AirBnb - Should visitors be wary?

Air BnB's in people's homes (ie. houses) will not be an issue for the visitor. If the person owns their house, they will be welcoming in more or less accordance with what you'd expect from their ratings.

Air BnB (and the like) in a Strata (condo) is very different. There is a lot of hostility in (some/most) Strata Corporations towards short-term licensing of units. The perception, valid or not, is that this activity degrades the value of the building and leads to security problems along with extra wear and tear. The standard bylaws of the Strata Property Act prohibit short-term licensing in most Strata Corporations (because it is a "business" activity being conducted in a residential Strata Lot) and that is enforced with varying degrees of "oomph". This is not to mention that it is becoming increasingly popular to codify specific prohibitions in the Bylaws to get around any ambiguity of relying on the standard bylaws.

You could experience no ill will, signs in the common areas discouraging the activity, knocks on the door from neighbours and/or Strata Council members, notes under your door, or in pretty extreme cases, the access fobs to the building being disabled.

I am trying to be as agnostic as possible in relaying these facts, because I know it is a heated argument on both sides of the debate, but the truth is that some people might never know that the building they're renting in prohibits Air BnB and the like, while others might find themselves locked out in the middle of the night. Most are somewhere in between.

/r/vancouver Thread