AirBNB Reached Out To The Jedi

Jay Heard is a Walmart manger who also acts as an AirBNB Host in Las Vegas

AirBNB contacted the Jedi and wanted to ask more detailed questions about the incident so that they can begin to assist us in making this right. Here’s the response we sent to AirBNB:

Hi Maria,
I’m so sorry I missed your calls today. Things have been extremely hectic, as you can imagine. We have secured a short term stay for now. We are safe.

1: We are photojournalists who have traveled the world living in short term rentals for over 10 years. We have never had a problem until we started using AirBNBs long term stay program in October of 2020. You can find us on Twitter, YouTube and on JediRich.com to verify.

On March 25th at 11:30 pm, a man who identified himself as “Tony from AirBNB security” broke into our apartment with a gun and forced us to leave our home during a global pandemic when there is an eviction moratorium in place.

The man said he was “employed by AirBNB security”. He only gave us 30 minutes to gather everything we owned and leave. It was a nightmare. We were shocked. It was now 1am on a Friday morning during March Madness in Las Vegas and we had nowhere to go. There was no availability anywhere. And it was my husband’s 53rd birthday.

2: Jay (Jarvis) Heard
Tony (no last name given)

3: 4200 S Valley View Unit R-2087
4: Yes. We called LVMPD today and they told us this was so serious they want us to file a report on person on Monday.
5: Yes. Here’s a video of the AirBNB representative who broke into our unit and forced us to leave by gun point at midnight on my husband’s 53rd birthday: https://youtu.be/RK8aBnaMiPM
6. Yes. We are safe now.
7. No. This is a criminal investigation.
8. We feel that Jay was never a responsible host. When we were arriving, we felt uncomfortable he would not give us the key code until after the time we were allowed to check in. We even started to worry we would not have a place upon arrival because it was very late and we needed the code and we kept asking him for the key code and he would say I’ll get to you later, I’ll get it to you later.

The place was very dirty upon arrival and especially the vent and the heater did not work. The first night was freezing. We went to Walmart as soon as they opened the next day and used a space heater for the entire length of our stay. The mops had stinking mold growing on them. The cleaning supplies provided were covered in bacteria and mold and smelled absolutely rancid. The carpet was disgusting with black stains. I did not feel comfortable walking barefoot in this place. We kept the place clean but it needed an extensive professional cleaning, especially focusing on the ceiling vents and changing the filters. That’s not something we could do. There was half-eaten food in the fridge. We cleaned as best we could but the filthy black mold in the vent just kept circulating the muck around the unit. I do not believe that the unit had a sanitary cleaning before we arrived because he was living there and he had to move his stuff into storage which is why he was delayed in giving us the key code. He told us he hired professional cleaners. My mother was a professional cleaner. I know he was lying.

We did not complain except for the leaking water in the AC unit which eventually stopped leaking primarily because we stopped using the A/C. The weather had gotten cold again so we were using our space heater that we bought because his heat still did not work.

We document everything on social media. Almost all of this stuff is video documented on our social media channels, YouTube and on our website.

We are easy going tenants. But this went way too far. We are photojournalists who have lived in short term rentals for over 10 years as we have traveled the world. We start a short-term sublease that commences on April 15th, 2021 in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. You cannot imagine the strict qualifications the Rudin Management Company requires to live in their buildings. If you don’t know Rudin Management Company, then Google Samuel Rudin NYC. They are one of the largest real estate management companies in Manhattan. If we are good enough for Rudin, then shouldn't we be good enough for AirBNBs unsafe, dishonest, lying hosts?

We feel that we should be compensated for this horrific stay which was ultimately a result of AirBNB making rash and unwarranted decisions without ever giving us the opportunity to present our side of the story and only allowing these unsafe hosts to tell their side and get us kicked off the system with no recourse or refund from AirBNB. This happened to us in Panamá and again in Las Vegas. AirBNB needs a to perform formal investigation before AirBNB abruptly uproots people from their homes. Steyn B. from Trust and Safety disclosed personal details about why we wrre kicked out to the host which were untrue. AirBNB has never given the ys opportunity to defend ourselves against the dishonest accusations of a lying host in Panama. This incident happened because AirBNB irresponsibly disclosed confidential information to a dangerous host who felt he needed to take matters into his own hands to save his property. This is so far from the truth, but it all would have been avoided if someone at AirBNB would have investigated the false claims made by the host before removing guests from your community. For wax owl fo how this is AirBNB’s fault, why did Lauren from AirBNB‘s Trust & Safety tell the host that letting us stay there was “at his own risk”. She freaked out a potentially mentally unstable host. There should be a hearing with an impartial mediator to hear both sides of story before you advising a host to to “take matters into their own hands.” Can you imagine if one of us had been shot or even killed?!? Quite honestly, our two stays with AirBNB were a nightmare.

I’m not sure if you’re aware but most COAs & HOAs do not like AirBNB guests. They constantly complain about ever little detail to the building administration to get the owner to stop doing AirBNBs. We were also quite shocked in how AirBNB handled this whole situation when they charged our account a second time for the remainder of the balance after they cancelled our reservations. I talked to Visa. They said that was an illegal transaction and we should call our bank and dispute the charge. So we did.

Mail was impossible to receive. It would take Jay a month to give us our Mail. We only got our Mail twice. He would throw our packages up to our 2nd story balcony, even if the box was marked fragile. We had delicate glassware delivered. We had to make other arrangements to have our Mail sent to my mother in-law.

The first time we turned on the A/C unit, the unit leaked water on the floor. When we open the vent, we found the the ceiling vent was filthy.

The furniture is not fit for people to be sitting. The couch and bed are dilapidated. When you sit on the couch and bed you sink in and you almost touch the floor.

We called the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department today and told them what had happened. They said for us to come in on Monday to file a full report with a detective. We really do not want to escalate this further than it needs to if AirBNB wants to make this right with us. And we are even debating whether to file criminal charges against the host because we take pressing charges very seriously. Having the host arrested is not our first choice. We do not want to ruin someone’s life over a petty mistake.

Sincerely,
Joy Lightowler


Sent from my iPhone