{"id":25156,"date":"2016-08-25T00:01:12","date_gmt":"2016-08-25T07:01:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=25156"},"modified":"2016-08-25T00:01:12","modified_gmt":"2016-08-25T07:01:12","slug":"airbnb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/airbnb\/","title":{"rendered":"Airbnb — When a Home Away From Home Gets Way Too Homey"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"At<\/a>
The Airbnb Option: At one\u00a0Airbnb the floor was only place I could find for my toiletries. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Barbara Falconer Newhall<\/em><\/p>\n

We’ve done it. We’ve given Airbnb a chance — three chances to be exact. And, maybe I’m\u00a0ready\u00a0to go back to staying in a nice, clean, impersonal motel. Maybe we’ll pay a little extra money and cut bait on Airbnb’s “home away from home” concept.<\/p>\n

Because somebody else’s idea of home isn’t always\u00a0mine.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0Clean but Bleak\u00a0Airbnb<\/h5>\n

Our first foray into Airbnbness took us to a spotless — but barren — house\u00a0on a busy street in our son’s town\u00a0on the Mississippi River. The kitchen was pretty nice, but the<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
The Motel Option: We once stayed in this Los Angeles motel; it was only a little more expensive than an Airbnb — but more predictable. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

rest of the house was chilling: bare walls, bare wooden floors, and the bare minimum of\u00a0chairs, sofas and lamps scattered about the cavernous house.<\/p>\n

The beds were good enough, but there was no place in the bedrooms to put our stuff\u00a0—\u00a0no dressers and only\u00a0a handful of hangers in the closets. I was reduced to arranging my clothes in neat stacks on the closet floor, which — as I said\u00a0— was clean, clean clean. But bleak.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0No-Sleep Airbnd<\/h5>\n

Another of our\u00a0attempts at an Airbnb home away from home was\u00a0a nightmare — except I couldn’t get far enough into sleep to have a nightmare.<\/p>\n

The place was a mess. \u00a0Literally.\u00a0The bedroom was overstuffed with the owner’s clothes, shoes and worn-out slippers. The bathroom was cluttered with used towels, used bathrobes and used toothbrushes. Mold on the shower curtain. The kitchen counter<\/p>\n

\"It's<\/a>
The B&B Option: Candlewyck House, a\u00a0real bed and breakfast in Pentwater, Michigan, was clean and cozy — with fresh sheets and towels and friendly company. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

was invisible\u00a0beneath a\u00a0battalion of half-used condiments. There was a hair\u00a0on the bathtub and a hair\u00a0on the kitchen sink. Fresh-smelling sheets were nowhere to be found.<\/p>\n

A Just Right\u00a0— Almost — Airbnb<\/h5>\n

The third place we rented held the\u00a0Goldilocks place on the clutter continuum. Just enough stuff to be comfy, but not so much that we felt like we were crawling into someone else’s bed at night. It was clean and freshly painted — but, unfortunately, too freshly. The painters had finished up work\u00a0just one\u00a0day before we arrived. The paint smell was still\u00a0tingling my nostrils days later at check out time.<\/p>\n

There’s a good chance we’ll return\u00a0to Goldilocks — the paint will be dry by the time we\u00a0head back. It’s a nice place on a pretty street. There will be\u00a0dressers to stash our\u00a0stuff\u00a0in. And\u00a0nobody’s\u00a0toothbrush will clutter the bathroom sink.<\/p>\n

Back to Squeaky Clean Motels?<\/h5>\n

But maybe, really we’d be better off in a motel. Airbnb is supposed to be a good deal. But, actually, it’s only a so-so\u00a0deal. The places we rented through its website were priced\u00a0just under $200 a night, including the Airbnb service charge.\u00a0A night at a nearby Marriott Residence Inn earlier\u00a0this year — complete with two bedrooms, two baths and a sitting space and kitchenette, all spanking clean — cost us\u00a0$244\u00a0a night, including taxes, etc.<\/p>\n

For the extra fifty\u00a0bucks a night you get clean towels,\u00a0clean carpeting — and sheets\u00a0so fresh and tidy and pillows so plumped and perky that it’s actually possible to forget that you’re getting into a bed that a total stranger occupied just hours before.<\/p>\n

I wonder, if Jon and I are\u00a0going to be making multiple trips each year to visit our adorable new granddaughter — would we be better off renting an apartment or condo? \u00a0A room in a bed and breakfast? How does anyone else manage long-distance grandparenting?\u00a0Suggestions please! I’ll share them. Watch this space.<\/p>\n

More grandmother stuff at “How to Grandmother When the Grandkids Live 2,500 Miles Away.”<\/a>\u00a0Also, “I’m Going to Be a Grandmother. Or Will I Be a Grannie, a Grandma, a Nana?”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"It's<\/a><\/p>\n

Airbnb is supposed to be a good deal — homey and cheap. But maybe, really I’d be better off in a\u00a0real bed and breakfast like this one. Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25268,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[1764,1765,34,1766,508,1767,1768,1769,55,82,33],"class_list":["post-25156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-my-changing-family","tag-airbnb","tag-bed-and-breakfasts","tag-dont-miss","tag-far-away-children","tag-grandparents","tag-grown-up-children","tag-hotels","tag-motels","tag-family-stories","tag-on-the-funny-side","tag-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25156\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}