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Our little family just got back from Europe where we spent 1.5 months living out of Air B&Bs. We learned a lot about Europe, but we learned even more about Air B&B, and _this_ is everything wrong with Air B&B.
1. Beds
This might seem like the one thing that a B&B would get right, but I can tell you right now that the one thing we missed most about home was our bed. During our month and a half in Europe our beds were the most unpredictable thing about every stay. You might be looking at the app and thinking “it tells me how big the bed is,” which is true, but it doesn’t tell you if that big luscious bed is actually 2 small beds pushed together with a nasty crack down the middle that your baby will get stuck in. They don’t tell you that those 2 blankets and 2 pillows in the picture are the only pillows and blankets in the entire apartment. They don’t tell you that the frame squeaks so loudly that when you get up to pee it wakes up everyone in the building.
Those all sound crazy, but every single one of those happened over the course of our trip and that’s why ‘Beds’ are the number one thing on our list.
2. Parking
I know this won’t apply to everyone, but if it does, I’m warning you now, parking alone can end up ruining a trip for you. Just like beds, we saw every variation of “parking available on premises or street” and they are not all created equal. To keep it short I’ll just say that our stay in Dublin only offered street parking. That cost 3 dollars and hour. And required you to move your car every 3 hours. Think about that. You’re trying to get out and see the city, but instead you have to babysit your car because you can’t leave it for longer than 3 hours? And on top of that you spent $150 for the privilege?
I know some places are different, but trust me, even when you’re in the suburbs, make sure there’s good parking.
3. Checkin and Checkout
If you’ve ever stayed in a hotel you know the process. Show up after 3, give them a credit card number, go to your room. When you leave, show up at the front desk before 11 and tell them you’re leaving. Not so with a B&B.
An Air B&B can set their own rules for checkin and checkout. What does that mean for you? Checkin and checkout is whenever they say it is. You want the front door key? It’s up the block, behind a building, locked to a fence. You want to checkout? Better do the dishes, lock the car park, turn off the heat and electricity and do it before 10.
Not every Air B&B is a pain like this, but most are, and they don’t disclose it until after you book.
4. Breakfast
This is a small on, but the value of a free continental breakfast can’t be overlooked. Not every hotel offers this, but a restaurant is going to be $10 per person per day. Just keep it in mind.
5. Cleanliness
This one might seem obvious, but most reviewers don’t factor in the building. Our stay in London looked great in the listing and even sounded great in the reviews. What everyone failed to mention? It was under a hookah lounge. That meant the hallways leading to the room were disgusting and the you couldn’t open the windows because of all the smoke directly outside your window. It was so bad that we actually tried finding a nearby hotel to move into, but there was nothing available last minute.
6. Neighborhood
Transitioning right off of cleanliness into the neighborhood. For some reason Air B&B has not way of getting information about the neighborhood the listing is in. You might think that this is something that can easily be solved with websites, and it partially can be done with websites that show heat maps for tourist activity or crime. What you won’t be able to find out is that the listing is underneath a hookah lounge, or worse, next door to a brothel.
I’m not joking.
The checkin process felt sketchy, and after arriving from the train station we realized the neighborhood wasn’t great, but it wasn’t until we went for the key that we realized what we were in for. The apartment was down a long skinny alleyway, which was mostly fine. Paris is full of alleys. The problem was the obvious prostitutes at the mouth of the alley.
Now, we were traveling with a group, so we pushed past and pretended we didn’t seeee anything, but then we saw the neon lights coming from the apartment next door to ours. If we weren’t traveling in a group, we would have bailed that moment.
That’s a wrap on everything wrong with Air B&B. Do you have your own B&B horror story? Leave it in the comments below. Is there something you want to see in our next video B&B? Leave that below too. If you found this video helpful make sure you like, subscribe, and ring the bell. We’ll catch you next time.
