Airbnb not fair with me on my claim for extensive theft to my property

[M-Lissa0]

Hello fellow airbnb community:  With much sadness I have to share my unfortunate dealings with our beloved Airbnb Corporate:  It happened to be my 40th guest.  I returned to find I had been buglarized, and not just a little.  It was mostly electronics that are used daily by myself and my guests.  The expensive jewerly, and sports memorbilia are not covered which were included in my orginal apox $10,000.00 claim.  The locks were broken and to add more horror, the police have reported to me that the name on the reservation is a woman that is in jail currently for identy fraud.

Anyway, after putting together the many pics of receipts and proof of ownership of stolen goods, and pics of physical damage....they responded with a reimbursement award of 2,495.00

Fellow airbnb hosts, this company boasts that for our piece of mind they have a 1 million backed policy.   The items they stold need to be there to do the job of hosting...and for the use of the guests.  Tv's, VACUUM,  VIDEO GAMES, COMPUTERS, TELEPHONE... and physical damages.

Please advise with your comments and concerns about this very sensitive issue.

M'Lissa

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[Ed-and-Hugh0]

@M-Lissa0 Sorry to hear that. What a learning experience. Obviously, it's not a good idea to have expensive items in a whole house rental. I've never rented a house where there was jewelry or expensive collectibles around.

[Ash-and-Dasha0]

This sounds scary. I saw the disclaimer in the 1M policy that personal items won't be covered. But gosh, due to the theft by the guest?! That's a really scary perspective. 

You should be able to bring criminal charges against the guest, maybe you could get her to pay restitution if convicted. But it certainly makes you worried about hosting in a nice property, especially in a shared house where you keep valuables, TVs, personal electronics, etc. 

Best of luck in recovering from this ordeal.

[M-Lissa0]

Thank you for your nice comments. I am so mad...the local police dont have much time for this. I have hired a private investigator.  I would like to find the people but it is hard!

[M-Lissa0]

There are plenty of houses that have very nice furnishings and I had 39 most wonderful guests this

year that did not break my locks off of doors or break into my garage.

Before this reservation,  I never had one thing missing! It is NOT human nature to steal..even a little.

It is pyschopathic to do extensive theft to a property while sleeping in your beds, and swimming in your pool! There should be a filter to keep these kind of people away from this forum!!!!!!!!

And I am sure Airbnb Corporate has talked at great lengths about this topic.  Instead of 

talking openly about this, they hide behind it and CEO talks about "Stranger Danger" 

like it is the name of a new cocktail or something.  Like people are silly to think people will never become dangerous.  Well I am here to tell everyone that THIEVES ARE SMART and good at what they do!  I am just appauled that this organization is making so much money that they don't hire more people to work on the safety and protection of hosts!!!!

Running police checks on people doesn't take that long and if they do, hire more people to do this.

This company will run itself right into the ground if they aren't careful.

Very disapponted in Airbnb,

M'Lissa Meyer

[Berma0]

I think you have revealed something that all of us will have to be careful of in the future.  Bad people are masters at recognizing opportunites.  I think the best thing we can do is study the reviews and seek more information from previous renters.  I have a couple people coming up that I agreed to host without reviews and I am nervous about it, especially after reading about your experience.

[Clare0]

@M-Lissa0 did you send the police report about the false identity to Airbnb?

[M-Lissa0]

Yes It was a big concern of mine that there is very little screening of the folks that use the Airbnb website.  In Fact, the deputy assigned to my case said that in the past 6 months, he has heard about 10-15 Airbnb related burglaries. Also a big concern is that that the criminals on the street talk to eachother because they roam the streets and work together, and i think the word may be out about the ease of theft within the Airbnb format.  

[Ash-and-Dasha0]

The security checks are actually pretty hard to do. First you need the consent of the person to have it done, second running a check against non-US databases is a great burden on airbnb. Other than terroristic related crimes which are recorded by the OFAC, there are no unified databases for petty crimes like theft. I doubt you would have been able to screen out this guest either even if you did your own check. The criminals might have been targeting airbnb houses and would have done their research and once that's planned, they'll fool you better than you can outsmart them. Again M'Lissa, it's must be really stressful to deal with. Did your property insurance cover personal loss due to theft? I am sure you checked that route. Hopefully you could recover from this with minimal stress. 

[Robert117]

I cannot help but my heart goes out to you for having to endure the tragedy of such sociopathic behavior! I cannot imagine how devastated you must feel....

[Donna3]

May you should contact the L.A. Times and see if ABB will be shamed into responding better.

[Gerry-And-Rashid0]

What a horrible experience - I would challenge the amount they have agreed to pay as it seems low to replace the day to day items that were stolen (tv's etc...). Sometimes it is a bit of a game with insurance, there is a bit of barter and to and fro challenge before you reach a mutually agreeable figure.

The only thing I can say is that we read through the Host Protection policy and it was very clear that items such as valuable jewellry, antiques, valuable paintings etc are not covered and should be covered separately by the host.

[Rosemary19]

@M-Lissa0 This is terrible! I am alarmed that the guest was able to create a false identity, as we all rely on the identity verification system. Personally I have separate insurance and I also take a security deposit. I hope the police are able to track down the culprit and recover your property.