Any experience with them? We're looking at spending winters in warmer places and Airbnb looks at first glance to be a convenient way to find long-term rental accommodation. I don't know anyone who's used them as a guest, though one guy here uses them as a host and says good things.
We're talking about Mexico or Panama or Chile or Argentina, places like that. Portugal, maybe. But I just hope to get general comments about how reliable they've been.
I live out of Airbnbs since it's cheaper than rent and utilities over here on a month to month basis.
Out of the 15 reservations I've done:
One had my parked car banged into,
One said I need to not talk so much to others who want peace and quiet,
One said I left the place dirty, but I got that review removed since we had plenty of conversation on the app which was friendly and I was never told on the app that I made a mess,
One claimed it was 100 ft away from a railway line on the very VERY bottom of the description which I took as a light rail line since it was near uptown in a city and my previous reservation was nearby, but it turned out to be a freight train line that woke me up in the middle of the night, and
One had a roommate who smoked pot in the middle of the night nextdoor on a regular basis so I had to ask for an air filter to get installed.
IOW, one out of every three reservations goes awry in some way or another.
Now to be fair, the places I reserve with are economy class hosts. They're at the level of your typical 2-3 star hotel as far as accommodations are concerned. I'm not looking for much.
You can find better places than what I reserve, but understand that hosts typically tend to not preview their properties because they know their locations are in demand. What you should do is inquire, not book, with 5 hosts and ask them all to preview so at least one of them gives you a preview and that preview turns out alright. By preview, I mean try to go on Zoom or Skype or some other video call. Ask to see the bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, and parking in real time. You do not want to get stuck with affording damages from a previous guest because a host might have had one who trashed the place before you arrived.
When you do check-in, make sure you take pictures of every room you're using, check the shower, check the bed, and check the fridge.