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Using Airbnb

airbnb

I’ve been using Airbnb.com for a few years now. It’s basically a website that allows people to share their spare room or their entire place to travellers for short term stays. I’ve used it a few times in the past when travelling for holidays, and quite extensively when I was in Canberra last year for work, commuting here while living in Melbourne. It’s always been a very rewarding experience, and the people that I’ve met have always been interesting people.

I think it’s a certain kind of person that shares out their room to travellers for short term stays. It’s a person who’s comfortable meeting and socialising with strangers, while also having been (or are) a traveller themselves, so they know what it’s like to try and find somewhere to stay that’s comfortable and friendly.

Airbnb allows both hosts and guests to provide reviews about each other, and these reviews are publicly linked and accessible via their profiles. This means that if you’re a traveller then you can look to stay with someone who has lots of positive reviews, and avoid the ones who have no reviews. It also means that if you’re a host that you can choose to accept booking requests only from people that have lots of positive reviews. It’s a kind of safeguard which works out really well.

We’ve been using it with the apartment that we’re living in (click here to see the ad, maybe even book it if it’s available for your preferred period of stay). It’s been going really well, and the experience has been very positive for us. Offering our spare furnised room at a very reasonable rate compared to hotels has been getting some good interest, and the people have all been great. I always enjoy hearing stories from people about their travel adventures, and since all guests are travellers, there’s certainly lots of enjoyable stories.

I’m enjoying the experience. It’s fun. I’m also enjoying that guests treat the place with respect and care. And they’re mostly quiet, which works out well for me. Talking is great, and sharing stories is great, but too much inane chatter isn’t. Thankfully none of them seem to be like that.

What about you? Have you had any experience with Airbnb yourself? Any good stories to share, or maybe even some bad ones?


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