Airbnb ‘won’t take down illegally-sublet listings’ claims landlord
The short-lets giant has not taken down a listing despite being informed that the Central London property is being illegally sublet, it is claimed.
A London apartment that was let by the Chelsea branch of Marsh & Parsons is being illegally sublet on a major short-lets platform even though both firms have been made aware of what’s going on by the landlord, it has been claimed.
Problems kicked off this year at the property on Beaufort Street after a tenant moved in but immediately informed the landlord that that he was undergoing a disciplinary procedure at work and had been put on leave without pay.
Although the tenant had been referenced via a leading tenant checking service, he told his landlord, Yasmina Mathias, that he could no longer afford the rent and then began secretly subletting the premises on Airbnb, it later transpired.
Referenced
The listing was only discovered because Mathias and her family live at the same address and saw a variety of strangers arriving at the door with suitcases, she tells The Neg.
When she subsequently found her flat on Airbnb it had a large number of bookings and she immediately informed the UK arm of the situation.
Airbnb responded by saying it would ”proceed in investigating the issue at hand,” but there was no further correspondence and the property is still available on the platform.
It is a growing problem and not just restricted to Airbnb, especially in central London, and one which was flagged up in The Neg back in 2018. Also, the property highligthed in this most recent case is also available to rent for short stays on Booking.com, as well as Top Hotels, London Hotel Deals and Stayz all of whom have similar T&Cs that throw the responsbililty for ensuring permission has been granted for the property to be used for this purpose onto the person listing it.
Illegal sub-letting
This highlights the challenges that these short-let platforms face. If an illegal sub-letting tenant is thrown off one platform, it’s all too easy for them to pop up on another, making it almost impossible to police this kind of criminal activity by dodgy tenants – something these criminals are all too aware of.
it also creates huge headaches for letting agencies. Back in 2018 Base Property boss Kristjan Byfield was highly critical of Airbnb for its refusal to take action over illegal sub-letting after his staff discovered one of the apartments the firm manages was being illegally sub-let in this way.
In a similar case to this one reported more recently in the Guardian, the newspaper accused Airbnb of wanting to “distance itself, as far as possible, from the host-guest contract to avoid any legal liability, while pocketing a percentage fee of every booking”.
The Neg has seen correspondence between Mathias and both Airbnb and Marsh & Parsons concerning the illegal let, and she says that although Airbnb has been unhelpful so far, the estate agency could have done more to help her deal with the tenant too.
Airbnb says…
An Airbnb spokesperson has told The Neg: “We are in touch with the landlord about this matter. We ask all hosts to ensure that they have permission to list their space and remind them to check and follow local rules before they list and throughout the year. This is made clear in our Terms of Service and on our responsible hosting page”.
Marsh & Parsons has been approached by The Neg but has declined to comment, saying it does not discuss anything regarding individual client instructions, cases or issues in the media or to third parties.
In what other commercial environment can you lease out a 6-7 figure asset without any verification over ownership and consent? Airbnb and all the short let platform, could easily cross-check hosts against land registry ownership records- requiring an owner’s direct consent where they are not the host. Their dev team could build this in a day. But they won’t, because they know it will result in a huge reduction in listings. The silent enablement of illegal subletting.