Airbnb to offer hosts loans for home improvements
Airbnb is to offer loans to some hosts as part of a wider programme that increasingly positions the company as an alternative to hotels. Its trial service, Airbnb Select, gives hosts the opportunity to take out loans to make minor improvements or have professional-quality photographs taken, with the borrowed sum repaid via rental revenues. The launch of Airbnb Select is part of a broader campaign to standardise Airbnb's offerings and move away from the company's more individualistic approach, which invited guests to "live like a local".

Airbnb is looking to take an increasingly active role in ensuring the homes it offers for rent on its site are pleasant to stay in, from offering loans to hosts for home improvements to actively partnering in the construction of an apartment block in Florida, according to reports.

The changes, which see the company move further than ever from its origins as a listing site connecting holidaymakers with hosts who have a spare room, could help Airbnb cement its position as an alternative to traditional hotels.

But it also risks irritating hosts who enjoyed the previously laissez-faire approach, as well as prompting awkward questions from regulators worldwide about the precise nature of Airbnb’s business.

The home improvement loans are part of a programme being trialled by the company, dubbed Airbnb Select, according to industry news site the Information. The programme will highlight homes and hosts that are more likely to appeal to travellers seeking a high-quality, hotel-like experience, the Information says, as well as offer them guidance and assistance to further iron out the wrinkles in their offering.

That can range from advice on cosmetic improvements to their homes, to help shooting the best photographs, as well as more significant aid such as the loans, which would be repaid through revenue made from future bookings.

Select is just the latest example of Airbnb’s effort to create a more standardised offering. Even its conventional hosts have reportedly come under pressure from the company to dial back on the idiosyncrasies that the site was famous for in its early days, when the key selling point for many tourists was the ability to “live like a local”, as one recent ad campaign put it.

Hosts are urged, for instance, to “learn from hotel bathrooms” – clearing bathroom counters of their own products and placing rolled-up towels in a basket – and “show personality, not personal items”. “Too many pictures of your dog and family might make [guests] feel uncomfortable,” the company notes.

Airbnb’s attempt to build a hotel-like experience goes further than simply pushing hosts to refine their homes, though. In a number of locations around the world, the company is actively partnering on the creation of hotel-like properties from construction onwards.

In Florida, for instance, an apartment building branded as “Niido powered by Airbnb” will see tenants in the 324 new-build flats, located just outside Orlando, encouraged to sublet their properties for up to half the year in exchange for paying a portion of the income to their landlord.

Partnering at the point of construction allows Airbnb hosts to offer the perks of their luxury apartments, such as swimming pools and other communal areas, to visitors without falling foul of their building’s regulations. And, of course, it allows Airbnb to dictate the design of the building to suit its travellers’ needs.

“This partnership shows how landlords, developers, and Airbnb can work together to create value for everyone and better serve tenants,” Jaja Jackson, Airbnb’s director of global multifamily housing partnerships, said in a statement on Thursday.

In Japan in 2016, Airbnb took an even more forthright step, experimenting with building a “community centre where travellers can also stay” in the village of Yoshino. The company responded forcefully to media reports that called the experiment a “hotel”, however, arguing that it wasn’t one, since “the Yoshino house is managed by and for the community, and 97% of the price charged by the hosts goes directly to the community”.

The risk for the company isn’t just that existing hosts rebel against the changes (although a job advert seeking someone to improve host quality “without driving significant churn in supply” suggests it is concerned). It is also that, as the company takes on more hotel-like aspects, it begins being asked to take on more hotel-like responsibilities, too.

Currently, Airbnb offloads the difficulty of complying with the myriad different local regulations on short-stay rentals around the world onto its hosts – a choice which some localities have welcomed, but others have fought strongly against. In New York City, that fight escalated until the company sued the city for passing a bill that made it unlawful to advertise unlawful rentals.

By arguing that it merely connects hosts and travellers, Airbnb has managed to keep on the right side of the law in most other places. But as that claim becomes less convincing, the company might find itself with more and more New Yorks on its hands.