How we fought back and won against scammy Airbnb hosts
They tried to charge us for $838 in fraudulent charges (including using a fake invoice) but ended up paying us $859 instead
Recently, two Airbnb hosts tried to scam us into paying for damages in which we did not commit. They tried to charge us for $838 in damages but they ended up paying us $859 instead. Here’s how it went down.
Meet our Hosts
Max and Casey manage a couple Airbnbs in the San Diego area under a company called Paradise Rentals - they own a bunch of other Airbnbs according to their website here.
Perhaps like other Airbnb institutional investors, this saga has shown they clearly care about profit over anything else, including willing to doctor up fake invoices to get paid.
The Stay
We stayed at this house for my bachelor party in San Diego. The house itself was nice, large and expensive - we paid $6K for 3 nights.
In terms of the stay, we had a couple hiccups but was relatively uneventful.
There was a lack of hot water in the house - structurally, I think it’s an issue with the listing. See below.
Given the nature of the bachelor party, we decided to just take cold showers and warm up in the hot tub.
The noise sensors went off every night. The host warned us and we acknowledged it immediately each time. Even using indoor voices in the house would cause the noise sensors to go off…
When we checked out, I thanked the hosts for the stay and let them know that we cleaned up after ourselves.
Host fraudulently requests $$ in damages
As you can see above, the host didn’t respond to my message. I didn’t think much of it, and I also forgot to write a review.
Right after the review period (14 days after departure) ends, I get this email from our Airbnb hosts.
I click on the email, and look at the items that they claimed we damaged.
Extra cleaning of the pool felt table - $250
Apparently this pool table was so dirty that it took them 2 people 2 hours to clean.
Total Replacement of the Sheets ($139.35)
These sheets also need a complete replacement because they’re so dirty.
“BROKEN CURTAIN ROD - $32”
These curtain rods is apparently broken - in reality, they just need to be re-secured (as shown by ChatGPTs response)
Broken Scissors (“costs $34 to replace”)
We did break this pair of (cheap) scissors - I broke them. But you literally have to find the priciest kitchen scissors to find one that they claimed would cost $34 to replace - better scissors than these can be found for $9 - see the Amazon search below.
Pre-existing scratches on a ping pong table ($312.50)
We literally didn’t use the ping pong table in the house the entire weekend (it was a dual purpose pool/ping pong table and we didn’t remove the pool cover to use the ping pong table) but the hosts claimed that we broke them.
We later found out that the host conjured up a fake invoice to charge us for these scratches - see the images on takeaways at the end.
We discover that the hosts have a repeated history of being shady
I immediately knew from the onset of the pictures and receipts attached - that things were fishy.
I texted the bachelor party group thread and collected some evidence about our lovely hosts.
Max and Casey have displayed opportunistic behavior in the past (see thread here)
The airbnb specialist gave us some additional information about our hosts
Max and Casey have been in hot water before with Airbnb for pulling this type of stunt
They waited until the review period had ended on purpose in order to ensure we didn’t write a negative review of them
We decline the charges and we plan our counter attack
We strike back
I am generally a chill person. I am not a transactional or opportunistic person by nature, but I can be. And given the circumstances, I decided that I wanted to be one here.
Remember the hot water issue? If this was a trip between my wife and I, yes, I would have found the lack of the critical amenity unacceptable.
But 14 dudes hanging out in a house in San Diego - whatever - we aren’t there to be pampered. We were totally prepared to shower cold and let it go.
But once the host intent revealed themselves with the fraudulent repair charges, we filed for a refund due to a lack of critical amenity.
The issue with this is that not only did we not have hot water for the entire weekend, the host decided to ignore us (we posit it’s likely because there’s a structural issue with hot water in the listing) when we told them that there wasn’t any hot water. See below.
We file a reimbursement for a very large amount (we knew that the amount was opportunistic but we decided to scare the host) for the lack of critical amenity.
After an investigation and some back and forth, Airbnb stepped in and offered to refund us $859.40 to settle the case.
I think we could have gotten a bit more if we pushed, but we wanted to secure the victory quickly to send a message to the host that his behavior was unacceptable.
As for the host reimbursement request, everything was dismissed except the two items (scissors and the curtain rod). We are still in the process of resolving it as the Airbnb resolution team made some mistakes, but we believe it will land between being entirely dismissed to paying $63.
Takeaways
This was the first time I experienced an Airbnb host clearly acting in bad faith. I’ve genuinely had good experiences with Airbnb and have been a good guest (out of 10 reviews, each of them have given me a 5 star guest rating). I believe in reciprocity - I default to being good, but I am not going to sit there quietly if you try to screw me over. I am going to fight you.
There are some lessons to learn from this specific experience.
Communicate entirely within the Airbnb secure messaging platform. One reason we were able to get a refund quickly for the lack of hot water is because we only messaged with the host through the Airbnb messaging platform.
FIGHT! If the charges are clearly fake and the host is acting in bad faith, don’t give up or give in.
Don’t be afraid to be transactional if the opposite party is acting transactional
Do research on the hosts. Research the hosts online to see if they have a history of these behaviors and chat with specialists to see if they have shady history (in our case, one of the specialists slipped up and told us that Max and Casey have in fact, been in hot water with Airbnb before).
Do research on the specific charges. Look at each of the items and what they claim to be broken/repaired. We’ve found so many inconsistencies between their story, the pictures and the items that they were trying to replace them with. I literally emailed some of the vendors to see if the payments were actually in fact, paid (I highly doubt it) - I will report back if I get a response.
UPDATE - FAKE INVOICE
Don’t be afraid to call out bad hosts publicly. Stick to the facts, don’t embellish, but hosts like these need to be removed from Airbnb in order to preserve a healthy and trusting guest and host community.
Doing so also leaves a paper trail and disincentivizes bad behavior as well.
Lastly, if you are thinking of booking an Airbnb down in San Diego, book with caution if you see these two as your hosts (and document everything meticulously if you do)
Go gettem