"I Was Terrified The Whole Time": 16 Travelers Whose Nightmare AirBnbs Wrecked Their Dream Vacations

If you're a horror fan, you might have already seen Barbarian, a movie about a woman who discovers the rental home she booked might actually be a real nightmare.

20th Century / Via media.giphy.com

Recently, the BuzzFeed Community came together to share their own horror stories they experienced after booking on Airbnb. Here are a few extra stories to add to the fun:

1."I rented a room as a broke college student, and a married couple had a huge fight about me, and I had to leave. Her creepy husband literally was sending my pictures (which I did not give him) from my social media to his buddies talking about me. It got even worse — so stay safe out there."

Psyche

2."Not a horror story but kind of funny. We stayed at a gorgeous, if dated house — on the water, hot tub, beautiful. The owners lived there in the summer and rented it in the winter, so the cupboards and pantries were full of food. We started looking through it, as you do, and began to notice everything was old. Real old. Thus began our weekend drinking game, 'When Did It Expire?' Some of the things we found EXPIRED 20 years ago!"

MrsEliot2013

3."I rented an Airbnb in Vancouver for five days during a conference. The apartment was gorgeous and on the 18th floor of a building that did not allow Airbnbs. There were signs EVERYWHERE banning short-term rentals, and the owner had me sneak in the back and use the freight elevator. I wasn’t allowed to enter or leave at certain times. I was terrified the whole time I’d get caught and thrown out in a foreign country."

Freight elevator
Andrew Kurcan / Getty Images/EyeEm

4."My husband and I booked an Airbnb in Florida for two nights. The photos looked really nice; they had a mini private beach with great reviews, so we thought it was all right. Come to find out, the whole thing was glass. Floor to ceiling was see-through glass with no curtains or anything, a bathroom with a rattan half door that faced other houses. The only shower was a tiny outdoor one with no door. The worst thing of all is that the Airbnb was directly next to the owner's house, and their balcony looked over the house and shower. They said they never go out on that balcony, but they spent most of the time we were there working out and chilling where we could see them and they could see us. The cherry on top: The water was turned off the day we were supposed to go to a wedding, so neither of us could shower or anything. ... It was an absolute nightmare."

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5."One of my friends rented a room in a flat in Paris for a few days. She said it was amazing, but the listing failed to mention that the couple had a cat that spent a lot of time in the room. She is allergic so had to spend the entire time basically mainlining allergy medicine."

—kristink48367649e

6."We had one that we called the murder death cabin. It was close to the beach, but you had a long, steep set of stairs to walk down to the beach, as it was along a hillside. The house smelled overwhelmingly like mold. The upstairs bedrooms had glassless windows that overlooked the living room, so we couldn’t put the kids to bed while the adults stay up and talk because they could hear everything. The furniture fabric was so thin that you could see the foam on all the armrests. There were holes in the wall and spiderwebs in the high windows. It could have been a really charming cabin if it had been kept up well, but they obviously didn't care.

Spiderweb on window

7."We booked a whole house Airbnb in Coeur d’Alene for my husband’s cousin’s wedding. We were sharing the two-bedroom house with his brother and sister-in-law. The place was beautiful, up in the mountains with a gorgeous patio. It was perfect. But when we got there, the couple who owned it were home. They told us that they stay in the basement with their six kids when people rent it. I kept trying to get away because it was my first trip away from my baby, and I needed to pump breastmilk. When I finally just came out and said that I needed some privacy, the host showed me my room and then stood outside the door regaling me with all of her breastfeeding stories.

"That night, when we got back from dinner, she was in the kitchen making popcorn for her kids, which was fine, I guess. But we wanted to sit on the deck and have a glass of wine. She. Wouldn’t. Leave. She kept telling us about how her son was a birder and liked to birdwatch out there. It was so awkward. We just wanted to be left alone.

"There was no AC, and it was so hot but no fans and no screens on the windows.  The next morning, I was in the bathroom with the door open because it was so hot. I was in a towel getting ready when the back door opened and all these kids just ran in. One stopped and just stared at me until I shut the door. When we all came out to go to the wedding, it was like prom. The whole family was in the living room waiting to see how we were dressed and to take pictures. Listen, they were nice people. But definitely not the vibe I was expecting on this trip."

laurenk486b7dddf

8."During the summer of 2020, my family and I decided to get out of New York City and stay in a house upstate for a few days. Before booking, the reviews were all positive, but a few days before leaving, I read a pretty bad review. We took our chances and drove up. The house was really outdated, with no AC, and only one fan in a five-bedroom house with windows that didn't have screens. The pool was filthy. Two of the bedrooms had beds on the floor, and we chose not to use those bedrooms. We stayed one night while talking back and forth with the owner of the home, who tried to resolve our problem. The second day, we discovered a muddy backyard; being city folk we assumed there was a stream through the backyard. We were at the base of a mountain. We later learned through other reviews that the mud in the backyard was actually sewage."

Sam

9."I found this affordable, super cute, small Airbnb in Phoenix. It was right by the city, perfect location. The owner was super nice and attentive. But the entire place was covered in bugs. I’m talking ants, spiders, mosquitos, crickets, flies. You name it, we found it."

Stranger To You

10."I stayed at an Airbnb cabin in the middle of nowhere. No cell reception, no neighbors, etc. On the second night, I had just finished giving my daughter a bath, and the owner just strolls in. No knock, nothing. I was there alone with my kids, and he was nice enough, so although it was awkward, it didn’t worry me. Later that night, I woke up to someone letting themselves in. I grabbed a knife from the kitchen and locked the bedroom door. They saw someone was staying there and left. It must have been friends/family. It's an anticlimactic ending but I’m sure you can see why I don’t use Airbnb anymore."

A cabin in the woods
Rocter / Getty Images/iStockphoto

11."I stayed in an Airbnb in NYC a few years ago. The lady that met us talked our ear off for 30 minutes and said if we see any rodents, could we please try to kill them!"

12."My girlfriends and I take a yearly summer trip to the California desert and have always had wonderful Airbnb experiences; however, our last house was an exception. The house clearly wasn’t set up to be an Airbnb, but rather was just someone’s main residence they listed to rent. The fridge was more than half full of their own food; they had car keys and mail and Costco club cards strewn about the house. The stock tank pool was filled with green algae, and we spent over three hours trying to clean it to make it functional. The grounds of the property were under construction, so there were massive piles of broken concrete, wood, wire, and bags of dry cement everywhere. After we checked in, we were told not to be barefoot outside in case of loose nails. We were also notified that the entire outside property was under surveillance. This made us feel so uncomfortable and not want to engage in our usual drunken dancing fun under the moonlight out of fear of being watched.

A home in the desert

13."I booked a little place for a mini-moon with my husband after our wedding as it’s all we could afford at the time. We got in pretty late, so we had dinner and went straight to bed. The next morning, when we woke up and pulled the blankets back in the light of day, we realized that the woolen blanket was absolutely filled/woven with hair. Like, an excessive, disgusting amount of hair. After that, we started noticing more and more hair, dust, and mold around the place."

isobellloyd2318

14."We stayed in a beach rental, and the owner mandated an additional cash payment upon arrival. We got there, and the place was nice enough, but there were laminated sheets posted everywhere with the house rules, one of which was no one staying in the rental who wasn’t on the reservation. Okay, that’s a common enough rule. We met a friend and were planning to go to the beach, so the three of us swung by the house to quickly pick up some snacks. We had just stepped through the door when the owner flew to the door out of nowhere, screaming at us that the unregistered guest had to leave.

Beach house

15."A couple of years ago, my partner and I got this Airbnb that looked good. When we got there, the bed hadn't been made clean, and there were wet towels on it. Also, one of the bathrooms hadn't been cleaned, and the toilet was full of liquid diarrhea. That bathroom stayed closed, and I had to make the bed clean. I was so grossed out I couldn't sleep properly for a few days."

loiritxaf

16."A recliner in the living room had a baggie pushed between the cushions. My sister pulled it out, and it had some old sausage in it. There was also a live tick on my pillow that didn’t crawl into sight until I laid down. This was in a city with no wooded areas around."

Ana