ANY AIRBNB Experiences,
like many Airbnb
rentals, are operated by
enthusiastic semi-ama-
teurs. On an unseasonably hot
fall afternoon, I joined one of
them on one of the more popular
offerings: Hidden Stairways of
San Francisco.
“The best part about these
stairs is that nobody really knows
they’re here,” host Greg McQuaid
told my group of four. Each of
us had paid $34 to join him.
Perhaps the heat had kept others
away, but four people on an Ex-
perience is in line with Airbnb’s
usual maximum of 10 guests,
designed to foster intimacy. The
staircase we were standing at
the base of, in the Golden Gate
Heights neighborhood, was
covered by a colorful tile mosaic
of sparkly flowers and fauna. Our
guide offered to take each of our
photos, and then we ascended to
panoramic views of the city.
Some hosts have found that
Experiences can be quite lucra-
tive. Tia Clark runs Let’s Go
Crabbing in Charleston, S.C., an
excursion that lets users catch
their own crustaceans by casting
nets from a dock. She says she
was able to quit her job as a bar-
tender to operate her Experience
full-time. Clark charges $75 per
person, and if she books all 10
slots, she can pull in roughly
$600 from every two-and-a-half-
hour trip. (Airbnb takes a 20%
cut of hosts’ earnings.) McQuaid,
who used to work as a radio pro-
ducer, also runs his walking tour
as a full-time gig, though he says
money can be tight at times; he
says he likes Experiences because
“people can make money out of
their passions.”
Chesky has said that Experiences
could emerge as a less fraught
business than its core homes
offering, one less likely to spark
conflicts with local governments.
But after its Halloween from hell,
Airbnb isn’t taking anything for
granted. As part of its sweeping
overhaul, the company says it will
verify 100% of Experiences.
Details on what that will entail
remain unclear. Airbnb already re-
quires aspiring Experience hosts to
apply for acceptance by complet-
ing 24 online prompts that involve
questions about themselves and
their work. Specialized activities,
such as operating certain vehicles,
already require proof of licenses,
permits, and certifications, and
other “heightened review,” Airbnb
says. Now it’s expanding that clas-
sification to include outdoor ac-
tivities near bodies of water, high-
altitude hiking, and backcountry
skiing, to name a few examples.
The company uses a third-party
vendor to verify licenses. Most
Experience hosts and guests are
insured for up to $1 million under
an Airbnb liability policy.
The importance of such precau-
tions was illustrated this autumn
by a tragedy in Puerto Rico. A
young couple from the mainland
U.S. were killed by a flash flood
on Oct. 11 during an Experience
coping with a bad trip at airbnb
“if there’s a [safet y] standard we can
stand behind in a deeper way than before,
then i think more people will use airbnb.”
—BRIAN CHESKY, CEO AND COFOUNDER
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