Property owner class action airBNB lawsuit. All owners can join?
Professional · Brooklyn, NY · Member since 2017 · 624 posts · 147 votes
It appears here there is a class action lawsuit in the works against airBNB by property owners for apparently leasing/subleasing of their property without consent. How large can the class get? Nationwide?
Whoa. Very curious to see how this turns out. Thanks for sharing @Account Closed
Very interesting considering I am about to buy my first property for AirBNB. In Nashville area where I live there is a lot of noise right now regarding legislation on STR by non-occupants. This will probably get a lot of press but seems to me a low likelihood of a successful lawsuit. But if it raises the awareness of people subletting against their HOA rules or lease agreements it could make governments take more notice.
@Ken Dillard You would definitely want to look into what the specific local ordinance is. I am also finding in certain areas in New York for instance, landlords are being fined and held liable for running an unlicensed hotel although they knew nothing of this nor did they benefit from tenants illegal unlicensed business on airBNB.
Whoa. Very curious to see how this turns out. Thanks for sharing @Account Closed
@Aaron Pfeffer Sure thing.
Hm this is interesting. I too am curious how this will play out. I know in November here in SF Airbnb took steps to eliminate hosts with more than one listing, as people were renting out properties without permission then booking them through Airbnb.
Interesting article! Do you think this will hold up? It seems to me that Aimco should be doing a better job of screening the tenants and evicting them when they breaking their lease agreements. Blaming Airbnb sounds a bit absurd if you ask me.
@Account Closed I'll be curious to see how it progresses. I have to hard time thinking that you sue Airbnb based on the behavior of tenants. Unless Airbnb is actively marketing to "tenants" instead of "owners" specifically. I know I wouldn't want my tenants decided to run an Airbnb out of one of my units. But I'd think that's an owner-tenant issue rather than an Airbnb issue. I'll be interested to see if they sue other competitors to Airbnb and how it progresses.
I will say this, I want all of the lawsuits to happen now and in every state. The municipalities to set up rules now as to if there are areas where it will be enthusiastically adopted and others where short-term hotel-ish style use cases will be forbidden. The worse things is ambiguity where I don't exactly know what I'm getting myself into or opening myself up to as a landlord.
Airbnb is responsible in regards to accepting adds without having proof it is being run by the actual owner of a property. How responsible is the question. Hopefully something will come of this to prevent tenants from appropriating a landlords property for their own profits.
Airbnb isn't leasing or subleasing anything. What a terrible lawsuit. People are. They're just using airbnb as a site to advertise their service.
If I post a unit for rent on Craigslist can they be sued? What if I post it on Facebook?
I can't stand sue happy people. I like them almost less than people who try to tell me what I can and can't do with my own property.
@Cody L. Its a bit more serious than that Cody. They are alleging they have contacted airBNB on many occassions to advise airBNB that it should stop renting/enabling the rental of its properties because that was in direct violation of its rules. AirBNB apparently refused or ignored these concerns.
They also allege a pattern of conduct and disturbances by airBNB renters that further causes an unusual amount of headache compared to their renters who go through a completely different vetting process by the way.
They have a valid concern. If you are in a habit of selling stolen property thats bad enough; if the actual owner of the property then contacts you and say, hey buddy, stop selling these items they were stolen from me, you ignore and continue selling, what then is your defense?
"...When approved, Aimco residents sign the Company's Good Neighbor Policy as part of their lease – a promise of good behavior and consideration for their neighbors. Aimco objects to the fact that Airbnb transient guests are unvetted and have no vested interest in maintaining a peaceful community atmosphere. On many occasions, Airbnb-supported trespassers have created safety, noise, and nuisance concerns for Aimco's lawful residents, including incidents of public drunkenness and fighting requiring police assistance. Aimco repeatedly asked Airbnb to stop renting Aimco's apartments in breach of Aimco's leases with its residents, but Airbnb refused..."
Airbnb is responsible in regards to accepting adds without having proof it is being run by the actual owner of a property. How responsible is the question. Hopefully something will come of this to prevent tenants from appropriating a landlords property for their own profits.
@Thomas S. That is true Thomas, what makes it worse is that this particular owner with a large network of properties have told airBNB on numerous occassions to refrain from illegally renting/or enabling the rental of its properties which they of course ignored. They knew or should have known not to.
Airbnb isn't leasing or subleasing anything. What a terrible lawsuit. People are. They're just using airbnb as a site to advertise their service.
If I post a unit for rent on Craigslist can they be sued? What if I post it on Facebook?
I can't stand sue happy people. I like them almost less than people who try to tell me what I can and can't do with my own property.
@Cody L. Its a bit more serious than that Cody. They are alleging they have contacted airBNB on many occassions to advise airBNB that it should stop renting/enabling the rental of its properties because that was in direct violation of its rules. AirBNB apparently refused or ignored these concerns.
They also allege a pattern of conduct and disturbances by airBNB renters that further causes an unusual amount of headache compared to their renters who go through a completely different vetting process by the way.
They have a valid concern. If you are in a habit of selling stolen property thats bad enough; if the actual owner of the property then contacts you and say, hey buddy, stop selling these items they were stolen from me, you ignore and continue selling, what then is your defense?
"...When approved, Aimco residents sign the Company's Good Neighbor Policy as part of their lease – a promise of good behavior and consideration for their neighbors. Aimco objects to the fact that Airbnb transient guests are unvetted and have no vested interest in maintaining a peaceful community atmosphere. On many occasions, Airbnb-supported trespassers have created safety, noise, and nuisance concerns for Aimco's lawful residents, including incidents of public drunkenness and fighting requiring police assistance. Aimco repeatedly asked Airbnb to stop renting Aimco's apartments in breach of Aimco's leases with its residents, but Airbnb refused..."
AirBnB isn't leasing them though, AirBnB is just a platform that allows people to advertise properties available for rent. They're connecting the STR "owners" (or not owners), with STR seekers. Whether they need to verify the ownership criteria is another question - but others don't (FB, CL, EBay, etc). I got scammed on a site coincidentally bought by AirBnB, since it's just a platform, it isn't their fault the person used fraudulent CC's to transfer me money. Then they caught it mid-transfer (transfer take days) and cancelled it, victim-less crime in their eyes! Although I told them I lost $300 over it and a pair of Rockets playoff tickets, learned a lesson that no internet companies are responsible for anything these days.
@Kevin Coggins So they are facilitating the commission of a crime or shall we say brokering it? Thats sounds like the definition of aiding and betting, accomplice etc.
Speaking of fraud....many many years ago, I responded to what I thought was a legitimate ad on CareerBuilder (not sure if they still around). I remember it was a company that claimed to be based in Tennessee somewhere and outsourcing certain accounting functions. They actually included what I thought was a $1,000 check in a "welcome packet" which they claimed was to use for buying printer, fax machine, office supplies etc.
I went to cash the check and couldn't quite understand why the lady was smiling at me at the counter. She apparently had alerted the cops.
Before you know it, cop cars, sirens everywhere. People are trying to figure whats going on, i'm trying to find out whats going on, until a few of the officers approach me and ask the cashier, is this him? Is this who? She nods. And they are like, you gonna have to come with us sir. Come with you were ? To the station. You were passing a fraudulent check. What? Put your hands behind your back and now theres a tussle.. quit resisting... don't make me tase you.... and then you shoved into the back seat of the police car. This was a nightmare.
But I had no clue what was going on. They were having none of it. I spent almost an entire day explaining to a detective how this was a very simple issue that could be verified if I could access my email to establish the facts, I still had the envelope the check was mailed in which they were trying to say was irrelevant. They said they only had to prove I passed a fraudulent check for the charge to stick... whether I knew or not that it was a bad check wasn't their concern. Really?
They eventually let me go after the threats and verifying that there was indeed a scam going on but if I had left that scene and went back to cash another check from that company... do I then have a defense?
Thats sort of the issue here with airBNB. Sometimes you cant get off the hook by saying well, I thought she was 18 or that she looked 18.
@Account Closed But by breaking Aimco's policy, that is not a criminal offense, and considering they don't have an agreement with Aimco, how are they held to that lease? That is between the tenant and Aimco. If you buy weed online from a company in say China, is the company held responsible for sending you the weed or are you? It may be completely legal where they are based out of to sell weed, but because it's illegal for you to buy it, doesn't mean they shouldn't be able to sell their weed.
It's like if a wholesaler is illegally marketing a property on here, is biggerpockets liable? Would they be liable if I connected with a contractor on here who scammed me?
In both cases, I don't see how the use of a third party platform somehow makes that platform liable. Unless Craigslist has been held liable for all the scams/armed robberies/murders that have occurred on there, I seriously doubt anything has changed.
The only way I see anything happening, is if somebody wants to send a message to these "third party platforms" to show that they are liable for the content/transactions on their websites/apps. But, I won't hold my breath for that, even if there's victory in a lower level court it'd likely lose an appeal.
To kind of add to what @Cody L. said previously, it seems like Aimco is chasing the $$$$, instead of who should be held liable. Just an example of how this kind of situation should probably be handled, instead of suing AirBnB:
My friend was trying to rent out his condo for the Super Bowl here, you could easily make $1,000+ over the weekend with a half decent location. His HOA sent him a letter because they found his listing on AirBnB and told him if it wasn't removed he'd be fined.
Maybe Aimco should go that route and get to the source of these listings.
@Kevin Coggins It can be but also doesn't have to be. If the city or town says it is a criminal or fineable offense to operate an unlicensed hotel then that is what it is.
What usually happens is that the landlord is getting stuck with all these fines by city for tenant violations it knew nothing about but is liable for. Some forms of negligence by the landlords tenant that results in injury to others in the community can get you in court.
In business though, the case doesn't have to be criminal to result in monetary liabilities. A party can allege economic harm or injury due to your actions or inaction and can civilly extinguish your assets.
@Kevin Coggins lol... actually it seems like they have a problem with (despite numerous warnings) airBNB renting or enabling the rental of their properties without their consent. They also have an issue with tenants they know nothing about, creating what apparently has been a pattern of disturbances that they do not experience with the tenants they actually had a formal lease contract with.
Airbnb isn't leasing or subleasing anything. What a terrible lawsuit. People are. They're just using airbnb as a site to advertise their service.
If I post a unit for rent on Craigslist can they be sued? What if I post it on Facebook?
I can't stand sue happy people. I like them almost less than people who try to tell me what I can and can't do with my own property.
Ever hear of a website called Silk Road? They weren't buying or selling drugs, it was just a site for for people to do it. The common theme, both sites took the money. Craigslist and Facebook don't handle the money.
I think what makes landlords mad is even when they report their property being listed on the site without their approval, AirBNB won't take it down. That makes them complicit and open to liability.
Airbnb isn't leasing or subleasing anything. What a terrible lawsuit. People are. They're just using airbnb as a site to advertise their service.
If I post a unit for rent on Craigslist can they be sued? What if I post it on Facebook?
I can't stand sue happy people. I like them almost less than people who try to tell me what I can and can't do with my own property.
Ever hear of a website called Silk Road? They weren't buying or selling drugs, it was just a site for for people to do it. The common theme, both sites took the money. Craigslist and Facebook don't handle the money.
I think what makes landlords mad is even when they report their property being listed on the site without their approval, AirBNB won't take it down. That makes them complicit and open to liability.
If landlords know it's happening, evict the tenant. airbnb shouldn't have to know the rules pertaining to STR for every city, state, or apartment community.
The comparison between SR and airbnb is weak. I'm no fan of airbnb (the company). I don't use them as I don't want to help fund a politically outspoken company who doesn't care about the politics of anyone outside their Bay Area bubble. So it pains me to defend them here
Airbnb isn't leasing or subleasing anything. What a terrible lawsuit. People are. They're just using airbnb as a site to advertise their service.
If I post a unit for rent on Craigslist can they be sued? What if I post it on Facebook?
I can't stand sue happy people. I like them almost less than people who try to tell me what I can and can't do with my own property.
@Cody L. Its a bit more serious than that Cody. They are alleging they have contacted airBNB on many occassions to advise airBNB that it should stop renting/enabling the rental of its properties because that was in direct violation of its rules. AirBNB apparently refused or ignored these concerns.
They also allege a pattern of conduct and disturbances by airBNB renters that further causes an unusual amount of headache compared to their renters who go through a completely different vetting process by the way.
They have a valid concern. If you are in a habit of selling stolen property thats bad enough; if the actual owner of the property then contacts you and say, hey buddy, stop selling these items they were stolen from me, you ignore and continue selling, what then is your defense?
"...When approved, Aimco residents sign the Company's Good Neighbor Policy as part of their lease – a promise of good behavior and consideration for their neighbors. Aimco objects to the fact that Airbnb transient guests are unvetted and have no vested interest in maintaining a peaceful community atmosphere. On many occasions, Airbnb-supported trespassers have created safety, noise, and nuisance concerns for Aimco's lawful residents, including incidents of public drunkenness and fighting requiring police assistance. Aimco repeatedly asked Airbnb to stop renting Aimco's apartments in breach of Aimco's leases with its residents, but Airbnb refused..."
The tenants are not illegally doing anything. And airbnb doesn't HAVE to take down the listings.
Are the tenants breaking the rules of their landlord? Sure sounds like it. So evict them. If tenants know they'll get evicted for breaking this rule they'll stop. Right? No need to bring the damn government into it yeesh
I had a tenant try to do this in our property we told them they'd be evicted never did I think to cry to airbnb about it much less sue them. This is a landlord/tenant issue
@Cody L. You seem to be ignoring a single fact... if the city or state says, "it is illegal to rent a room for a certain amount of days or operate a hotel without a license", and tenant ignores that, knowingly or unknowingly, a violation occurred. It wasn't a suggestion by the city or state but a rule or law. The landlord unfortunately is fined who in turn goes after tenant, airBNB or both based on specifics of case. Sometimes the guilty party is the landlord using the airBNB service, sometimes the tenant without the landlords consent. In this case you have a landlord with a large network of units, 50,000+, who is the forced to terminate numerous leases because after complaining to airBNB several times, they ignored the warnings, facilitated the illegal transactions, and profited from it. Its not just an advertising service. They are in business with the illegal host and offer a flaky insurance policy of sorts, that doesn't always deal with the nature of some of the crimes that result from the service in some cases. This is a serious complaint:
Hm this is interesting. I too am curious how this will play out. I know in November here in SF Airbnb took steps to eliminate hosts with more than one listing, as people were renting out properties without permission then booking them through Airbnb.
@Ariel Vincent Some cities and states do have laws and ordinances that make some forms of airBNB usage illegal. Here you have a City going after landlord for $1.2million.
Why would anyone that is a landlord support Airbnb on this matter. This is about holding companies to a standard of business practice that protects the public. If it is known that a business customer is doing something wrong then that company should have a minimum level of responsibility to not enable that act. Not my responsibility is a inappropriate response and why government is regularly forced to interfere with private business.
What many people fail to understand is that if companies do not hold certain standards the government is forced to step in to inforce those standards to protect the public.
If businesses like airbnb are not going to police themselves, which is the root of this lawsuit, then the government will once again end up having to do it for them.
@Douglas Krofcheck This is interesting.. last I checked, if you are a landlord in New York or California who utilized a reasonable amount of debt to finance the property, you are barely cash flowing; with the play being mostly appreciation. Some already spend quite a bit, out of pocket, to maintain building during holding period. Now you have this 'great idea', that landlords should go out and spend more money on finger print readers, airBNB scanning software and schemes to track renters movement, now some renters are having privacy concerns. So the victim now has to spend more money, while airBNB and tenant, profits.