Travel Bloggers Unite - We Need A Decentralized Alternative To Airbnb!

This is the last draw! Airbnb has to go away!!!

When we started traveling for our travel project For 91 Days over 7 years ago, the term Travel Bogger was just born and something like a Digital Nomad wasn't heard of. Back in the days we were looking for apartments on Craigslist or consulted Facebook or Twitter, with success. I know it's old school but it worked and we could find some incredible places like half a mansion where we lived in for our For 91 Days in Savannah, Georgia for an inredible price.

Then there was the birth of Airbnb and it was a blessing for us. No more fear of loosing deposit money, you get to read reviews of your host and the place up front, we loved it.

But over the years things changed at Airbnb, it became a nightmare when they steered away from private apartments, where the owner rents a room or the entire place when they're not in town. Now you'll find agencies listing over a hundred properties on the platform.

It changes entire neighborhoods. For example we rented an apartment in Alfama, Lisbon but only because we had a voucher which gave us 2 nights in a decent place. BUT, it was one of the worst Airbnb experiences ever. So many things went wrong, there is not one person being responsible. We couldn't get in touch with anyone when the internet was down. The check-out was far from being smooth. It felt like the agency hired an agency which hired and agency.

On top of it Alfama is now one giant hotel spread out through the entire neighborhood. Portuguese people are being forced out to make room for even more Airbnb Apartments. The locals still living there hate us tourists staying there. They're taking their frustration to the walls as graffiti:

And I understand I would feel the same way. And I do feel guilty for being part of the problem. Yes Airbnb is so convenient but I think NOW is the time for a decentralized, ethical vacation rental platform to take Airbnb's place.

There are some interesting projects on the blockchain like CriptoCribs and https://cryptobnb.io/. I've reached out to both platforms asking about their ethics but I haven't heard back from them yet. We need a platforms which values neighborhoods instead of selling them out.

Not too long ago we scraped together all of our savings and retirement funds to buy an apartment in Valencia, Spain! Our favorite city on this earth. Because after traveling for 4 years nonstop and not having a permanent address presented itself with some problems. We needed to have an address and place where we can relax and and work if we're not on the road.

And yes - we have it listed on Airbnb. But we feel so sick about it. And as hosts we're getting now blackmailed by the platform to turn on Instabooking, to turn our private apartment into a hotel, where we don't have any say who is staying in our place. Otherwise our apartment will be on the bottom for Valencia listings. Sorry Airbnb, this is our real home with our real things in there. NO WE ARE NOT A HOTEL!

And it also started in Valencias as well in our neighborhood, on Sunday afternoon when it's time to check out we hearthe constant sound of trolleys of the checked out guests walking over to the Metro station.

So right now, we're looking for an alternative but in the meantime we're looking to rent out our apartment to other Digital Nomads / Travel Bloggers without Airbnb and for long term only!

Take a look:

It's our baby - we bought and fully renovated it 2 years ago, if you would like to read more about it, let us know. And yes, we would accept cryptocurrencies (SBD of course too) as a payment method.

If you're interested and would like to know more about it, get in touch with us via our Discord Travel Group. And if you hear about a great alternative to Airbnb, please leave comment.

How do you feel about Airbnb these days?