← The David Greene Show
The David Greene Show
Banned by Airbnb: How One Review Nearly Cost Him Everything I Episode 112
00:37:56
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- [00:00]
A
Welcome to Real Talk Real Estate, the show where we cover how to build wealth in real estate with no fluff, no BS, and no sales pitches. I'm David Green and I've been doing this for over 10 years. I've seen the ups, the downs, and everything in between. This is the show where we pull back the curtain and show it to you, too. So if you want to build wealth through real estate or you just love learning about it, you found your home. What's going on? Real Talk Real Estate. Welcome to the David Green Show. I'm David Green and I'm joined today with Joe Jonathan Clark, a short term rental owner who's got a story about an experience he had that was a little rough on him that we want to share with everybody else. We're going to be talking about what happened, why it happened, what he did, and where we're at now. So hopefully all of us can avoid falling into the same situation and having the same experience. So, Jonathan, thanks for being willing to come on the show, man. I appreciate it.
- [00:50]
B
Oh, no, it's. It's my pleasure. And thank you for having me. And I got to tell you, based on my experience, I'm not even sure if it's. It's something we can avoid. It was rather disconcerting. It seemed almost completely random, to be honest. So I can essentially tell you what happened, which is I've been an Airbnb host now since 2019. I've been slowly transitioning from my main line of work, which is as a lawyer, to just becoming more and more of an Airbnb host with these properties. As I acquire more. Like many of us, I, you know, I've gotten quite into it. I enjoy it. It's in many ways quite fulfilling, and I've invested a lot of time and effort into it. So I've been a super host now, I think, for about three years. So in any case, I actually woke up, as I often do, thinking about my Airbnb, we're coming into high season here. Bookings have been going pretty well, all that. And I logged in and I was unable to. And I had a message that said, we've shut down your account because of. And what it said was essentially an issue with my reviews. And I had no like it. The. The way they described it was as if a review I left for someone else as a host caused some sort of issue. So that was the first thing that confused me because I. I don't generally leave negative reviews for guests. Probably. I mean, I probably hosted a thousand people at this, A thousand different groups at this point, and maybe I've left three to five bad reviews when something's really bad. But mostly I try to just work it out with people directly.
- [02:41]
A
Let's, let's pause for a second there. What you're referring to is that a guest can leave a review on their commenting on their stay at a property, and then the host is also theoretically allowed to leave review for the guest. So if the guest makes a bunch of complaints and says, I didn't like the way it smelled, the furniture wasn't in the right position, whatever the host can say, the guest was terrible. They complained about this, they were unfair about that. Whatever the case would be. And the idea would be future guests that are going to book this property can read the reviews and see what other people said. And conversely, future host can see the reviews that were left about other guests before they accept the booking. So you're under the impression at this point that Airbnb is telling you, you left a review that we didn't like, so we shut down your account. Is that basically where you're at?
- [03:27]
B
So, I mean, that was, that was all the information I had, but it didn't add up because, as I said, I generally leave positive. It's not like I go around writing vindictive reviews for people. It's just. There's very little ROI on that. Right. So I hadn't had any bad experiences recently. Most of my reviews have been quite positive. Had had a pretty good streak going, you know, and so. But I, I couldn't access anything, so. Oh, they also told me all your upcoming stays will be canceled and all, all fees will be refunded. We're coming in the high season down here. This is when I make most of my money. I had a large amount of bookings. And this is also terrible for the, the guests, as I tried to point out as well. I mean, people plan their, their trips especially for the, the summer and for New Year's six months in advance. It's not uncommon. And so that's what I was told. And I couldn't contact any of my guests. I couldn't read any of my messages, which got sort of comically very Airbnb. When as I was finally able to talk to people, they said, we've sent you a message and all that. They're asking me to go to my, my inbox and verify things. And they've shut everything down. Right. So, so this is all going on, I'm thinking, like, my life's work almost, you know, not exaggerating has just been taken from me for nothing. And. And so then I began the process of trying to. To call Airbnb. I actually messaged you. You were one of the first people I. I messaged. But then I just began the series of phone calls. And anyone who hosts Airbnb can probably imagine what. What that was like. To. To say there was a lack of sympathy would be a real understatement. It was generally implied that I'd done something very wrong. People were sort of rude and condescending. I kept trying to be polite.
- [05:33]
A
You're talking about with the staff of Airbnb when you were talking. Yeah.
- [05:36]
B
Yes. You know, so this is another interesting thing. So I'm a super host, so I call the Super Host Helpline, which I'm told is like an important benefit.
- [05:48]
A
Yeah. Like a feature they have for a super.
- [05:50]
B
Yes, exactly. So I'm asking them, because it doesn't sound like the Super Host Hotline that I recall, which used to be quite. Quite helpful. And I'm. I'm asking them, is this the Super Host hotline? And they're. And they're sort of. It seems to be. They're. They're being deliberately vague, so they're like, well, this is the hotline. This is the hotline for super hosts, etc. And. But essentially, you know, I spent many calls. I asked for supervisors. I got disconnected many times. I got hung up on multiple times on the first wave. Then they'd say, they're transferred to a supervisor, and they say, okay, we're transferring you. And then it just hangs up. And then also, eventually you get to the supervisor and get hung up on. Now, what I learned, I guess I'm a trusting person, was I just assume these are mistakes, Right. But I was asking AI about it. I was asking my friends, and they were saying, no, this is a feature of the system. This is deliberate. They try to hang up on you. They try to frustrate you because they want you to just stop calling. But it's just. It's interesting that this. I. I understand having that. I mean, I don't like it or respect it, but if. If you had that system for people complaining or wanting money back or, you know, I. I've heard about. You talk about unreasonable guests. I've dealt with unreasonable guests or unreasonable hosts. All right, fine. You want to make it tough on them. But, like, I'm not asking for money. I'm trying to give you money. You've made a lot of money from me, and I just want the system to go on working, and you've created this infrastructure where I can't even talk to anyone who can influence it. So essentially that's what happened. It was a really unpleasant day as, as you can imagine. And ultimately I just sort of had, had, had to wait. And that was sort of, that was like the first step of what happened. I mean, I feel like I'm talking a lot. I could, I could wrap it up if you'd like.
- [08:00]
A
No, this is really good. Like, I'm just thinking for people that don't manage an Airbnb, but they've been thinking about getting into it when you have, like Airbnb itself is so dominant in the short term rental space that we often call short term rentals Airbnbs. I think I, I just interviewed the, the owner of Stay Fi, which provides services for direct booking, and he told me that depending on the market, Airbnb controls 60 to 80% of all the bookings. They're, they're a monster. Everybody else is fighting over 20 to 40% of what could be there. So when, when your account is shut down, that means 60 to 80% of the possible bookings you could get become impossible. And many people don't list anywhere but Airbnb. That's the only place they even put their property. In fact, Airbnb is now starting to penalize people that use other platforms to advertise their property. This is how much of anopoly they've really got on the system. So when they shut you down and you have to use their support and you're speaking to somebody with questionable English in another country, in another time zone that does not understand real estate to no fault of their own. These are just villagers that were grabbed somewhere and brought into a call center. And they're expected to handle complex situations like why was the account shut down? They, the guest is claiming X, but I'm saying Y. They're almost like a judge that has to hear a case. This isn't an easy thing for someone to do, but they've hired these people to do this job and your entire investment, or even livelihood for some people is hanging in the balance of people like this. We're dealing with one of these ourselves. It is maddeningly frustrating that you're trying to do the right thing and they're giving you zero help. So, like, we have a property that we manage for somebody else. They shut down the account. They took down the condo. They won't tell us why. They said, we told you why on the account. I said, I know, but you shut the account down, so I can't see any of the notes that you sent. Well, we can't tell you what was sent. You have to go to the account to get it. Yeah, there is no account. You guys shut it down. I'm trying to put the property on a new account and you're flagging it as a duplicate listing. You're telling me I can't manage it. Why? Because it was shut down on another account. And you just go in circles like this with these people that, that are very polite and absolutely inept until the point that you just throw your hands up and give up and say, like, I don't even know what's going on. So I get where you're at. I just want to kind of lay some groundwork for the listeners to understand the experience.
- [10:27]
B
No, that's. That's a great summary. And, yeah, that's the process. It's. It's almost if. If you were watching it on a movie or something, it would almost be comical of how.
- [10:41]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [10:44]
B
Completely contradictory and complex everything is, and referring you to things and exactly that. You can't. You can't read it. It's like, you know, it's like a catch 22 kind of situation or Kafka, whatever you want to say. Any of these, like, sort of absurd things you read or hear about. You're. You're in that situation now, thankfully, it's, you know, it's just Airbnb, not your life. But in this situation, you know, I've been in those situations before where, okay, someone left me an unfair review, and I, I wasn't happy about that, and I was trying to get it resolved. But again, it's another thing where. And this is. I guess this is a very important thing you point out to future hosts, current hosts. I. The. One of the first things I, I did is I went and register for booking.com after this, and I'm. I'm in the process of setting it up. But. But yes, you get in this situation where you've lost everything. You're. You're dealing with people who seem to have no understanding of the situation. Most of them are quite polite. I will say some of them are not that polite. They're clearly reading this, a script, like a rehearsed script. And then also, I'm getting things. I. I got like, one message from a supposed supervisor, and she's like, saying things like, don't worry, it's all under control, but was very poorly written. You know, the grammar is incorrect and it's like, that's, that would be fine in other situations. I'm not trying to be judgmental, but if these are the people that have my career in their hands.
- [12:17]
A
Yeah.
- [12:18]
B
And they're supposed to be performing an analysis, but they can't read or write very well. It's, it's just absurd. And you can't reach anyone else. They, they literally hang up on you. They literally disconnect you. They send messages to accounts you cannot access. So it's, it was, it was quite an experience.
- [12:40]
A
So where are you with it?
- [12:42]
B
After sending a lot of messages, a lot of calls, I, I, I realized, okay, well, I do have, maybe have a, okay, network. I can start talking to people. So I started talking to people in my network and, and that was going to be my next step. It's, it's so funny. It's like when you, when you, when you try Airbnb or artificial intelligence, when you look at, on the Internet, they say, oh, email. All these people email Brian Chesky, right. It's like everyone supposedly has this mythical Brian Chesky email that will, like, solve everything. But I was reaching the people in my network, and there's one guy who I, who I do believe had, had his, his email. So that was going to be my next step. Just trying to figure out who I know from school or work who might be an executive at Airbnb. These are the kind of things I was, I was working on. But fortunately, it didn't come to that. After about a day, I got a message from someone I do believe is in a different layer, like his. He wrote in perfect English. He very much understood. His tone wasn't like, you have done this violation. He was apologetic even. And he said, thank you for your patience and your understanding. And that begun. He said, we've gotten your account to a team that's reviewing it. And so that was like the first thing. So. And he was actually able to respond to me. And then a little while later, he said, we, we reviewed it. And he said, you did nothing wrong. There was literally no problems. So then, of course, my next, as I'm sure yours, would be if someone tries to, you know, avoid problems or fix things. I said, can you tell me what I, what I did here so I can avoid it in the future? Said, no. Can you tell me what happened? I'm not allowed to tell you what happened. I asked AI, I Googled it. Presumably it got flagged by an algorithm. Then some overworked person just, who doesn't care about me at all, just reviews it for 10 seconds and it's easier for them just to destroy, destroy everything I have.
- [14:45]
A
Yeah, of course, for them it's clicking a button.
- [14:47]
B
Yeah.
- [14:47]
A
It's getting a task off of their CRM screen.
- [14:50]
B
And I, I, you know, they just, they don't care these. And I'm not saying they should care care, but I do think some people would maybe care a little more and think about the ramifications of doing this.
- [15:02]
A
If you were a good person, you would. I'm gonna put it that way. I'll make a moral judgment. If you're a good human and you make a decision that severe, you'll put some thought into how you do it. At first.
- [15:11]
B
Yeah, I mean, I, I, I, I agree. And so that, that didn't happen. And I talked to this guy who probably, he's probably the next layer maybe where they outsourced to a third party.
- [15:26]
A
Well, thank God they've done that. My guess is all the emails that Brian Chesky's getting, he's realized I need a layer of supervision for the people that get stuck in this hell. I can't get out of the Bermuda Triangle.
- [15:38]
B
Yeah, yeah, no, maybe the, maybe the email does work. Yeah, you're right. So the Cesky email, just keep, just, just keep hammering it. But, but in any case, this guy helped me, but then, you know, he said, there's no advice I can give you for the future. And then the last interesting thing I said was, well, can you tell me about the super host hotline that I used to use? And he said, there is no superhost hotline. And this is a funny thing. You get into this, like, again, bureaucratic modern language where he was like, in order to be fair to everyone, we send everyone to the same health helpline. And it's kind of like, well, wouldn't fairness be rewarding the people who work? But regardless, he said, in order to be fair, we send everyone to the same line and there is no Super Host hotline. So then I went back, I just got Super Host a week ago, and on the email it says one of the main bonuses is you get a Super Host hotline. So that was my last email sent back to him this morning. And I'm kind of curious what they say, but, you know, there's not going to be any real answers.
- [16:44]
A
This is such a fascinating drama of just what's happening at Airbnb right now. I don't, I mean, it's obviously horrible when you're in your situation. I'm actually going to see if you would mind sharing me the email, the person you talked to? Because I have a listing in the same position. I don't know if you heard me talking about it. Like I mentioned earlier, we don't know why they took it down. I've had one gal that said it was taken down because of violations. And I said, what violations? We were not notified of any. And then it's that we sent them to the account. The account is shut down. She also mentioned something about reviews. And then I kept asking, what did you say about review? And she wouldn't go back. It was. It was like she said too much. The same vibe you're getting. Right. And so I'm like, did a guest say in a review something that their algorithm catches and says, oh, it's a safety issue because the guests said a word that triggered their AI to shut you down. And then you're obviously talking to staff that doesn't understand and is not authorized to tell you. They're probably warned every day if you say these things, you're fired and you're going back to your village and you're going to be scrounging in the dumpsters for food. Do not blow it. And so this poor human is trying to talk to you. Who you're a lawyer, right?
- [17:59]
B
Yes.
- [17:59]
A
Yes. Like, they're trying to talk to you, and you're a good man and an honest person that's trying to get a real understanding. But you have a legal background. They don't. They're intimidated, probably because they don't want to lose their jobs and they're not authorized to tell you the truth. They probably don't know why it happened either. That's what I think happened with ours. I'd be terrified if they're penalizing hosts for leaving bad reviews of guests, because that is the only thing as a host we have saving us from these people that come and throw parties from these people that come and hold you hostage. I mean, this is a common thing in the Smoky Mountains where a guest will show up and immediately they will send you 12 pictures.
- [18:36]
B
Sure.
- [18:37]
A
Anything they can find wrong with your property. Dumb, dumb things. Like, they'll pick up a. A rug, and they'll, like, show underneath the rug that there's some crumbs or something that, like. And I. And they'll demand a discount. Right. If you can't warn other hosts that this is what this gets guest is doing, there's no recourse against this. They will continue to hold you hostage to get refunds. At a time when most hosts are not even able to make their nut. They're losing money every month. They're trying to just survive. There's no one to sell these properties to because no one's jumping into the space right now. They're all sort of customized and themed to where even if it's an area where a homeowner might buy it, they don't want a circus. If you've created a, you know, themed prop, it, it is a bad, bad problem that we have. And in for something that I don't understand. Airbnb has made these decisions at the worst possible time in the market to destroy the host's ability to make any money. You've got the support issue, you've got the guests taking advantage of you issue. Now They've added this 15 and a half percent fee that all the hosts are going to have to pay, that the guests are not going to have to pay pay. I don't mean to be sitting here and slamming Airbnb. I am flabbergasted why this is happening at a time like this. And when you reached out, I just thought, oh, it's not just me. This is everywhere.
- [19:57]
B
No, no. So I couldn't agree with you more. And my. If, if I were just stepping into this with no context, I would think there's some sort of overt hostility to, towards hosts in, in, in, in my interactions. And it's, it's just bizarre. You've talked about in, in recent shows how they've maybe made some sort of decision that it makes more sense to be really favorable towards guests and just get more, more bookings. But, but what I'm seeing is, first off, I, I think it's very important because it shows how we have even little less efficacy than you may think. Because I don't leave bad reviews because at some point I sort of realized with the system. And again, I love, I think Airbnb is incredible invention. It's changed my life. It's been great so many ways, but the system has deteriorated to the point where I'm like, I don't want to make any waves whatsoever. I don't want to leave bad reviews for people. I don't want to do anything because I don't want to get caught up in this mess. And what you described sounds very similar with the vague violation, the reviews. And what I can tell you is I just, I didn't even, it wasn't even a matter, okay. If you're too hard on a guest, even if they deserve it, you're going to get flagged. Because I. I haven't done that.
- [21:25]
A
Okay.
- [21:27]
B
So to me, it seems it. That almost feels like the algorithm has been modified once again. And it's just. It's just gotten worse.
- [21:38]
A
I think I'm picking up what you're putting down here. And if, and you're not saying this, I'm saying what I think I hear you saying. There seems to be a skew against people who own assets right now, just to be frank. It's sort of like in publicly traded companies. It. Whether it's conscious or it's unconscious or subconscious, they're punishing the people that own the means of production. Right. Like everybody's got a competitor. So as a host, I am competing against all the other property owners in my area on that platform. I have to have the best product at the best price, some combination of that marketed the best way with the best reputation. That's going to be your, your star ranking to be at the top of the algorithm, or I lose, I die, I lose money, I lose my property, I lose my investment. The guest is. Who would they be competing? They're not really competing against anyone. They kind of control the flow of money. And then Airbnb is competing with Vrbo, with booking.com, with whatever other platforms are going to come. It seems that Airbnb has chosen to just 100% favor the guests at the expense of the host, because they don't want the guests going to vrbo, they don't want the guests going to booking. They want to keep them on Airbnb. And so as a host, you need to be aware you are stepping into an environment that you are at an inherent disadvantage against your guest. If you're using an online travel agency. Now, that doesn't mean don't do it. I don't know you can do it without using Airbnb. They've got a chokehold on everything. If you've got a short term rental, it probably has to go through that. I don't think that VRBO bookings can keep somebody making their mortgage payment, let alone all the other expenses that go into it. But you need to be aware of this. Right? So one of the things that we've done at Coast To Coast Getaways is we made a concerted effort to get direct bookings. Not a thing I ever intended to do. I was forced into it. So we have ways of getting direct bookings organically, we have ways of getting through the podcast, and then we have a system where if you come to me from Airbnb, we make a relationship with you, we get your info, we direct market to you, we offer discounts to get the right guests to come back. It's one of the things I'm just trying to do to keep my sanity right now, because I don't know what you do here. I mean, in your experience, you basically had a white knight that you got lucky with that someone introduced you to. Right.
- [23:57]
B
Well, I, I should, I, I started. I, I, I used AI And I was like, just, I drafted like, a demand letter that was very simple. And I, then I was sending that demand letter to any email response I could get back. Maybe that flagged something. But, yes, mostly I think I was just. That's, that's what's unsettling is it just seems like everything about this process was, was random, and I had very bad luck to get my account shut down, and then maybe I had good luck to get it in someone's hands who, who actually cared. But, yeah, I mean, I think that's sort of a tone I've noticed. And I, I, you know, I'm hesitant to even say anything bad about Airbnb.
- [24:40]
A
Because you're afraid the algorithm's going to hear it and they're going to come after you and shut you down again. I, I know.
- [24:45]
B
So, again, I disavow. I love Airbnb. Okay.
- [24:48]
A
It was only David that said anything like this.
- [24:51]
B
But in theory, in theory, it does sometimes seem, even in these little micro interactions, that there's just a slight layer of hostility towards, towards me as a host. I'm, I'm unfailingly courteous to everyone. Most of my guests are wonderful. But the moment something goes wrong again, you're, you're guilty. You're just guilty. The moment, you know, I had a, I had a recent incident, which was small. It's just one of my small properties. Wasn't such a big deal. My maid, who's normally wonderful, for some reason, she forgot to leave towels. She never makes mistakes, but these things happen. You know, I house 10 properties. Every once in a while, something goes wrong, so she doesn't leave towels. And the moment airbnb hears about it is they just say, we've given your guests a full refund. You know, and it's just like, okay. I mean, and it's fine. I just took the loss there because I've learned that it's just not worth fighting. But then when this happened, which was almost, life would be life ruining if this hasn't been fixed, you know, and, and sure, now I can diversify into booking.com and eventually VRBO. But I do think most people use Airbnb. It would just be nice if Airbnb would just get back to a little more of an equilibrium of.
- [26:12]
A
Well, the research I've done is that Airbnb went public. They're now publicly traded, so they're beholden to their shareholders. They outsourced their customer service from people in the United States to people overseas to save a bunch of money, to increase their price to earnings ratio, to increase their stock price to make their shareholders more money. And that they are also saying that our shareholders are demanding more. So we need to come up with alternative forms of revenue, which is going to be all the extra things that they sell to people in your property that you don't get. And we need to increase our fees. We need to move them from the guest to the host. And the way they're selling it is. Well, by moving it from the guest to the host, more people will travel because they're not paying as much, and so you'll get more bookings. But what they're not telling you is that all the hosts now bump up their prices by 15% because Airbnb is taking 15% from them. Yeah. Well, guess who pays that higher price. The guest. So the guest pays the same price, the host makes the same money, and Airbnb collects an extra 15%. And if you don't like it, there's nothing you can do. Go on vrbo, where nobody looks. So it's. It is scary to have this feeling like this giant has a stranglehold on the industry. And I have to do whatever they say, regardless of how fair it is. And I don't know what the answer is, because you can't just avoid it. You. You sort of are stuck here. Unless you want to go to foreclosure.
- [27:39]
B
Yeah, no, I don't know what the answer is either. I mean, one of my answers I. Is to start to come talk to you. We can obviously do things on an individual level. I can network with people I know and start. But. But to me, it seems, yeah, once you get sort of caught into this whole sort of entire focus on shareholder earnings, you get into the spiral where the quality of almost all the products we use in our lives now are declining because of this. And this is one more example. But it's not a system you can really take down. You just have to operate within it. But I suppose someone like you with a platform and, you know, I can't go to direct bookings, really. Right. I mean, it's it's not, it's not viable for me. So. But, but, but, but people who can, can do that. Maybe eventually there's a, a slightly more fair site like Airbnb or Airbnb maybe just comes back to a little closer to something that works. Well.
- [28:48]
A
The fear is if somebody made Airbnc that was better than Airbnb.
- [28:54]
B
Yeah.
- [28:55]
A
That Airbnb is, can raise money selling stocks and just buy that competitor. And so as like Google can do. Right. Like anyone that might possibly be a threat to you, you buy them before they get to the point they can.
- [29:09]
B
No, I mean, you're probably right. I mean, but. And I do think this seems to have been, it's like when you look at a picture of like a flight back in like the 60s or whatever and these people are like reclining on couches and things like that. And it's just this is, this is the direction we're going.
- [29:26]
A
Right.
- [29:27]
B
So. And then originally they say, oh, there's this convenience for lowering prices. But eventually the prices, just as you're saying, the prices go back up and then we have none of the benefits that we're originally theoretically paying for. So I, I do think that's, that's where we are right now. I mean, I don't think it's hopeless or anything that.
- [29:48]
A
No, but it, you need to be paying attention is what I tell people. It's not hopeless yet. It is incredibly foolish to just let your property sit there, Let it book, create systems so that you don't have to pay attention to it. I can't tell you how many people I've hired to work for me that came in calling themselves a property manager that I hired in the company who thought, no, I just set up auto replies and I don't ever do anything. You're, you're insane if you think that's working. In today's market, there are enemies everywhere. Even the person feeding you the bookings, in a sense, has made themselves your enemy here. So if there's enemies around, you got to be aware, you got to have your hands up and you need to be in the fight and you be paying attention. And so direct bookings is one way you can do that. Listening to information like this is another. Being careful about what you're stepping into and to be frank, diversifying your income streams. If you're the person that jumped and said, full time real estate, I'm not doing anything else, yeah, I'm going all in because bigger pockets sold me to, I hope you listen to me in the day When I said, I don't think you should. It's great to put a lot of effort in this. It cannot be the only place that all your eggs are in a basket, because look what happened to you. Your account was shut down. No reason was given to you. Imagine if you were like a property manager that had 27 properties on that whole account, and it was shut down for whatever reason, and your only hope is someone in India or the Philippines that's just giving you the run around over and over and over and couldn't care less.
- [31:14]
B
No, yeah, yeah.
- [31:16]
A
Scary stuff.
- [31:17]
B
Yeah, it is. And it's like part of what I went to Airbnb for was a little more of a sense of self sufficiency. Right. When I've worked at law firms or things like that, you could still be fired. Right. Or even if you're then a solo attorney, your clients can make a mistake, they could lose their money, they could find another lawyer, whatever. The whole point of Airbnb, for me at least, was just like, okay, I'm running this. I'm not going to mess it up. And so it's going to. It's going to work properly. And, you know, I respond every message pretty much in, like, under a minute. I'm unfailingly polite to everyone. There's. There's just. And then you still get in this situation. It's. It's. And again, I'm fine now. It worked out. I'm not here complaining about my circumstance, but I think it's a. It's very illustrative. Like, it's. You're completely right. This is something we all need to be aware of. And at some point, probably there needs to be some sort of organization to improve things a bit. Because it's not sustainable.
- [32:22]
A
No. If it keeps going this direction, you're right.
- [32:24]
B
It just gets worse. Worse, right?
- [32:25]
A
Yeah. Yeah. And then eventually, all the hosts pull their properties off, they go to foreclosure, they sit there, they collect dust, they fall apart. So somebody buys them and turns them into some public housing or something like that, or they just. If it's like a cabin in the mountains, it just dies and doesn't go anywhere. Or what's worse, this is my big fear, Jonathan, is you get the companies like Airbnb that partner with private equity and have their own arm that go and buy the properties at a foreclosure that they pushed into foreclosure at pennies on the dollar, and then they own it and they manage it and they give it a boost in the algorithm. So that their properties show up at the top and you don't have a chance.
- [33:07]
B
Yeah, I mean, and I. I agree. And why wouldn't they want that? Right? All the incentives are in the wrong. Are in the wrong place here. So. And. And yeah, if things don't happen, then I think that's where it ends up. Because it's just, we're. We're seeing these patterns of consolidation same way. I mean, someone now owns all the. All the various publicly traded companies. Right. Even those are all consolidated into Vanguard or, you know, what have you.
- [33:39]
A
That's it. We've seen it happen before.
- [33:41]
B
Yeah. So. So. And a lot of the residential properties have now been bought by. By these.
- [33:47]
A
That's it. That's exactly right. Yes.
- [33:49]
B
So why wouldn't they take over the punishment, too? Like, it's. Of course they.
- [33:53]
A
I'm afraid of this happening in the real estate agent space. If the. For the agents listening to this, that, that gave away the MLS access to companies like Zillow and realtor.com that. What happens when Zillow decides they want to be a brokerage? And if you want your house to show up on a Zillow search, you got to list it with Zillow Broker company. What do you do if you're just a regular agent wanting to sell a property? There is nothing you do, because everyone's looking at Zillow, everyone's going on Airbnb. So I think if you're a real estate investor, you need to be paying attention to this. Do not sit in ignorance. Do not sit around doing nothing, hoping that it gets better. Like you said, Jonathan, it's probably getting worse, so we need to be paying attention to it. And I appreciate you coming on to share your story here.
- [34:34]
B
Oh, no, I really appreciate it. You were like. It was like a little moment of hope when. When I was really in this, I was like, oh, wow, David Green. You know, respond, at least this will be. This will be cool. So I gotta say, you know, for people who are interested in your products, I was really impressed you responded to me. I just sent it through your. Your website, you know, and it's the opposite Airbnb service. So, like, whoever wants to have you manage like it was. It was seconds, so that's hilarious.
- [35:04]
A
Thank you for that. I do appreciate it. My heart goes out to the owner, operators, the mom and pops, the people like you. Of course I'm. It's not on the side of some big corporation that's going to pay me to sponsor the show, to pretend like they're great. Most investors want to come on a podcast and share their wins. If you're, if you got the, the balls to come on here and be like, I got scared, I got screwed. This was not good. I want to warn other people. I don't know if these podcasts go viral, like the person that shares how they have 17 properties that they bought in three weeks and using other people's money. But this is the real life that people need to see. So I really appreciate that endorsement.
- [35:40]
B
No, I, likewise, I really do appreciate too. So it's been a real pleasure and I, I, I, I thank you.
- [35:45]
A
Yeah. You'll have to let me know if anything else goes wrong. If you guys want to reach out to me. Yeah, you can do it the same way Jonathan did. Just go to davidgreen24.com use the chat feature. It'll go directly to me and I will get you put in touch with anybody that I can. Whether you have a short term rental you'd like me to manage. You need a loan to buy a property or you are a real estate agent or broker that wants to get better training, I'm here for you. We're building a family oriented community to help everybody out and people like Jonathan are exactly who we want to work for. So. Thanks man. Which, which area are you in?
- [36:16]
B
I'm actually, it's, it's funny, I'm in beautiful Santa Catarina, Brazil. So it's pretty far away. It's, it's, it's been great, but there's a lot of challenges that as well. So I've mostly relocated from the United States. I was living in Miami and, and eventually I, I now I sort of travel around and manage these properties, but I'm, I'm based here in Brazil.
- [36:40]
A
That must makes it even scarier if you're one of those traveling nomads making your money out of real estate. Yeah. That rug gets pulled out from under you, you got nothing to stop the fall.
- [36:48]
B
No, I was, yeah, I'm telling you. So I don't know, hopefully, hopefully we get it all worked out here. I think, I think probably, I don't think things just get worse and worse indefinitely. I don't think that's, that's typically the way things unfold, so let's hope not.
- [37:02]
A
If anybody wants to reach out to you and they want to share any support resources or they just want to ask you questions, where can they go?
- [37:08]
B
Oh, I don't know. I guess, I don't know. I got like a cell phone number so they probably can't. Can't go anywhere. Maybe they can find me on Airbnb.
- [37:16]
A
You have like, a social media page or anything you want to share?
- [37:18]
B
I don't have anything.
- [37:19]
A
All right. He's a traveling nomad, folks. You got to be here on the David Green Show. If you ever want to hear the mysterious Jonathan show up again. We'll have to have you back on, John.
- [37:27]
B
All right. I appreciate the time.
- [37:29]
A
All right. Thank you, sir.
- [37:30]
B
All right, thank you.