hotels - I don’t want housekeeping and I keep a do not disturb on the door.

Same. I find it pretty invasive and weird, especially if it's a 1 or 2 day stay.

Hotels feel exactly the same to me as before. May be the fact that you tried out a hotel recently after staying in a few Airbnbs and were surprised by how well they stack up compared to the Airbnb experience.

If at all. Never had a host bring anything to us whenever we stayed in Airbnbs. Often, never saw the host at all (they'd just text a code to get in and out of the places I've stayed)

You've seen a host before? I've never seen one.

Mostly in Europe and Africa. When we stayed in AirBnBs in Europe we've met the host almost every time. One helped me park my oversized rental van and then paid for the parking since it didn't fit in the spot that came with the house. Another was there to show us all the amenities. Another was there to tell us to pretend we were his friend because rentals weren't allowed. And the one in Africa did a whole grocery shopping for us because she knew we were arriving late with kids and wouldn't have any food to feed them in the morning.

But yeah I've only ever met one host in the USA, and that was because they lived next door.

Once, when I stayed in Petaluma many years ago (I think 2014 or 2015?) but it was maybe 5 minutes?

They gave us a small tour, showed us how to use some appliances (like the heater) and showed us how to use the door code, and walked through the expectations (at that time, they were simple, was happy to accomodate).

That was it.

Every time after that, nope, never once.

I have had amazing airbnb hosts in South America, but usually these hosts are essentially running hotels. Hosts in the US were the worst. One host in NYC, whose slum apartment I stayed in for a few weeks, checked up on the apartment several times while I was at work to turn off the air conditioning (that I left on to avoid coming home to 85 degree heat). Another charged a $300 cleaning fee for a week-long stay, and then complained to me that I left dirty dishes in the sink - apparently they didn't come clean the place for several weeks after I left.

> that I left on to avoid coming home to 85 degree heat

My sympathy is with the host here.

Even if it was a tiny window unit left at a high thermostat temperature? The thing could not cool the place down in a reasonable time if it wasn't running 24/7.

The cheap fuck of a slumlord wanted to avoid paying $5/day in electric bills for the thing. This wasn't central air.

I met one once. Because he was renting out the bottom floor of his townhouse in DC, so he was on site anyway. Nice place, mostly, with rave reviews. Complimentary candy, soda, and even beer when we arrived (late at night after a long flight, so the snacks were very welcome. But holy crap the bed was awful. Hard as a rock, firmest mattress I've ever tried to sleep on. Ended up sleeping on the couch. And the power kept failing each day we were there, though that seemed to be a neighborhood thing, not specific to his apartment. Just bad luck.

I'm back to hotels because that was the closest I came to having the quintessential perfect AirBnB experience. Any halfway decent hotel has better service, better beds, better climate control, better everything pretty much.

> quintessential perfect AirBnB experience.

I don't think its the luxury you are defining it by. Its a room in somones house that comes with its pros and cons.

Not sure if you’ve never used it, but a vast number of AirBnBs are entire home/apartment rentals.

right. I was talking about the 'quintessential' part. Entire apartments isn't quintessential airbnb, atleast for me, I've been using regularly for over a decade. Op was also talking about airbnbing someones floor in a condo not 'entire apartment'. Not sure if you read the post properly.

It’s about meeting hosts, not sure if you read the posts properly, or what the point of the needless snark is

maybe you only book 'whole house/apartment' ? . I usually book a room in hosts house as a single traveller. I always see the host, i even went skiing with one last week.

I prefer AirBnb for medium term (> 1 week < 1 month) stays where you often get some sort of discount and the cleaning fees aren't so outlandish on a per-day basis. It's been great and definitely advantageous compared to similar hotel options for the past 2.5 months I've been in Mexico City.

I'm fine replenishing basic sundries myself in exchange for something that is at least a studio apartment with full kitchen so I can save a bit on eating out costs, do grocery runs every 4-5 days.

Every time I've stayed in a hotel these last few years, it's been awful. Dusty rooms, skeleton crew, cleaning once per week "for the environment", prices just awful

AirBNB has even worse prices, but I check them both every time

what area of the world you stayed at?

“Last few years” goes from now to peak covid lockdown, so it’s pretty meaningless.

Had awful experiences in: Washington State (all over), Silicon Valley, Tampa Bay, Dallas, and Salt Lake City. Mostly Marriott-owned places FWIW, but I checked and all the surrounding hotels had the same issues. The staff at the hotels were nice and they were doing their best, but they were hilariously understaffed.

I stayed in a few non-Marriott hotels in northern Japan and didn't have any trouble there beyond the normal Japanese hotel badness (they're clean, but insanely cramped, expensive, and uncomfortable)

Sounds like an easy ask for a room upgrade or did they just not care?

What do you mean? I should call them and ask to upgrade my room?

Well, that's a good idea, but... What's the point? They don't have any rooms that are clean or sections of the hotel that are well-staffed

But at least you get a more luxurious dusty room?

Haha, that's a good point. Plus it might trigger someone's KPI dashboard or something. I'll call and complain next time around

Unfortunately the hospitality industry has had a harder time recovering from COVID -- most of the managers are fresh out of college and have little to no underlying experience in managing properties, and it's so bad that Hilton and Marriott aren't doing "brand assurance" audits (ensuring that the properties are up-to brand standards) until the end of 2024/early 2025 because hotel owners have pushed back so hard.

My SO and I stayed at a Waldorf Astoria a few weeks ago and they managed to screw up the stay so badly that we'll probably never go back to that specific location ever again -- the response that we received from the staff was so bad I was looking on LinkedIn to see if I had any friends who were still at Hilton Corporate to help me get the local property to fix their screw up (charging my credit card $10k for a $2800 stay because someone fat-fingered a $100 nightly charge into a $1000 nightly charge) because the local management just couldn't do anything.

Good lord. That's the sort of thing I would give the hotel one chance to fix. If not, charge back.

Kitchens though…

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