Airbnb cracks down on party homes, from Escondido to Pacific Beach

Following its pledge to ban parties from its short-term rental listings, Airbnb announced Friday that it has so far suspended or removed 17 San Diego County properties from its online platform.

“Party houses,” characterized by Airbnb as those that have received complaints or violated Airbnb’s policies on parties and events, are scattered throughout the county, from Escondido and La Mesa to several neighborhoods in San Diego. , including Clairemont Mesa, Linda Vista, Mission Bay Park, the Peninsula area, North Park, Pacific Beach, Southeast San Diego and Uptown.

The San Francisco-based home-sharing company didn’t provide details of individual short-term rentals, nor would it share addresses “out of respect for guest privacy”.

“We will continue to enforce our party rules against groups of any size and will take action on both guests and listings if we receive reports from neighbors,” said John Choi, director of public policy at Airbnb. in San Diego.

To date, Airbnb has launched similar crackdowns in four other regions across the country — Los Angeles County, where 50 listings have been removed or suspended; Arizona with 50; Clark County, NV, with 20; and Atlanta, 50.

Airbnb differentiates a deletion, which is permanent, from a suspension, which is temporary and varies in duration depending on the severity of the issues.

While Airbnb already last year instituted a global ban on party homes that “create persistent nuisance in the neighborhood,” it announced more than a week ago that it would begin banning all parties and all events at the homes listed on its website. The latest action is largely driven by the widening pandemic, and it’s likely San Diego and other cities can expect to see more listings removed as Airbnb continues its crackdown.

“In the current environment, preventing large parties and gatherings is more important than ever, and we support the efforts of local officials to put an end to this irresponsible behavior,” Choi said in a statement. “We hope that sharing these milestones today can further raise awareness of our Neighboring hotline 24/7 so that we can strengthen enforcement of our party house ban throughout San Diego County.

Anyone wishing to report a party or nuisance at a short-term rental listed on Airbnb can call the company’s hotline at 1-855-635-7754.

It’s unclear exactly how many short-term rentals there are in San Diego County, but in the City of San Diego, the City Auditor estimated the total — both the whole house and the shared rental units — at 16,000. This includes listings on multiple sites, including Airbnb.

For years, critics of San Diego’s growing inventory of vacation rentals in residential neighborhoods have complained that the city has done little to enforce nuisance regulations and has failed to wanted to close the houses which were the subject of multiple complaints to the local police.

While many cities in the county and across the United States have specific laws governing Airbnb-style rentals, San Diego city leaders have so far been unable to implement regulations at the airport. city ​​scale. Two years ago, Airbnb launched a successful referendum petition campaign which forced the city council to abandon strict vacation rental rules passed in 2018.

It was only recently that the San Diego City Attorney’s Office take action against a Bankers Hill short-term rental whose neighbors had repeatedly complained to the police, saying it was the place of loud parties. City Attorney Mara Elliott filed a civil suit in Superior Court earlier this month, citing violations of the state’s unfair competition law and municipal code. Additionally, Airbnb has suspended listing while it investigates.

Airbnb emphasizes on its website that unauthorized parties have always been banned on its listings, noting that 73% of homes listed on its site worldwide already prohibit parties in their “house rules” and that “the vast majority of our customers behave inappropriately.” in a way that respects the House Rules and for the neighbors.

Airbnb says it has stepped up its efforts since the start of the pandemic by removing the “event-friendly” search filter from its platform as well as the internal “parties and events allowed” rules from what it describes as event-friendly listings. Additionally, the most recent global ban on party homes includes a provision that Airbnb listing occupancy will be capped at 16 people.

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