Airbnb guests have long shared concerns about hidden cameras in rental homes. While camerasinside homes are strictly prohibited under Airbnb’s rules, suspicions about undisclosed surveillance continue to surface online.
In one recent case, a guest said she began to suspect she was being watched after a host texted her asking for a date. In another, a woman shared what appeared to be a camera disguised as a picture frame pointed directly toward the shower at her Airbnb.
Now, a woman says she spotted a “fake” mirror during her stay at an Airbnb in Corpus Christi. She suspects something may be happening on the other side of the wall.
What Raised Red Flags in Her Airbnb?
TikTok creator Julie Suarez (@suarxro) posted a video investigating what she believed could be a suspicious mirror inside her Airbnb rental.
“I’m gonna show you something real quick, ‘cause I don’t know if I’m tripping,” she begins.
She first points out a full-body mirror in the room before comparing it to the bathroom mirror above the sink.
“This is a real mirror,” she says, testing it by placing her finger against the glass and showing a small gap between her finger and its reflection.
She then repeats the same test on the full-body mirror. This time, she says the reflection appears to touch her finger, which led her to question whether it could be a two-way mirror.
Suarez also notes that the mirror appears to be drilled into the wall rather than simply hung in place.
Next to the mirror is a locked door she wasn’t able to open.
“It’s locked,” she says while trying the handle.
“Mind you, I’m in an Airbnb, So I’m thinking this door is for the cleaning products,” Suarez says. “I genuinely wanna know what’s behind this door.”
In a follow-up video, Suarez responded to a commenter who suggested sliding a phone under the door to record the other side.
The clip shows a small portion of the room beyond the door, though nothing clearly identifiable appears in the footage.
“The lights were on the entire time, I don’t see any cleaning supplies,” she wrote in the caption.
Suarez told viewers in the comments that the investigation would likely end there since she had already checked out of the property.
Viewers in the comments were certain that something suspicious was happening at this Airbnb.
“6 screws to hold up a 2lb mirror…” one commenter wondered.
“You’re better than me I’d UNdrill it lmao,” stated another.
“Call the cops bro that’s actually really scary,” suggested a third.
A commenter speculated about what it could be, writing, “It probably is a two-way mirror & they’re just watching you make a video.”
Is There a Way to Tell if a ‘Mirror’ Is Actually Two-Way Glass?
According to experts at Two Way Mirrors, there are several at-home tests that can help determine whether a mirror is actually a two-way mirror.
One is the fingernail test, which is exactly what Suarez performed at her Airbnb. The site says that if the fingers appear to “touch,” it may mean you’re touching the reflective coating on two-way glass rather than a standard mirror.
Another method is comparing the tint. A two-way mirror typically reflects about 70% of light, which can give it a darker appearance than a regular mirror.
If those tests are inconclusive, Two Way Mirrors suggests knocking on the glass. A hollow sound may indicate there’s open space behind the mirror rather than a solid wall.
In situations like this, guests can contact Airbnb’s 24-hour safety line to report suspicious objects. While there may be an innocent explanation, the company encourages users to report serious safety concerns.
Ljeonida is a reporter and writer with a degree in journalism and communications from the University of Tirana in her native Albania. She has a particular interest in all things digital marketing; she considers herself a copywriter, content producer, SEO specialist, and passionate marketer. Ljeonida is based in Tbilisi, Georgia, and her work can also be found at the Daily Dot.
Airbnb plans to double down on artificial intelligence to improve its user experience for both guests and hosts. During a fourth-quarter earnings call, Airbnb’s CEO, Brian Chesky, said the company is building an “AI-native experience” aimed at helping guests book trips, assisting hosts with their listings, and running the company more efficiently. According to Chesky, there’s an AI search tool to help guests book trips that’s live for a small percentage of users right now.
In a shareholder letter posted on Airbnb’s website, the company said it’s conducting early testing with an AI-powered search that is “focused on giving guests a more natural way to describe what they’re looking for, and ask questions about the listing and location.” The letter added that the AI search tool will become “a more comprehensive and intuitive search experience that extends through the trip,” but the company didn’t offer a definitive date on when it would be available to the public.
While it may feel like Airbnb is late to incorporating AI into its ecosystem, it introduced an AI chatbot that handles customer service requests last year. While the AI agent is only available to users in North America currently, Airbnb said that it already handles a third of customer requests without the need for human intervention, as reported by TechCrunch. Chesky also said during the earnings call that the AI chatbot would tackle “significantly more” customer tickets a year from now and that it would roll out to the rest of the world.
Wu and Ba’s exits appeared amicable. But lower-level employees have been more candid about internal tensions at the Musk-run startup. Several members of xAI’s technical staff have also left in recent weeks, according to their posts on X and LinkedIn.
“All A.I. labs are building the exact same thing, and it’s boring,” said Vahid Kazemi, who worked on xAI’s audio models, in a post on X. “I think there’s room for more creativity. So, I’m starting something new.”
In an interview with NBC News, Kazemi also criticized the company’s working culture, saying he regularly worked 12-hour days, including holidays and weekends.
Launched in March 2023 with a roster of industry veterans from companies like OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, and Tesla, xAI will now operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of SpaceX. The new iteration of SpaceX faces no shortage of challenges: Grok continues to face legal scrutiny, while Musk’s leadership style remains a point of contention.
Here are the co-founders and notable leaders who have left xAI so far—and where they are now.
Jimmy Ba
Jimmy Ba, who led A.I. safety at xAI, announced his exit on Feb. 10. A professor at the University of Toronto who studied under A.I. pioneer Geoffrey Hinton, Ba’s research played a key role in shaping Grok’s development.
“So proud of what the xAI team has done and will continue to stay close as a friend of the team,” Ba wrote on X. He hasn’t announced his next move, but added that “2026 is gonna be insane and likely the busiest (and most consequential) year for the future of our species.”
Tony Wu, a former research scientist at Google and postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University, announced his departure from xAI on Feb. 9.
Wu led xAI’s reasoning team. “It’s time for my next chapter…It is an era with full possibilities: a small team armed with AIs can move mountains and redefine what’s possible,” he wrote on X.
Wu has not disclosed his next role. Co-founders Guodong Zhang and Manuel Kroiss remain at xAI and are helping lead the company’s reorganization.
Mike Liberatore
While not a founding member, Mike Liberatore joined xAI as chief financial officer in April 2025, just one month after xAI acquired X in a deal that valued the combined company at $113 billion.
Musk replaced Liberatore with ex-Morgan Stanley banker Anthony Armstrong. Armstrong advised Musk on his Twitter (now X) acquisition in 2022 and later served as a senior advisor at the Office of Personnel Management during Musk’s controversial tenure at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Greg Yang
Greg Yang spent nearly six years as a researcher at Microsoft before joining xAI’s founding team. He left the company in January due to health complications from Lyme disease.
“Likely I contracted Lyme a long time ago, but until I pushed myself hard building xAI and weakened my immune system, the symptoms weren’t noticeable,” Yang wrote on X. He continues to advise xAI in an informal capacity.
Igor Babuschkin
Igor Babuschkin, a former research engineer at OpenAI and Google DeepMind, was a co-founder and key engineering lead at xAI. Widely known as the primary developer behind Grok, Babuschkin left in July 2025 to start his own venture capital firm, Babuschkin Ventures, focused on A.I. research and startups.
Christian Szegedy
Christian Szegedy spent 12 years at Google before joining xAI as a founding research scientist. He left xAI in February 2025 to become chief scientist at superintelligence cloud company Morph Labs.
More than a year later, he departed that role to found mathematical A.I. startup Math Inc. in September, according to his LinkedIn.
Kyle Kosic left OpenAI in early 2023 after two years to co-found xAI, where he served as engineering infrastructure lead. He departed about a year later, in April 2024, to return to OpenAI as a technical staff member.
Kosic was the first co-founder to leave xAI and did not issue a public statement. It is unclear who now leads xAI’s engineering infrastructure, though another co-founder, Ross Nordeen, remains the company’s technical program manager after previously holding the same role at Tesla.
From Airbnb and Booking.com to Amazon and Google, leading companies show how disciplined experimentation turns uncertainty into advantage. Unsplash+
Leaders at Airbnb wondered whether listings with professional photographs might perform better than those using user-uploaded images. Rather than relying on instinct or anecdote, they ran a controlled experiment: some listings were assigned professional photography, while others retained user-generated photos. The results were striking. Listings with professional photos received more than twice as many bookings and earned hosts over $1,000 more per month. What began as a simple test ultimately led Airbnb to launch a full-scale photography program, transforming how hosts presented their properties and how customers experienced the platform.
This is experimentation in action: a disciplined approach to uncertainty that allows organizations to uncover insights they might never reach through planning alone.
Booking.com reportedly runs over 25,000 experiments each year, a practice that has helped transform it from a small startup into a global travel powerhouse. According to Lukas Vermeer, its director of experimentation, Booking.com runs more than 1,000 experiments simultaneously, often tailoring tests to individual website visitors. These are primarily A/B tests, in which two alternatives are assessed side by side to determine which performs better. Over time, this approach allows the company to optimize entire customer journeys, refining everything from search results to booking flows based on real-world behavior rather than assumptions.
What these companies demonstrate is that sustained experimentation fundamentally changes how organizations learn.
Why experimentation matters more than ever
Building a culture of experimentation creates the conditions for unexpected opportunities to surface and be exploited. It encourages organizations to move beyond incremental improvement toward breakthrough innovation, while also improving internal processes and engagement. Employees in experimental cultures tend to be more curious, more resilient and more willing to challenge the status quo.
Creating this culture starts with the leaders. For experimentation to take root, leaders must be willing to redefine what success and failure mean. Instead of treating failure as something to be avoided or punished, leaders need to frame it as an essential part of learning. This shift enables a growth mindset in which teams are encouraged to generate ideas, test them quickly and scale what works. Crucially, leadership teams must model this behavior themselves. When leaders visibly test, learn and adapt, experimentation becomes embedded in the organization’s DNA rather than confined to innovation labs or product teams.
Empowering employees to test and learn
A true culture of experimentation empowers employees at every level to test hypotheses and iterate continuously. That requires time, tools and psychological safety. Providing dedicated time for experimentation sends a powerful signal. 3M famously allowed its researchers to spend 15 percent of their time exploring scientific topics or personal interests, regardless of immediate commercial relevance. The policy led to numerous innovations, including the invention of Post-It Notes.
Google adopted a similar philosophy, allowing employees to spend 20 percent of their time on side projects. While not every experiment succeeded, the approach produced significant breakthroughs like Gmail and AdSense. By making experimentation an expected part of the job, companies like Google and 3M normalized creative exploration and reduced the fear associated with trying something new.
Amazon has taken a related but distinct approach, fostering a culture of “many small bets.” Rather than seeking uncertainty upfront, Amazon continually tests new products, processes and business models, accepting that most experiments will fail, but that a few will deliver outsized returns.
Leaders don’t need to replicate these models exactly. Even modest steps, such as allocating one day per month for experimentation, offering workshops or providing small seed budgets, can be enough to spark momentum.
Making data the backbone of learning
Experiment without measurement is just trial and error. Effective experimentation depends on data. Leaders should encourage teams to document their experiments clearly: what hypothesis was tested, what data was collected and what was learned. Results, positive or negative, should be shared openly to maximize organizational learning. Over time, this creates a shared language or evidence and reduces reliance on opinion-driven decision-making.
As Adam Savage, the special effects designer and co-host of Mythbusters, has said: “In the spirit of science, there really is no such this as a ‘failed experiment.’ Any test that yields valid data is a valid test.” the essence of this approach is learning: rapid experimentation is vital for outpacing competitors, far more so than simply being right.
Reducing fear through structure and play
Many organizations struggle with experimentation due to fear—specifically, fear of failure. Psychologists describe loss aversion as our tendency to fear losses more than we value gains. In business, this often shows up as risk avoidance, perfectionism and decision paralysis. Leaders must actively normalize failure as a learning mechanism and a key part of progress. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos captured this succinctly when he said, “If you know it’s going to work, it’s not an experiment.” Booking.com’s Lukas Vermeer echoes this philosophy, emphasizing that experiments exist to discover what works, not to prove someone right.
Some organizations have gone further by gamifying experimentation. Platforms such as LabQuest have integrated points, badges and leaderboards into testing and user research, turning participation into a game. This approach has reportedly increased engagement and improved data quality, with significantly higher participation rates and more actionable insights compared to traditional methods. Gamification reduces the emotional stakes of failure and reframes experimentation as something engaging rather than intimidating.
A simple framework leaders can use
One practical framework for experimentation is the Build-Measure-Learn-Loop, popularized by Eric Ries in The Lean Startup. It begins with a clear hypothesis: We believe that changing X will improve Y. Teams then run a small, fast, low-cost test, measure the results using relevant metrics and decide whether to scale, refine or abandon the idea.
This loop isn’t limited to product development. HR teams can experiment with new onboarding processes. Marketing teams can trial messaging variations. Even finance teams can explore alternative budgeting allocation models. When every initiative is treated as a learning opportunity rather than a final verdict, organizations become more adaptive and resilient.
Steven Bartlett, founder of Social Chain and host of The Diary of a CEO podcast, underscores the role leadership plays in this process. “Get your team to conduct fast, fearless experiments—more often,” he advises. Bartlett has described how his social team reports weekly on the tests they’ve run, reinforcing that experimentation is a core expectation. As he puts it, whether teams behave this way ultimately comes “down to the leadership.”
Thriving through uncertainty
In a world changing at unprecedented speed, relying solely on past data and established models is increasingly risky. Markets shift, customer expectations evolve and competitive advantages erode quickly. Experimentation offers a way forward, not by eliminating uncertainty but by learning within it.
High-performing companies test, learn and adapt in real time. For leaders, the lesson is clear: the ability to foster experimentation is no longer optional. It is a core capability for navigating unpredictability and uncovering unexpected solutions.
Renting an Airbnb isn’t always the straightforward, stress-free experience people expect. Over the past few years, guests and hosts alike have shared stories about misleading listings, unruly guests, and unexpected rules.
For example, one guest arrived at what a host advertised as a five-bedroom home and found a camper instead. A host recently went viral after sharing their beloved property in a state of total disarray.
Now, another Airbnb dispute is drawing attention after a Wisconsin woman says she’s being charged thousands of dollars over what she believes was a setup waiting to happen.
A $3,000 Charge Over a Bathroom Incident
TikTok creator Jennie (@jennielynn290) shared a photo she says shows the real source of the damage she’s being blamed for. Her post, which has racked up more than 217,000 views, shows a bidet sitting loose on the bathroom floor, disconnected from the toilet.
“Stayed in an Airbnb over Thanksgiving. This was in the floor and now I’m being charged over $3,500 in damages,” she wrote.
In the caption, Jennie explains that she booked the Airbnb expecting a relaxing holiday stay with her family. Instead, she says a chain of events led to water flooding into the basement and a hefty bill.
“This was left in the floor by I’m assuming the cleaning ladies,” she wrote, referring to the bidet. “While we were there someone laid a wet towel on top causing the on button to be turned on for over an hour. Water pouring into the basement and leaving an inch of water. Now the host is asking us to pay over $3,000 in damages. What do we do!”
In the comments, reactions split fast.
One person wrote, “I would think you’re at fault because you left running water on the floor which caused property damage.”
Another commenter put it even more bluntly: “I truly don’t know how you think this isn’t your fault. The item being on the floor is not the problem — the problem is your friend turned the water on and didn’t notice water for hours.”
“I think you misunderstood,” Jennie replied. “A wet towel was pushed on top of the bidet that should have been connected to the toilet, not laying on the floor, which turned it on causing a leak.”
Others sided with her and focused on the setup itself. “Airbnb is a scam,” one commenter wrote. Another added, “Hotels are so much more affordable and less likely to have this kind of stuff happen.”
Several people zeroed in on the bidet. One commenter shared their own experience, warning against cheaper attachments altogether. “Airbnbs should not have cheap plastic bidets,” they wrote, describing a similar flood that led to months of repairs and mold damage.
Jennie Explains How It Happened
After the debate picked up, Jennie posted a follow-up video walking viewers through exactly what happened in the bathroom.
She explains that the shower itself caused part of the problem. “There was a really cool shower with two shower heads and wall mounts that sprayed a ton of water,” she says. According to her, water regularly sprayed outside the shower area and onto the bathroom floor.
She explains that her niece showered first and laid a towel down to soak up the water. When Jennie went in next, she says she slid the soaked towel into a small nook near the toilet so she wouldn’t have to stand on it.
“I pushed the towel over into this little nook where the toilet was,” she says. That nook, she explains, is also where the loose bidet was sitting.
She didn’t realize the towel had pressed against the bidet’s button. “I guess when that happened, it turned on the bidet,” she says. Water was then sprayed directly into a crack in the wall and ran down into the basement below.
“That’s what caused the leak,” she explains.
Jennie hasn’t shared what ultimately happened with her claim or whether Airbnb ruled in her favor.
According to Airbnb, guests can be held responsible for damage caused during a stay, but there’s a formal process.
If damage happens, hosts can request reimbursement through Airbnb’s Resolution Center. Guests have 24 hours to respond.
If the dispute escalates, Airbnb’s Community Support team reviews evidence from both sides to decide whether the guest is responsible and whether the requested amount is reasonable.
That review includes photos, documentation, and any explanation the guest provides.
The Mary Sue has reached out to Airbnb and Jennie via email for comment.
Ljeonida is a reporter and writer with a degree in journalism and communications from the University of Tirana in her native Albania. She has a particular interest in all things digital marketing; she considers herself a copywriter, content producer, SEO specialist, and passionate marketer. Ljeonida is based in Tbilisi, Georgia, and her work can also be found at the Daily Dot.
On June 12, Peggy Orenstein’s inbox flooded with booking requests for her Inglewood Airbnb.
The date seemed random, but after a quick search, the influx of interest became clear. It was exactly a year before one of the biggest events in American soccer history, when the U.S. will kick off its World Cup in a match against Paraguay at SoFi Stadium, and Orenstein had set up the system to only accept booking requests up to a year in advance.
Orenstein’s rental sits just across the street from the venue. Suddenly, her Airbnb became one of the hottest homes in the Southland.
She hadn’t adjusted the prices yet to reflect the rabid demand, so she declined the requests and tweaked the rates. Typically, a two-night stay at the house would cost around $1,000. For a two-night stay during the Americans’ opening match June 12, it’ll now cost more than $10,000.
Roughly 6.5 million people are expected to travel to North America during the 2026 World Cup, and many of them will be heading to L.A., where SoFi Stadium is hosting eight games, including two U.S. matches during the group stage. Airbnb hosts are viewing the games as a gold mine, hoping soccer fans will shell out thousands to stay near the stadium.
The World Cup rental market will serve as a test case for the 2028 Olympics, when an estimated 15 million people are expected to visit Southern California.
For the night of the opening match June 12, more than 70% of short-term rentals in Inglewood have already been booked, according to data site Inside Airbnb. That’s a 58% increase compared to typical reservation rates on normal days.
Rates are rising as well. On June 1, the average booked rate for an Airbnb in L.A. is $245, according to data platform AirDNA. On June 12, when the U.S. plays Paraguay, it’s $382 — a 56% jump.
In Inglewood, prices are even wilder. Homes that normally rent for hundreds are listed for thousands. The nightly price for a one-bedroom apartment a block from SoFi is typically around $400. On June 11, the day before the game, it’s $713. On June 12, the day of the game, it’s $1,714.
“It’ll be interesting to see how much people will pay,” Orenstein said.
Some hosts use an algorithm to determine their nightly rates, but Orenstein sets the prices herself. She arrived at the $10,000 number by looking at nearby hotels, which are mostly sold out for the nights of the eight World Cup matches.
“The Lum Hotel had a suite available during the World Cup for $1,943. Meanwhile, our house can accommodate eight guests with four bedrooms, plus a kitchen and yard,” she said.
There are classic amenities such as a grill and hot tub, but the biggest amenity is proximity. Orenstein is banking on visitors ponying up for the convenience of parking at the property and walking to the stadium while everyone else navigates traffic jams and long rideshare waits.
“It gets crazy out there,” she said. “I’ve had people offer to pay me $40 to use the bathroom while walking by during a Taylor Swift concert. Our neighbor sold parking spots for $1,000 during the Super Bowl.”
David (pictured) and Peggy Orenstein, run an Airbnb across the street from SoFi Stadium.
(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)
Colin Johnson has been renting out his home near SoFi Stadium for two years. It’s his actual residence, meaning when someone stays there, he has to book a hotel or crash on a friend’s couch. But he said the payouts are worth it.
“There are so many events and venues around us, why wouldn’t we take advantage?” he said.
A typical two-night stay in the three-story townhouse runs about $600. For the U.S. opening match, it costs more than $3,000.
Johnson said demand is roughly 60% Americans and 40% foreigners, but he expects foreign interest to pick up as the games get closer.
Demand isn’t limited to Inglewood. Luxury rentals across Los Angeles are being booked for eye-popping numbers, according to Mokhtar Jabli, founder of luxury rental platform Nightfall Group.
He’s booked two so far. The first was rented by a Florida client coming to Los Angeles to see Iran play two matches at SoFi Stadium against New Zealand and Belgium. The modern home in Hollywood Hills, complete with an infinity pool overlooking the city, rented for $33,000 for seven nights from June 15 to 22.
The second was booked by a New York client coming to see the U.S. play Paraguay. The 7,000-square-foot mansion in Malibu comes with a movie theater, butler, security and full-time staff. For 10 days, it rented for $100,000.
Jamie Lane, chief economist for AirDNA, expects a surge across L.A. County — not just in demand, but in supply.
“There’s a lot of interest right now in what you can make as a host,” Lane said. “In most cities, there won’t be enough lodging, so that pushes rates higher.”
He added that since Airbnb is the official “Alternative Accommodations and Bookings Platform” of the World Cup, the company is urging people to host. AirDNA has hosted multiple bootcamps around the country for people interested in renting out their homes during the World Cup, teaching them how to furnish homes, how to set prices during the games and more.
Lane expects a boost in listings early next year, which would mirror Paris in the months leading up to the 2024 Olympics, when active listings soared by 40%.
It’s unclear how proactive Southern California cities will be in cracking down on illegal listings as homeowners look to make a quick buck by renting out their rooms. Many cities have strict short-term rental regulations, but haven’t taken the steps necessary to enforce them.
Last year, the L.A. Housing Department estimated that 7,500 short-term rentals were violating the city’s Home Sharing Ordinance, but the city only issued 300 citations.
Orenstein said it won’t be easy in Inglewood.
“You have to jump through hoops to have an Airbnb,” she said. “Apply for permits, do inspections, pay your taxes every month. It has to be done right.”
An estimated 17,000 Airbnb users will book stays in the Philadelphia region during the World Cup, generating $167 million in revenue for the region, a new report finds. Hosts are expected to make $8 million, or $1,900 each.
Haunting footage shows bags, bodies, and frantic movement through short-term rentals; a glimpse inside a shocking human trafficking network
A growing online investigation has cast a glaring light on an alleged human-trafficking scheme in metro Atlanta, where a violent gang allegedly used multiple Airbnbs to hide victims and evade law enforcement, according to local news station WSB‑TV in September. In surveillance footage released by WSB-TV, Airbnb properties appear to buzz with suspicious activity; people hustling in and out, bags being hauled between rooms, and groups mysteriously shuffling from one house to another overnight. Allegedly, the scenes looked less like weekend getaways and more like trafficking operations-a glaring red flag that ultimately helped expose the network. More videos, like the one below, are going viral, accusing short-term rentals of being used for human and sex trafficking purposes.
A lady’s Airbnb was used by 20 men(no prizes for what kind of “men”)
Who had 14yr old girls in the property.
The lady reported all this to police, they also destroyed her belongings.
The police ignored her and told her to drop her report.
According to the report, authorities discovered the network moved individuals (some of whom were forced or coerced) among a series of short-term rental properties throughout Gwinnett and surrounding counties. The tactic allowed traffickers to stay under the radar as they transported victims in and out of the homes. The gang reportedly targeted local listings that lacked active oversight, using open-to-the-public platforms to provide a rotating location for victims. The story has now surged online, with social-media posts and local forums amplifying previously unreported details about the ring’s operations. A post shared by WSB-TV on X (formerly Twitter) helped the piece gain broader attention.
Violent human trafficking gang used Airbnbs to hide victims in metro Atlanta https://t.co/mUpcBPHPHi
While state authorities had earlier secured convictions of gang leaders in related cases, such as the May 2025 conviction of two LOTTO gang figures for trafficking and racketeering in Gwinnett County, this Airbnb-centric network appears to mark a more “tech-savvy” evolution of the problem. “The LOTTO gang preyed on our most vulnerable Georgians, and we won’t rest until the entire network is behind bars. With seven convicted in this case so far, our work doesn’t stop here. We’re going after everyone involved in the trafficking of these five victims, and we will ensure they’re held accountable,” said Attorney General Chris Carr.
Advocates point out that the case represents a large concern that short-term rentals could provide a cover for exploitation, including trafficking, forced labor and sexual servitude. “These short-term rentals are a key place for those who want to exploit the vulnerable,” said Camila Zolfaghari of the anti-trafficking nonprofit “Street Grace.”
Now that the story is going viral, authorities are under pressure to review legislation, possible platform (Airbnb) oversight issues and homeowner responsibility for short-term rental listings. As the law enforcement and internet sleuths dig deeper into how the gang operated, more questions are likely to emerge about how rental platforms are monitored and how vulnerable individuals can be better protected from covert operations embedded in seemingly innocuous homes.
As Florida’s Republican leaders consider overhauling the state’s property tax system, Gov. Ron DeSantis recently zeroed in on tax changes for primary homes, or homestead properties.
During an Oct.15 event in West Palm Beach, a high school student asked DeSantis if there are alternative revenue sources that could replace property tax funding. Lawmakers have offered competing proposals, but appear to be focused on changing how primary residences are taxed.
DeSantis said governments could spend less money, and that primary residences are not local governments’ main source of property tax revenue.
“The vast, vast majority of property tax revenue is not from homestead Floridians’ properties. It’s second homes, investment properties, commercial properties, Airbnb, all those other things,” DeSantis said. “That’s about 68 to 70% of property tax revenue statewide.”
His estimate is very close.
Sixty-four percent of Florida’s property tax revenue comes from properties that are not primary residences, preliminary 2025 data shows.
“It is reasonable to conclude that about two-thirds of the property taxes are paid by non-homesteaded properties,” said Matt Caldwell, the Lee County property appraiser and a former Republican lawmaker. He said the statistic varies based on market changes.
The idea of changing how Florida collects property taxes makes counties and cities nervous because no one has spelled out where the lost revenue would come from.
“Local governments will have to offset that revenue loss, meaning Floridians could see reductions in public services — things like first responders, emergency preparedness and disaster management — new or increased local taxes or fees, or a combination of these strategies,” said Esteban Leonardo Santis, research director at the center-left Florida Policy Institute.
PolitiFact contacted DeSantis’ office for comment but received no reply.
How much tax revenue comes from Florida’s primary residences?
Both the Florida Policy Institute and the Florida Legislature’s Office of Economic and Demographic Research reported in September that 36% of statewide property tax revenue comes from primary residences. Florida’s current homestead exemption is generous, and can reduce a home’s taxable value by as much as $50,000.
The Florida Policy Institute estimated that ending property taxes for these properties would cost about $18.5 billion, which breaks down to $7.8 billion for counties, $3 billion for cities and $7.7 billion for school districts.
If the state fully or partially eliminates property tax on primary residences across all income levels, it could result in a cost shift, Santis said, and that could come in the form of a higher sales tax or corporate income tax. Florida renters would not benefit from the policy.
This kind of overhaul “limits local fiscal autonomy, gives outsized benefits to owners of more expensive properties, and makes the state more susceptible to economic downturns,” he said.
Caldwell said part of the challenge is defining property tax. Some taxes are levied based on a property’s value, and others aren’t based on value, but both are included on tax bills.
He said the distinction might not matter to the average property owner who will view property tax “as everything charged to them” on their November bill.
Since August, DeSantis and Florida Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia have traveled the state to talk about their efforts to root out what they describe as “waste, fraud and abuse.” Floridians don’t need to pay property taxes, they say, when local governments are misusing millions.
But local governmentshave pushed back on those statements, saying some spending examples were misrepresented, approved by voters or weren’t funded by property taxes.
Our ruling
DeSantis said in Florida, “68 to 70% of property tax revenue” is from “second homes, investment properties, commercial properties, Airbnb,” not primary residences.
He’s very close. Sixty-four percent of Florida’s property tax revenue comes from properties that are not primary residences, including second homes, vacation rentals and businesses.
Ending taxes for primary residences could cost about $18.5 billion across Florida counties, cities and school districts. That might result in reducing or privatizing services, or increasing the sales or corporate tax rates.
DeSantis’ statement is accurate but needs additional information. We rate it Mostly True.
PolitiFact Researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report.
Being CEO has its many perks: Business leaders get to command the world’s most powerful companies, shape their legacies as pioneers of industry, and enjoy hefty billion-dollar paychecks. But in the steep climb up the corporate ladder, many won’t notice all the peers left behind until they’re looking down from the very top. It can be a lonely, solitary job.
Leaders at some of the world’s largest companies—from Airbnb and UPS to PepsiCo and Apple—are finally opening up about the mental toll that comes with the job. As it turns out, many industry trailblazers are grappling with intense loneliness; at least 40% of executives are thinking of leaving their job, mainly because they’re lacking energy and feel alone in handling daily challenges, according to a Harvard Medical School professor. And the number could even be higher: About 70% of C-suite leaders “are seriously considering quitting for a job that better supports their well-being,” according to a 2022 Deloitte study.
To ward off feelings of isolation, founders and top executives are stepping outside of the office to focus on improving their well-being. Toms founder Blake Mycoskie struggled with depression and loneliness after scaling his once-small shoe business into a billion-dollar behemoth. Feeling disconnected from his life’s purpose and that his “reason for being now felt like a job,” he went on a three-day men’s retreat to work on his mental health. And Seth Berkowitz, the founder and CEO of $350 million dessert giant Insomnia Cookies, cautions bright-eyed entrepreneurs the gig “is not really for everyone.”
“It can be lonely; it’s a solitary life. It really is,” Berkowitz recently toldFortune.
Brian Chesky, cofounder and CEO of Airbnb
Eugene Gologursky / Stringer / Getty Images
Airbnb’s cofounder and CEO Brian Chesky is one the most outspoken leaders in the business world waving the red flag on loneliness. Chesky described having a lonely childhood, pulled between his love for creative design and sports, never really fitting in. But his mental health took a turn for the worse once assuming the throne as Airbnb’s CEO. His other two cofounders—who he called his “family,” spending all their waking hours working, exercising, and hanging out together—were suddenly out of view from the peak of the C-suite.
“As I became a CEO I started leading from the front, at the top of the mountain, but then the higher you get to the peak, the fewer the people there are with you,” Chesky told Jay Shetty during an episode of the On Purpose podcast last year. “No one ever told me how lonely you would get, and I wasn’t prepared for that.”
Chesky recommends budding leaders actually share their power, so no one shoulders the mental burden of entrepreneurship alone.
“I think that ultimately, today, we’re probably living in one of the loneliest times in human history,” Chesky said. “If people were as lonely in yesteryear as they are today, they’d probably perish, because you just couldn’t survive without your tribe.”
Indra Nooyi, former CEO of PepsiCo
Jemal Countess / Stringer / Getty Images
Leaders at Fortune 500 giant PepsiCo face constant pressure from consumers, investors, board members, and their own employees. But it’s also tough to vent to peers who may not relate to—or even understand—the trials and tribulations of running a $209 billion company. Indra Nooyi, the business’ former CEO, said she often felt isolated with no one to confide in.
“You can’t really talk to your spouse all the time. You can’t talk to your friends because it’s confidential stuff about the company. You can’t talk to your board because they are your bosses. You can’t talk to people who work for you because they work for you,” Nooyi toldKellogg Insight, the research magazine for Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management,earlier this year. “And so it puts you in a fairly lonely position.”
Instead of divulging to a trusted friend or anonymously airing out her frustrations on Reddit, Nooyi looked inward. She was the only person she could trust, even if that meant embracing the isolation.
“I would talk to myself. I would go look at myself in a mirror. I would talk to myself. I would rage at myself. I would shed a few tears, then put on some lipstick and come out,” Nooyi said. “That was my go-to because all people need an outlet. And you have to be very careful who your outlet is because you never want them to use it against you at any point.”
Carol Tomé, CEO of UPS
Kevin Dietsch / Staff / Getty Images
Before Carol Tomé stepped into the role of the CEO of UPS, she was warned the top job goes hand-in-hand with loneliness. The word of caution didn’t phase her—at least, not at first. But things changed when she actually took the helm of the $75 billion shipping company.
“I would say, ‘How lonely can it really be? It can’t be that lonely?’ What I’ve since learned is that it is extraordinarily lonely,” Tomé toldFortune last year.
“When you are a member of an executive team, you hang together…Now, my executive team will wait for me to leave a meeting so that they can debrief together. It’s the reality and you have to get used to it. But it is super lonely.”
Tim Cook, CEO of Apple
NurPhoto / Contributor / Getty Images
Apple CEO Tim Cook isn’t immune to the loneliness that often comes with the corner office. More than 14 years into his tenure, he’s acknowledged his missteps, which he called “blind spots,” that have the potential to affect thousands of workers across the company if left unchecked. Cook said it’s important for leaders to get out of their own heads and surround themselves with bright people who bring out the best in them.
“It’s sort of a lonely job,” Cook toldThe Washington Post in 2016. “The adage that it’s lonely—the CEO job is lonely—is accurate in a lot of ways. I’m not looking for any sympathy.”
Seth Berkowitz, founder and CEO of Insomnia Cookies
Courtesy of Insomnia Cookies
Entrepreneurship can be a deeply fulfilling and rewarding journey: an opportunity to trade a nine-to-five job for a multimillion-dollar fortune, if all the right conditions are met. And while Insomnia Cookies’ Seth Berkowitz loves being a CEO and all the responsibilities that come with it, he cautioned young hopefuls about the weight of the career. He, like Cook, advises aspiring founders to counter loneliness with genuine, meaningful connections.
“It can be lonely; it’s a solitary life. It really is. [During] the harder times, it’s very solitary—finding camaraderie, mentorship, some sense of community, it’s really important,” Berkowitz recently toldFortune. “Because I go so deep, it’s sometimes hard to find others and let them in.”
Peter Thiel, PayPal’s first CEO, turned his fintech fortune into a far-reaching empire of influence spanning venture capital, politics and power. Marco Bello/Getty Images
In 2007, Fortune magazine reimagined a classic mafia scene with a Silicon Valley twist: 13 male founders and early employees of PayPal, all long gone from the company, posed at a San Francisco café with slicked-back hair, poker chips and dozens of whiskey glasses. The crowd included some of the most recognizable names in today’s tech scene, like Elon Musk, Peter Thiel and Reid Hoffman. The magazine dubbed them the “PayPal mafia,” not for their time at the fintech company, but for their outsized impact on Silicon Valley through the companies they launched afterward.
PayPal went public in early 2002 and was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion the same year. Most of its early employees left the company after the acquisition. They went on to found YouTube, SpaceX and LinkedIn, among other legendary names in Silicon Valley. However, like their cinematic namesake, the group hasn’t avoided controversy. These former colleagues have built billion-dollar businesses while also finding themselves in the crosshairs of public criticism.
For instance, Thiel has faced controversy over his political affiliations and, most notably, for funding Hulk Hogan’s 2012 lawsuit against Gawker Media with $10 million — a case that ultimately drove the online media company into bankruptcy. Musk has also faced criticism for his takeover of Twitter and his prior role in the Trump administration, where he led widespread federal employee firings.
Here’s what they are up to these days:
Peter Thiel: venture capitalist
Peter Thiel. Marco Bello/Getty Images
Peter Thiel, Max Levchin and Luke Nosek founded PayPal in 1998, originally as a software security company. After merging with Elon Musk’s X.com (unrelated to the social media platform he owns today), PayPal shifted its focus to digital payments.
Thiel served as CEO from 1998 until 2002, leaving after the company was sold to eBay. He then co-founded Palantir Technologies, a major U.S. government contractor providing data analytics services. The company now has a market capitalization of $439 billion.
Thiel is also known as a prolific angel investor. He co-founded Clarium Capital, Founders Fund, Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. In 2004, Thiel became Facebook’s first outside investor after acquiring a 10.2 percent stake in the company for $500,000.
Thiel is among the many former PayPal employees who have entered political and high-profile public arenas. An active donor to the Republican Party, Thiel supported Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign but withheld donations during the 2024 election. He is also credited with helping JD Vance reach the Vice Presidential ticket.
Elon Musk: entrepreneur, the world’s richest person
Elon Musk. Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images
Elon Musk briefly served as PayPal’s CEO before being ousted by the board in 2000. He went on to build one of the most influential portfolios in technology, spanning electric vehicles, space exploration, social media and A.I.
Musk founded SpaceX in 2002 and has led Tesla since 2008. He also founded Neuralink and The Boring Company, expanding his reach into brain-computer interfaces and infrastructure. In 2022, Musk gained global attention for acquiring Twitter for $44 billion, later rebranding it as X.
His ties to A.I. run deep: Musk co-founded OpenAI with Sam Altman in 2015 but left in 2018 over strategic disagreements. In 2023, he returned to the field by launching xAI, a research venture focused on building A.I. that is more understandable for humans.
Today, Musk is the richest person in the world, with an estimated net worth of $400 billion. He is also perhaps the only PayPal alumnus to ascend into direct political influence. During the Trump administration, he led the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)—a name shared with his cryptocurrency venture—before stepping down in May after clashing publicly with the President.
Max Levchin: computer scientist
Max Levchin. John Lamparski/Getty Images
Position at PayPal: co-founder, chief technology officer from 1998 to 2002
As PayPal’s chief technology officer, Max Levchin helped lead the company’s anti-fraud efforts by co-creating the Gausebeck-Levchin test—the foundation for the widely used CAPTCHA security tool. After leaving PayPal, he launched the media-sharing platform Slide in 2004, which was acquired by Google in 2010. Levchin briefly served as Google’s vice president of engineering until Slide was shut down the following year.
In 2012, he co-founded Affirm, a leading “buy now, pay later” (BNPL) company, where he continues to serve as CEO. Today, Affirm has a market capitalization of $27.5 billion, with 21.9 million consumers and more than 350,000 merchant partners on its platform.
Levchin has also held board positions at Yahoo and Yelp. In 2015, he became the first Silicon Valley executive appointed to the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s advisory board, emphasizing the importance of collaboration between companies and regulators.
Reid Hoffman: entrepreneur, investor
Reid Hoffman. Kimberly White/Getty Images for WIRED
Before joining PayPal, Hoffman worked as a senior user experience architect at Apple, contributing to the company’s online social network eWorld. He later became director of product management at Fujitsu. After his online dating startup, SocialNet, folded, Hoffman joined PayPal in 2000 as chief operating officer.
In 2003, he co-founded the career networking site LinkedIn. Following Microsoft’s $26.2 billion acquisition of LinkedIn in 2017, Hoffman joined Microsoft’s board, a move that greatly increased his wealth.
Over the years, Hoffman has served on the boards of Airbnb and OpenAI, where he was also an early investor. Through the venture capital firm Greylock Partners, he has backed dozens of A.I. startups. In 2022, he co-founded Inflection AI with Mustafa Suleyman, who now serves as CEO. Earlier this year, he teamed up with cancer researcher Siddhartha Mukherjee to launch Manas AI, a startup focused on drug discovery.
David Sacks: investor, White House A.I. and Crypto Czar
David Sacks currently serves as the White House A.I. and Crypto Czar. JC Olivera/Variety via Getty Images
Position at PayPal: chief operating officer from 1999 to 2002
Since leaving PayPal, David Sacks has built a career spanning film, tech, investing and politics. In 2005, he produced and financed a political satire that earned two Golden Globe nominations. The following year, he founded Geni.com, a genealogy-focused social network that later spun off Yammer, one of the earliest enterprise social networking platforms. He went on to co-found Craft Ventures, the startup Glue, and the podcast platform Callin.
Jeremy Stoppelman joined Musk’s X.com in 1999 and became vice president of engineering after its transition to PayPal. In 2004, he co-founded Yelp, where he has served as CEO ever since. Under his leadership, the company turned down a 2010 acquisition offer from Google and went public two years later. Stoppelman’s net worth is estimated at more than $100 million.
Ken Howery: investor, U.S. ambassador
Position at PayPal: chief financial officer from 1998 to 2002
Ken Howery served as PayPal’s chief financial officer from 1998 to 2002. After PayPal’s sale to eBay, he became eBay’s director of corporate development until 2003. He later joined Peter Thiel at Clarium Capital as vice president of private equity and went on to co-found Founders Fund as a partner. Beyond investing, he is a member of the Explorers Club, a nonprofit dedicated to scientific exploration, and an advisor to Kiva, the micro-lending nonprofit founded by former PayPal colleague Premal Shah.
Howery is also among the former PayPal executives who have moved into politics. He has donated at least $1 million to Donald Trump’s campaign through Elon Musk’s political action committee. During Trump’s first term, Howery was appointed U.S. ambassador to Sweden and today serves as the U.S. ambassador to Denmark.
Roeloth Botha: venture capitalist
Roelof Botha joined PayPal as director of corporate development shortly before graduating from Stanford University. He later became vice president of finance and went on to serve as chief financial officer until the company’s acquisition by eBay.
Position at PayPal: software architect from 1998 to 2003
Companies later founded: Yelp, Learnirvana
Russel Simmons helped design PayPal’s payment system as a software architect. After leaving the company, he and fellow PayPal alum Jeremy Stoppelman set out to build a platform for restaurant reviews. With a $1 million investment from Max Levchin, they launched Yelp in July 2004. Simmons served as chief technology officer until his departure in 2010. At the time, Yelp said he would remain a “significant” shareholder, though the size of his stake—and whether he still holds it—remains unclear.
In 2014, Simmons co-founded Learnirvana, an online learning platform.
Andrew McCormack: entrepreneur
Position at PayPal: assistant to Thiel from July 2001 to November 2002
Companies later founded: Valar Ventures
Andrew McCormack began his career as an assistant to Peter Thiel at PayPal and followed him into subsequent ventures. From November 2002 to April 2003, he oversaw operations at Thiel’s hedge fund, Clarium Capital.
In 2010, McCormack co-founded Valar Ventures with Thiel and James Fitzgerald, focusing on fintech investments. He remains a general partner at the firm.
Luke Nosek: investor
Position at PayPal: co-founder and vice president of marketing and strategy from 1998 to 2002
Companies later founded: Founders Fund, Gigafund
In 2005, Luke Nosek joined Peter Thiel and Ken Howery to launch Founders Fund, a San Francisco–based venture capital firm that has backed companies such as Airbnb, Lyft and SpaceX. While his exact net worth is unclear, Nosek has made substantial investments through his venture firms. At Founders Fund, he led one of the firm’s earliest major deals with a $20 million investment in SpaceX, later serving on its board.
In 2017, Nosek left to co-found Gigafund, which went on to invest $1 billion in SpaceX, according to the company. He also sits on the board of ResearchGate.
Premal Shah: entrepreneur
Position at Paypal: product manager
Companies later founded: Kiva
Three years after leaving PayPal, Premal Shah co-founded Kiva, a nonprofit that provides loans to entrepreneurs in underserved communities worldwide. He also serves on the boards of other nonprofits, including the Center for Humane Technology, the Change.org Foundation, Watsi and VolunteerMatch.
Keith Rabois: investor
Position at PayPal: executive vice president of business development
After leaving his executive role at PayPal, Keith Rabois became an active investor, backing companies including Slide, YouTube and Palantir. He also invested in LinkedIn, where he served as vice president of business and corporate development, and Square, where he was chief operating officer.
Rabois joined venture capital firm Khosla Ventures from 2013 to 2019 and was a partner at Founders Fund from 2019 to 2024.
For those who love the macabre, it’s the most wonderful time of year. Plenty of historic hotels around the world are great for haunted stays, but Airbnb also has a number of options for spooky slumber parties for paranormal investigations or cinema buffs who want a shot at staying in a movie house.
Here’s some inspiration for to die for Halloween getaway this October.
Top 3 Halloween Destinations
No. 1: Salem, Massachusetts
Essex Street in Salem.
With the countdown to Halloween on, Airbnb says its top trending destination for a spirited weekend is Salem, Massachusetts. This Halloween headquarters is famous for its witch trials and Halloween celebrations and has starred in movies like “Hocus Pocus.”
Stay at the Henry Derby House, which was built in 1838 for tailor Henry Derby. The Salem home features creaky stairs and rattling windows.
Henry Derby House
No. 2: New Orleans, Louisiana
New Orleans is the country’s most “paranormal playground,” according to Airbnb. In fact, a mansion in the Garden District is the platform’s most haunted, according to reviews. (More on that below!)
No. 3: San Bernardino, California
Another top spot for horror seekers, San Bernardino is known for its top-notch haunted houses plus a Halloween EDM Festival.
The haunted room at the Parks-Bowman mansion on Airbnb
Some guest reviews claim that this Garden District mansion is haunted. The historic mansion is famed for sightings of a ghostly young girl in a yellow 1890s dress. The listing says: “Don’t worry, our ghost is very shy; you probably won’t see her, although some people swear she exists!”
Stay in the original home from Steven Spielberg’s 1982 film “Poltergeist,” which is about a family that’s haunted by ghosts. This four-bedroom suburban house blends Hollywood history with eerie nostalgia and is perfect for movie fans and has some cool amenities like a pool, hot tub and fire pit. Note: Ghost hunting is not permitted without a written agreement. Ouija boards, séances, spirit summoning are also strictly prohibited.
You can book a stay in the iconic movie home of Bella and Charlie Swan, where the fan-favorite series first began. Featured in the first movie of the cult following vampire franchise, this charming 1930s house in downtown St. Helens is perfect for fans and close to the riverfront and Portland.
Dating back to the 1600s, Linville Manor is known as one of Maryland’s most haunted spots and was featured on HGTV’s :Scariest Houses America” this season. Legend has it that spirits convene in the house at 1:11 AM, and mysterious crashes echo through the halls. The four-bedroom historic home sits on four acres.
Book a stay at the The Stranger Things’ Byers home
Did you know that you can stay in the home where Strangers Things was filmed? The Byers home isn’t associated with Netflix, but it’s the iconic location that served as the home to Jonathan, Joyce, and WIll Byers in the hit show.
For more than a year, dozens of fans and professionals worked to design this vacation rental, curating every VHS tape, vinyl record, board game, and trinket for you. Unique amenities include the opportunity to watch “Stranger Things” episodes under the interactive Christmas light wall inspired by the Byers’ living room from the series and play board games or Dungeons and Dragons in the Upside Down-inspired bunk room. You can also listen to vinyl records or play Amiga 500 games in Jonathan’s recreated room and ride BMX bikes around the property.
This immersive retreat features fan-favorite replicas and ghostly illusions, making guests feel like they’re spending the night in the beloved theme park mansion. If you choose, the home contains elements of illusion, sights, and sounds that occur throughout your entire stay.
Airbnb’s growth has slowed in recent years, says the company’s CEO, Brian Chesky, but he has a plan to remedy the situation.
In an interview on Tuesday at the Skift Global Forum conference, an event for the travel industry, Chesky noted that Airbnb experienced 40% growth in 2022, but that number declined to 18% in 2023 and then 12% in 2024. For the second quarter ending June 30, revenue growth was at 13%.
“I’m not happy about where the growth rate is at the company,” Chesky said at the event. “I think Airbnb should be growing significantly faster. It should at least be growing in the teens, and I aspire to run the kind of company that’d be growing at more than 20% one day.”
The problem, Chesky explained, was that the company lacked the foundation for sustainable growth and needed to “rebuild” itself entirely earlier this year to open the doors to new businesses.
“That’s what we’ve been doing,” Chesky said. “The final stage is now we reinvent ourselves.”
In May, Airbnb redesigned its app to include a new feature that allows guests to book services (such as massages, photography services, spa treatments, personal training, private chefs, and beauty treatments) and experiences (such as watching a comedy show or going on a boat sightseeing tour with local hosts). Chesky said the company hopes to grow its core business, vacation rentals, while “layering on” these services and experiences.
Chesky said on Tuesday that he believes Airbnb‘s new offerings will be “multi-billion-dollar businesses” at some point, per Business Insider.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky. Photo by Myunggu Han/Getty Images for Airbnb
He also stated in the interview that he believes Airbnb’s growth will accelerate next year, despite Airbnb’s history of “decelerating” growth, and reminisced about the company’s “hypergrowth,” when it was first founded in 2008.
“We grew the company like a rocket ship,” Chesky stated at the event.
Airbnb is also leaning into AI. In August, Chesky stated on an earnings call that Airbnb would become an “AI-first application” over the next few years. The company began using AI for customer service in April, which reduced human customer service interactions by 15%. AI now handles tasks at the company like canceling reservations and helping with travel plans. Airbnb plans to expand the agent this year and give it more advanced capabilities, like the ability to search through a reservation to find specific details.
Airbnb’s growth has slowed in recent years, says the company’s CEO, Brian Chesky, but he has a plan to remedy the situation.
In an interview on Tuesday at the Skift Global Forum conference, an event for the travel industry, Chesky noted that Airbnb experienced 40% growth in 2022, but that number declined to 18% in 2023 and then 12% in 2024. For the second quarter ending June 30, revenue growth was at 13%.
“I’m not happy about where the growth rate is at the company,” Chesky said at the event. “I think Airbnb should be growing significantly faster. It should at least be growing in the teens, and I aspire to run the kind of company that’d be growing at more than 20% one day.”
An Airbnb guest in Kelowna, British Columbia, says she and her friends were left horrified after making an unexpected discovery at the home they were staying in.
When Jade, who did not share her surname, and her friends pulled back the drapes, they discovered something unusual—strands of hair pinned to the walls.
“We noticed the hair as soon as we arrived, which was 11 p.m. on a Thursday evening,” Jade told Newsweek. “It was scary because we were five women alone. At first we were really scared but didn’t really feel we had options to leave since it was so late.”
According to Jade, the host explained that the hair display had been left behind as part of a prank when the owner’s daughter once lived in the home with friends. “If you zoom in you can see they look like faces. It’s a ‘core memory,’ so they didn’t want to take it down,” she said.
Pictures from the viral video where the women shared the unusual Airbnb detail. Pictures from the viral video where the women shared the unusual Airbnb detail. @jadenicole10/TikTok
An Airbnb spokesperson told Newsweek: “Airbnb requires hosts to meet our ground rules on accuracy and cleanliness, and guests can contact us 24/7 in the rare event they encounter an issue. We are in contact with the guest to continue supporting them, and we are taking action to address this with the host.”
Instead of removing the strands, Jade said the hosts offered paper and tape for the group to cover it up themselves. “They offered to give us paper and tape to cover it up but not take it down. I shared the TikTok so I could validate that it was super insane because the host clearly didn’t think so,” she said.
She shared the moment on TikTok where it gained more than 2.3 million views, and people shared their reactions in the comments.
One commenter quipped: “I’d add a lock of my own hair. Confuse whatever serial killer is keeping trophies.”
Another wrote: “Um, Ma’am, is that a trophy wall? I’ve watched too much true crime for this.”
Some users thought the strands resembled small faces with mustaches, pointing to shiny pink dots visible above the hair. Others joked that perhaps past guests had carried on the tradition without the owners realizing.
This isn’t the first time an Airbnb has included something unusual. Earlier this week, a couple shared how they discovered a “hidden” door and “secret” third floor space in their vacation rental.
While in 2024, a viral post shared the chilling note left in an Airbnb in the Appalachian mountains that prompted the poster to say they were “so scared right now.”
AI could take over up to half of all entry-level, white-collar jobs within the next five years, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei predicted earlier this year. But that just means more jobs will open up in other areas, says Airbnb’s CEO, namely in service and hospitality.
At the Goldman Sachs Communacopia + Technology Conference on Tuesday, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said that hospitality and service jobs will likely be safe from AI for the next five to 10 years — and that people will come to Airbnb to find that work.
“Services and hospitality are not going to be disrupted for quite a long time through AI,” Chesky said at the event. “I do think that a lot of what we’re doing with hosting, certainly over a 5- to 10-year period, [will] still be people-driven.”
Chesky said that the reason hospitality and service jobs will be safe from AI displacement is that people still want a human touch for some experiences.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky. Photo by Gerald Matzka/Getty Images for Airbnb
“When people go to Bordeaux and they drink a bottle of wine, I don’t think they want that to be an AI-driven experience,” Chesky said. He added that if someone vacationed at Lake Como in Italy, they wouldn’t want “a robot answering the door for them.”
In addition to Anthropic’s Amodei, other AI experts have warned that widespread joblessness could result from the technology. Earlier this month, University of Louisville Computer Science Professor Roman Yampolskiy predicted that AI would take over 99% of all jobs, from computer work to physical labor. The only roles left will be those that humans prefer other humans to do for them, he said.
“I hope that if AI displaces a lot of jobs, I hope [Airbnb] could be a place for at least some of those jobs to expand to,” Chesky said. “And I think a lot of people are going to come to us.”
Still, that doesn’t mean Airbnb isn’t using AI to improve its offerings.
Chesky stated in an earnings call in August that the company is using AI to assist with customer service and handling tasks, such as canceling reservations.
Airbnb remains a popular option for vacation rentals. According to its second-quarter earnings report last month, revenue was $3.1 billion, a 13% increase from the previous year. According to the company, Airbnb had more than five million hosts and two billion guest check-ins from the time the platform launched in 2007.
In May, Airbnb announced that it was moving beyond rentals and incorporating new services, like photography packages and private chefs, into its platform in a quest to be the “everything app.”
AI could take over up to half of all entry-level, white-collar jobs within the next five years, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei predicted earlier this year. But that just means more jobs will open up in other areas, says Airbnb’s CEO, namely in service and hospitality.
At the Goldman Sachs Communacopia + Technology Conference on Tuesday, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said that hospitality and service jobs will likely be safe from AI for the next five to 10 years — and that people will come to Airbnb to find that work.
“Services and hospitality are not going to be disrupted for quite a long time through AI,” Chesky said at the event. “I do think that a lot of what we’re doing with hosting, certainly over a 5- to 10-year period, [will] still be people-driven.”
Looking to travel somewhere with beautiful foliage this fall? New Hampshire is one of the best states to see autumn colors, according to Airbnb.
The online vacation rental marketplace recently released 2025 fall travel trends, using data from over the last year to analyze things like top Gen Z travel destinations, coastal towns on the rise and top experiences for adventures this upcoming season.
For top destinations to see fall foliage, Airbnb named New Hampshire as the second-best state, placing right behind its neighbor Vermont. Here’s what they said about leaf peeping in the White Mountain State.
Why New Hampshire is a top state for leaf peeping
Aerial drone photo of during autumn day of the beautiful red, orange and yellow leaf foliage. Taken in the White Mountains, New Hampshire with train track trestle curving around mountainside.
According to Airbnb guest reviews, New Hampshire is one of the top travel destinations for fall foliage, with many listin reviews mentioning words like “fall,” “autumn,” “foliage,” “maple” and “color.” An Airbnb survey conducted by Focaldata in August 2025 shows that 83% of respondents find foliage to be an important factor when choosing a fall vacation spot.
Specifically, the most wishlisted stay in New Hampshire between the months of September and November last year was a peaceful home built with boulders on Stoddard’s 250-acre Lakefalls estate, which is surrounded by a two-mile-long marsh and 11,000 acres of conserved land full of beautiful nature.
Elon Musk’s A.I. firm is best known for its Grok chatbot. Photo by Jared Siskin/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
Mike Liberatore, chief financial officer of Elon Musk’s xAI, has left the company after just three months, the Wall Street Journal first reported. His exit adds to a wave of high-profile turnover at the startup. Launched by Musk in 2023, xAI is best known for its Grok chatbot. The company’s technology has quickly caught up to competitors, but Grok has also made headlines for controversial outputs and now for a string of executive departures.
Liberatore joined xAI in April after eight years at Airbnb, where he was vice president of finance and corporate development. He also previously worked at PayPal and eBay. At xAI, he was reportedly involved in fundraising and oversaw data center expansion efforts in Memphis, Tenn. Liberatore left in July, according to the Journal.
Around the same time, Raghu Rao, xAI’s former commercial lead, also departed. Rao had joined in April following roles at Zoom, Ernst & Young and Deloitte.
Another loss came this summer when Robert Keele, a member of xAI’s legal team, stepped away from his role as general counsel. “Working with Elon on this tech, at this time, was the adventure of a lifetime,” Keele wrote in an Aug. 5 X post. He said he was leaving to spend more time with his family. His farewell included a Grok-generated video of a man in a suit shoveling coal, which Keele said was the chatbot’s response to the prompt: “What’s it like to lead legal at xAI?”
The most recent co-founder to exit was Igor Babushkin, who led engineering teams at the firm before leaving in August to launch his own venture capital firm focused on A.I. startups and agentic systems. “We wouldn’t be here without you,” said Musk in an Aug. 13 post responding to Babushkin’s announcement.
Not every departure has been as cordial. Last month, xAI filed a lawsuit against Xuechen Li, a former member of xAI’s technical team, accusing him of stealing trade secrets to take to a new role at OpenAI. Li, who joined xAI in February 2024 and helped develop Grok, allegedly uploaded confidential data before accepting an offer from OpenAI in August. On Sept. 3, xAI won a court order temporarily blocking Li from starting the new job.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky, 43, oversees the hiring, firing, management, and promotion of 40 to 50 employees at the travel startup, taking a hands-on approach to personnel decisions.
On a Saturday episode of the “Social Radars” podcast, Chesky said he stays “as close” as possible to the “people doing the work” at Airbnb andmanagesstaffers who report to the C-Suite executives who also report to the CEO.
“I treat them all as my directs,” Chesky said on the podcast. “I skip level, I co-hire them, and I make decisions on whether or not they’re working out and leave the company.”
Chesky called the process of managing up to 50 people “a lot of work,” but “necessary.” The core of his management approach is to forge relationships with many individuals within Airbnb.
“What you need to do is you need to have relationships with as many people as possible in the company,” Chesky said on the podcast.
Airbnb had a market value of $79.8 billion at the time of writing.
Brian Chesky, co-founder and CEO of Airbnb, on May 25, 2025. Photo by Gerald Matzka/Getty Images for Airbnb
What Is “Founder Mode?”
Chesky’s management style is part of a hands-on approach called “founder mode,” which arose from a talk he gave last year at a Y Combinator event.
Founder mode emphasizes direct relationships with employees instead of a hierarchy, highlighting “skip-level” meetings and more active involvement in the company’s daily operations. It contrasts with manager mode, which involves more delegation and fewer direct reports.
In an essay describing founder mode, published in September 2024, Y Combinator founder Paul Graham wrote that conventional wisdom had failed founders. For example, the saying “hire good people and give them room to do their jobs” could actually result in “professional fakers” driving a startup into the ground, per the essay. Founder mode means that CEOs interact with their employees beyond just direct reports and are heavily involved in the company, Graham wrote.
Chesky isn’t the only founder to take a hands-on approach to managing employees. Jensen Huang, CEO of AI chipmaker Nvidia, still reviews payroll for all 42,000 Nvidia employees “at the end of every cycle,” he disclosed on a July episode of “The All-In Podcast.“
Huang said that he has his “methods” for going through the data, and taps into machine learning to make it go faster.
“I review everybody’s compensation up to this day,” Huang said on the podcast. “I go through the whole company.”
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky, 43, oversees the hiring, firing, management, and promotion of 40 to 50 employees at the travel startup, taking a hands-on approach to personnel decisions.
On a Saturday episode of the “Social Radars” podcast, Chesky said he stays “as close” as possible to the “people doing the work” at Airbnb andmanagesstaffers who report to the C-Suite executives who also report to the CEO.
“I treat them all as my directs,” Chesky said on the podcast. “I skip level, I co-hire them, and I make decisions on whether or not they’re working out and leave the company.”
The Olympics are still three years away, but Los Angeles is already bracing for its first major showdown over the 2028 Games
A gathering of Unite Here Local 11 members yesterday.Photo: Courtesy of Unite Here Local 11
Outside the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on Thursday morning, workers in red shirts waved signs reading “Fair Games.” Hotel housekeepers, bellmen and cooks stood in protest together, demanding their cut of the city’s Olympic payouts. It was a rally, but also a warning.
Unite Here Local 11, the Los Angeles hotel workers union, launched its “New Deal for Our Future” campaign, demanding that Olympic organizers commit $5 billion to build affordable housing, impose a city-wide moratorium on Airbnb rentals and cut ties with the company altogether. If not, the union warns, it is prepared to strike when the Games arrive in 2028.
“ If LA28 and their billionaire backers refuse to change course, we will take this fight to the streets and to the Games,” said Kurt Petersen, Unite Here’s co-president. “ When the world’s eyes are on Los Angeles in 2028, we will not hesitate to strike.”
The union’s timing is not accidental. Dozens of Unite Here contracts with hotels, airports and stadiums are set to expire just ahead of the Olympics, giving workers rare leverage over an event projected to bring hundreds of thousands of visitors to the city. Tourism workers at the rally do not intend to let the moment pass them by.
“ A lot of people are gonna stay in our hotels,” said Emmanuel Cabrera, a bellman at the Westin Bonaventure and organizer with Unite Here. “We’re just asking for our fair share.”
In response, organizers with LA28 issued a statement, promising that the Games would create good-paying jobs and real opportunities for working people in Los Angeles. The International Olympic Committee has not yet weighed in.
The “New Deal” campaign comes amid escalating political fights tied to the Games. Earlier this year, the City Council approved a $30 minimum wage for hotel and airport workers. Business groups, backed by Delta and United Airlines, are now pushing a referendum to overturn it. Unite Here countered with its own ballot initiatives, including raising the minimum wage for all workers and taxing companies with high CEO-to-worker pay gaps.
Scroll to continue reading
Meanwhile, Airbnb has mounted a shadow campaign to loosen restrictions on short-term rentals before LA hosts a string of mega-events — the 2026 World Cup, the 2027 Super Bowl and the 2028 Olympics. The company argues that expanded rentals could help cover the city’s $1 billion deficit. But Unite Here insists that Airbnb worsens LA’s housing crisis by removing units from the long-term rental market.
Olympic organizers insist that the Games will be privately funded. LA28 recently announced that for the first time, the IOC will allow naming rights for Olympic venues (Honda and Comcast have already signed on). But if the budget overruns and costs spiral, the city is ultimately responsible, and activists warn that Angelenos could end up footing the bill. Sponsorships are nothing new, but critics say the deals have taken on a new intensity.
“ LA28, as we speak, is literally auctioning off our city,” Peterson said. “What’s next? Welcome to ‘Airbnb Los Angeles?’”
With contracts expiring, ballot measures on the horizon, and billions of dollars at stake, labor organizers say their battle with Olympic leaders has already begun, years before the opening ceremonies.
Four years ago, one of Vice President Kamala Harris’ top donors—the billionaire cofounder of LinkedIn Reid Hoffman—celebrated the IPO of Airbnb, a company he was heavily invested in, by fashioning Monopoly boards where the game’s “jail” space is replaced by “government regulation.”
Since Harris became the Democratic presidential nominee, many billionaire tech investors have come out of the woodwork to support her campaign. While they often tout Harris as a business-friendly politician, they’ve been vocal in their dislike of Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan’s antitrust agenda. Hoffman is one of the most influential donors in that group. He has donated tens of millions of dollars in support of the Biden and Harris campaigns and has organized other wealthy tech investors to do so as well.
When Airbnb went public in December 2020, the company was valued at more than $47 billion. Hoffman sent at least a handful of other investors a board game styled after Monopoly called “Airbnopoly,” according to images of the game obtained by WIRED. A top Airbnb investor confirmed that he was one of several people who received the game from Hoffman and his venture firm Greylock Partners.
The box is labeled as “a Reid Hoffman and Greylock production,” and it contains all of the pieces typically included in the classic board game, like cards, dice, and game pieces—all with a travel theme. Instead of a top hat or a thimble, players can navigate the board with an airplane seat, golf club, flip flops, and so on. The spaces on the board are customized, too, to include airports instead of railroads and Airbnb locations rather than Atlantic City streets. In one telling modification, instead of a “Go to Jail” space, the board tells players to go back to a “Government Regulation” corner space. If players avoid government regulation, they move across a path titled “Progress.”
Some spaces on the board require the players to pay government-issued fines, taxes, or trust and safety fees. “Recent developments in American politics make you curious about living in Canada,” reads one of the game’s cards.
Airbnbopoly is clearly more of a novelty gift than a screed against big government. “Reid is a huge lover of board games, having played Settlers of Catan, et cetera, for many, many years, so he made a custom board game called Settlers of Silicon Valley and gifted it to many friends,” says Aria Finger, podcast cohost and chief of staff for Hoffman told WIRED. “Then for Airbnb he thought a custom game would be a nice, unique gesture, and the Monopoly board easily lent itself to Airbnb’s various rentals, so he decided on that.”
Still, it has become public at a time when Hoffman and his Silicon Valley contemporaries have called for Khan to be fired under a possible Harris administration.
Since Khan was confirmed as chair in 2021, the FTC has gone after tech giants like Amazon, Google, and Meta for possible anticompetitive behavior. Many of these lawsuits have failed, while others are ongoing. Khan’s biggest win came in August when a judge found that Google had maintained an illegal monopoly in the online search market.
In 2016, Hoffman sold LinkedIn to Microsoft, and he sits on the company’s board. Microsoft is reportedly currently under FTC investigation as part of a probe into collaborations and investments in artificial intelligence. A spokesperson for Hoffman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
