Sounds like a high school pre-graduation party. Home's host is British...not a BE-er I suppose or we may have heard about it first hand. Airbnb does seem a recipe for disaster.

Couple's house wrecked after renting it out to 'drug-taking partygoers' on Airbnb - Telegraph

Airbnb is a great community. Unfortunately this ruins it for all the genuine users who've had great experiences with the site because people then start slapping on huge deposits which can sometimes make it unaffordable

I'm familiar with that condition (there are exceptions) but does that really count for the sort of "weekend hire" described?

I can't imagine that the weekend rental would have been covered by the Tenancy regulations in Alberta.

I am not a fan of this website, unfair competitive advantage allows those who sell rooms on it to undercut hotels to a point they cannot compete, not because hotels don't want to, but hotels have overhead and costs these renters do not have.


I wouldn't trust anyone to stay in my home, I could never rent it out to some random off the internet.

And I was just about to ask if.......

B&Bs have existed for as long as hotels (since the year dot basically).

Of course it is fair competition. Hotel operators are only in it to make a profit - why shouldn't homeowners do the same thing? Being an AirBnB host is just a business, the same as running a hotel. Many people prefer to give their money to a small business rather than a massive hotel chain.

It's the same with Uber - there's nothing wrong with breaking a monopoly and making taxi services more affordable. In Vancouver the City even stipulates what the MINIMUM rate for a Limo is - how is that good for the customer??

"According to neighbours, the bus arrived at the house shortly after the end of a major iced hockey game in Calgary."

The torygraph never cud spell proper.

It it were fair competition the same regulations for health and safety would apply, and there are a ton of unlicensed "hosts" on that website, ask any major city how many they find operating against the law and rules to make a quick buck.

If that's fair competition, you got me.

Fair is when the laws and regulations apply equally since those "hosts" are in the same business but homeowners skirt the rules.

I am biased since Air b nb "hosts" likely employ nobody and serve no real purpose but to make 1 person money.

Jobs are more important then home owners making a few bucks.


It's just annoying, we can't reduce rates to this websites level because we have overhead and regulations these "hosts" do not have.

Government needs to crack down hard on anyone using that site with an illegal business.


FYI: Most hotels even chains are small businesses owned by individuals. Only the largest of the large are corporate owned.

The chain only receives a small % of the income.


Uber is just as bad if they are not required to follow the same laws and regulations.

if one company has an unfair advantage from the start because of government regulations, and another doesn't, how is that fair competition?

Lots of hotels breach the rules. All day. Every day. I could probably walk in to any hotel in Vancouver and find a H&S breach.

The operating companies are also mainly registered in tax havens, so they don't pay taxes in the country where the hotels are.

The hotel industry is massively profitable - typically up to 35% gross margins and 10-15% net margins. That is high for any industry.

The profits get sliced many ways and that's also why most hotel chains are owned by Private Equity firms and not hotel operators.

That's also why those 'so-called' travel search engines get approx 8-12% of the revenue for every single hotel booking that is made from a click-through from their websites.

Technology is taking us back to the inn keeper and his wife model of hospitality. You have a point about jobs though.

You'd be surprised how many hotels are owned by individuals and it's higher then you realize most likely.

Yeah it is, which means the government better be prepared to pay benefits to those unable to be self employed.

Is it really the same business though?

I suppose some may be but doesn't everyone know they are not getting a hotel or other commercially run business with all the services one would expect?

Perhaps the original idea of the site has changed.

I saw them interviewed on CTV News when the story first broke, neither of them had British accents.