Over 2,000 rental listings in New York are now banned from receiving new reservations and will soon be deleted permanently from the listing of the Airbnb community. The property hosts, who are likewise no longer part of the said community, were notified earlier this year.
The hosts of the said properties, however, can continue their current bookings or those bookings made ahead of the announcement, says David Hantman, head of public policy at Airbnb, in a blog post on April 21.
He also explains that while the profile pages of these notified hosts are still viewable, the guests will no longer have any trace of them on the community site.
The announcement came after the New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and other public officials alerted Airbnb of bad players abusing its site in New York and came a day before its scheduled appearance in the New York State Supreme Court to respond to a subpoena requiring to disclose user data of its thousands of property hosts in New York for the last three years.
The basis of the subpoena is the New York state law in 2011 that makes renting out properties for less than 29 days by residents in New York illegal, which protects renters in case these hosts or owners force them to leave just to make easy money for short-term stays. Airbnb is a global community that connects global travelers on the lookout for authentic and superb accommodations with hosts who provide distinctive places to stay.
In an earlier blog post, Hantman expresses its company's doubts over Schneiderman's real intention for the subpoena. He says that while Schneiderman assures they were going after the bad apples, it appeared to be otherwise.
"He professed to be interested in collecting more tax dollars for New York," Hantman says in an April 20 blog post.
Regardless, the subpoena and complaints prompted Airbnb to undergo an investigation, only to find out that some hosts or property managers weren't giving their guess a superior, local experience.
"These hosts weren't making their neighborhood stronger and they weren't delivering the kind of hospitality our guests expect and deserve," says Hantman, adding that these hosts weren't making communities better, but rather worse.
The Airbnb has a community of over 500,000 property hosts in the world that aim to create and provide remarkable experiences for its millions of guests in a year. Hantman reveals that the majority of the company's hosts are merely regular people who rent out their homes to travelers, though other hosts manage multiple properties for their own business or for others. By that, the local economy and the government are said to rely on such property community and accept them.
"They are providing safe, positive experiences to vacationers and they pay their fair share," he explains.
This year, he says about $768 million worth of economic activity in New York will be generated by the Airbnb community, as well as support for about 6,600 jobs. The Airbnb is expected to pay over $36 million in sales tax too.
Hantman says that the company is constantly learning and is committed to making its cities stronger and better and will investigate any complaint reported to them.
Meanwhile, Hantman says there will be a community meetup at 7:00 pm on Wednesday in New York as well as a webinar at 11:00 am on Thursday to address all questions and issues.
