Some people of color — particularly Black guests — say that despite the policies and partnerships that home-sharing platforms have put into place, they still face discrimination when booking or staying in vacation rentals.
Dallas and Shirley Smith, who booked an apartment on Vrbo last year to celebrate their 55th wedding anniversary but were turned away by the host after they arrived, at home in Peachtree City, Ga., Nov. 2, 2022.
Since 2016, the company has required all guests and hosts to agree to its Community Commitment, to “agree to treat each other with respect and without judgment or bias,” and to adhere to a nondiscrimination policy. The report is vaguer about what the company is doing to oversee hosts and guests who show bias after a home is booked. A number of Black home-share guests have complained on social media about how they’ve been treated, and The New York Times interviewed a half-dozen who shared their accounts of what they believed to be racism on the part of hosts.
Evans, who believes that the host treated her unfairly because she is Black, said she called the company more than 30 times and sent a letter to Airbnb’s CEO, Brian Chesky. She provided photos of her 10-person dinner and a large framed map of area plantations that hung over the sofa; she felt it celebrated slavery and indicated the host’s mindset.
Airbnb and other vacation rental companies can be in a difficult position when they try to root out racist behavior after the fact, especially in cases where the bias isn’t made explicit. Black guests say what they experience can be hard to document. Friendly online exchanges turn chilly when hosts see guests’ faces; they are subjected to arbitrary rules or false accusations. Home-sharing companies often have to adjudicate conflicting accounts of what took place with little documentation.
Still, in April 2021, Dallas and Shirley Smith, who are Black, said they encountered racism when they booked a garage apartment in Montgomery, Alabama, for a weekend to celebrate their 55th wedding anniversary. Vrbo does not require guests to have a profile photo. When the Smiths arrived and called the host for an entry code, he told them they had to leave; the apartment was rented to someone else. Dallas Smith pointed out that it appeared to be vacant.
“We definitely take any reports of discrimination seriously,” Fish said. “One bad experience means it’s not eliminated.”Progress Against Discrimination
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