One Airbnb host claimed that “middle-aged ravers” turned their property into a “battlefield,” ransacking rooms, smashing doors and even “throwing mattresses out of windows.”
Muzingaye Nduna says he woke up to messages from police and neighbors after police were called to “restore order” at one of his Airbnbs overnight.
The 37-year-old sent his cleaner to his home in the West Midlands and was stunned to see the horrific images of the damage.
The snapshots show all the wooden doors broken, the bathroom sink torn from the wall and the rooms destroyed.
Other images even show mattresses in the garden as if they had been thrown through an upstairs window and a patio door ripped off its hinges.
After renting the property, Muzingaye Nduna said mattresses and bed frames were “thrown outside through the upstairs windows”.
In the bathroom, those present were reportedly so violent that they tore a sink from the wall.
He shared the shocking images on TikTok last Monday and his stunned users commented that it looks like a “battlefield.”
Nduna, who left his business improvement job to become a property investor, questioned whether the incident was a “crazy rave” or a personal attack on his business.
He says that when he checked the guests’ IDs before their arrival, they said they were between 40 and 50 years old, so he assumed they wanted to use the house to access the nearby hospital.
Although he loved house parties when he was young, Nduna says he has never seen as much destruction as after that visit in February 2022.
The property investor claims he was initially quoted an exorbitant £12,000 to refurbish the property, forcing him to consider leaving the rental industry entirely.
Luckily, Airbnb investigated and gave £8,450 as part of its damage protection plan to the host, and it took the trader two weeks to restore the property.
Airbnb said the problems are “exceptionally rare” but that they are willing to pay hosts up to $3 million if a guest damages their accommodation or belongings during a stay.
Mr Nduna, from the West Midlands, said: ‘When I first saw the photographs I was shocked.
Nduna said when their cleaner arrived, they found a patio door had been completely ripped off its hinges and dumped in the back garden.
He claimed that all the doors in the house had been damaged in some way, with some being ‘shattered’ in two
Mr Nduna said: “All the doors in the house were smashed, but there is one that is a sliding glass door, so they took it off the hinges and threw it in the garden.”
Nduna, 37, was left stunned after a cleaner sent him pictures of the horrific damage caused by the ‘ravers’.
“I asked myself, ‘Is this just a crazy party or is this someone intentionally trying to cause harm here?’
“I was actually scared because I had never dealt with the police before, so I was worried that something big had happened and I would have to appear in court.
‘When the police are involved there is an element of fear because you wonder ‘did we do something wrong?’
‘All the doors in the house were crushed, but there is one that is a sliding glass door, so they took it off its hinges and threw it into the garden.
‘Basically all the furniture was damaged in one way or another.
‘The sink and all the televisions were removed from the walls and thrown on the floor, the shower screen was removed and all the beds were thrown out of the windows, including the frames and mattresses.
“There were holes in the walls from hitting or throwing things and furniture thrown down the stairs.
‘I’ve been young and a student before, so I’ve been to house parties and I know how crazy they can get, but we’ve never done anything like this.
“I knew there might be some people who could cause some damage, but I thought maybe a broken table here or there, something that could be fixed quickly.”
‘I didn’t worry about anything that might exceed the deposit.
Nduna said there was no furniture intact and that AirBnB had helped him cover the repair costs.
He said the damage was so bad that he wondered if someone had been “intentionally trying to ruin my business.”
‘I was wondering if someone was intentionally trying to ruin my business because they weren’t happy with the property being on Airbnb or me generating income.
“All of that ran through my head for days before I finally thought, ‘I have to get back to business.'”
Muzingaye, who decided not to press charges, says he is not sure who showed up at the property and how many were there.
It welcomed Airbnb guests to the home for the first time in 2021, and it was often used by families needing access to the nearby hospital.
The investor says it is now used to house “children and vulnerable adults” who need hospital care, but he still uses Airbnb for his other properties.
It has since added a doorbell camera to the property and requires guests to sign terms and conditions that state they will cover the costs of damages.
The TikTok video revealing the shocking damage has almost 20,000 likes and more than 1,000 bewildered comments.
One said: ‘Why, just why?’ I don’t understand some people’s mentality!’
Another wrote: “It looks like a battlefield.”
A third added: ‘OMG! How can people be so disrespectful and do this?
Muzingaye says Airbnb’s insurance helped cover the cost of all damage to the property and in the end their only losses were in income while the property could no longer be rented.
Airbnb says it now has AI booking detection technology to help reduce the risk of disruptive parties, which it says resulted in a 75 per cent drop in the number of party reports in the UK last year .
An Airbnb spokesperson said: “Parties are prohibited on Airbnb, and we removed the guest and reimbursed the host for damages when this was first reported to us over two years ago.”
‘While problems on Airbnb are exceptionally rare, we strive to provide quality support to our community of hosts.
“Our AirCover reimburses hosts up to $3 million under host damage protection in the rare case that a guest damages their accommodation or belongings during an Airbnb stay, if the guest does not pay.”
West Midlands Police has been contacted for comment.
