Investigation: Airbnb hosts across West Yorkshire still allowing up to 30 guests to stay in properties

We can reveal some Airbnb hosts across Leeds and West Yorkshire could be letting up to thirty people stay in one property, despite the maximum limit of sixteen guests in place due to the pandemic.

On August 20th Airbnb imposed new restrictions to help limit the spread of coronavirus. These included setting a maximum of sixteen guests per property, and prohibting parties of any sort.

But our investigation has found at least five different properties across the region advertisting more than sixteen guests in their description.

When we messaged the hosts, three out of four we got in touch with were happy to accommodate more, with one offering space for up to thirty-one.

As Leeds was recently placed on the government's watch list after it recorded its highly weekly infection rate since mid-May, there are concerns parties and gatherings taking place inside are part of the problem.

Headingley Councillor Al Garthwaite has had dozens of complaints from residents in her ward, after parties have been taking place until the early hours of the morning.

In response to our investigation she said: "These numbers are just not safe.

"People could potentially come from all over the country possibly bringing infection with them and spread it not just to people in the house but to others, for example, in pubs, bars, restaurants, shops."

She said while people should not be organising parties or gatherings in the first place, more needs to be done by Airbnb to also stop this from happening.

She said: "Communication is one thing, monitoring is another.

"I do think they do need to monitor that the hosts are abiding by the rules. They should do spot checks and come down hard on anyone who’s breaching it.

"I know it’s the hosts income and I’m really sympathetic to that…but I do think this has to be communicated and it has to be backed up with enforcement.

"It may well be these house parties and gatherings that have caused spikes across Leeds."

In response to our investigation, Airbnb told us this is a new policy and it is in the process of communicating this to hosts around the world.

It said they continually review our policies to help ensure the safety and security of everyone and are reaching out to these hosts to educate them on the new policy.

It also recently launched a new pilot restriction for the UK to crackdown on antisocial behaviour and reduce unauthorised parties which will restrict certain bookings by UK guests under the age of 25 for entire home listings in their local area.