John and Ed were approaching Black Rock desert on the way to Burning Man when the email arrived from a friend. “Thanks for letting us stay in your apartment this weekend!”

John looked at his husband in confusion. There must be some mistake – they had left their San Francisco apartment with their professional housesitter.

“No, it’s definitely your house – your car, your wedding photos, your cats,” said his friend. “We found it on Airbnb.”

In what is just the latest symptom of San Francisco’s overheated property market, John and Ed discovered that their housesitter had rented out their apartment while they were away, charging $2,000 for five days. Worse still, Ed had found the housesitter on TrustedHousesitters.com.

Photograph: Jennifer Morrow/flickr" src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/static/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2015/9/17/1442462206700/21368953406_1a147b8e20_o-1020x612.jpeg?width=445&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=a1df5a5d32494feaac31bc92ebbe4777" height="132" width="220" loading="lazy" /> It’s quite probable that John and Ed forgot all their troubles as soon as they got to Burning Man. Photograph: Jennifer Morrow/ flickr

“We met him in May this year,” said Ed. “We used him twice before, but met him in person for the first visit and then got a police check and followed up his references. He seemed a nice enough guy.”

The housesitter fed the cats and even fixed their internet connection. John and Ed said they had no idea he also planned to rent out their house to strangers.

“I feel violated, and pretty upset that somebody I thought I could trust has done this to me,” said Ed. “He told our friends that there was a ‘misunderstanding’ between us, but there’s no way I told him he could go ahead and make $2,000 for himself.”

The couple’s friends changed the locks, and the case was reported to the San Francisco police. But police were unable to help, because John and Ed had willingly handed over their keys. The couple are instead pursuing the housesitter in a civil lawsuit.

The housesitter’s profile was still visible on TrustedHousesitters.com at the time of writing, despite requests from John and Ed to remove it. It shows him sitting in private jet, and claims he has worked for Google and GE.

At least the cats were fed Photograph: Oliver Symens/ flickr

“I read about TrustedHousesitters in the New York Times and figured I’d see if any opportunities made sense,” the profile reads. “I’m a very caring person and will treat your animals and house as if they were my own.”

TrustedHousesitters told the Guardian it had facilitated “more than 1m nights of house sitting” since it started in 2010, and that it always recommended references and police checks were conducted before agreeing a sitter – as John and Ed say they did. The site said it had disabled the housesitter’s profile, which it said would be removed from the site in the next scheduled update.

“TrustedHousesitters also provides a housesitter agreement form to ensure both parties understand of what is expected them including who is permitted to live at the premises during the term of the agreement,” said a spokesperson, who claimed that it was harder to investigate the complaint because John and Ed’s agreement with the housesitter had not been made using the site’s own secure messaging tool.

“As a result this particular housesit was not registered on the site, so we did not hold the details of who the housesitter selected was,” the spokesperson said. “We have made multiple attempts to contact the home owner requesting the housesitter’s details.”

Airbnb acknowledged the complaint and confirmed it had removed both the property listing and the housesitter’s profile. Ed criticised the company’s “lackadaisical” approach to the complaint and said its slowness to respond had aggravated the situation, possibly exposing other Airbnb users to the same fraud.

Airbnb, which has claimed its service peaked this summer when providing accommodation for 1 million people on just one night, has a large complaints team, though this is understood not to be a common complaint.



“We have zero tolerance for this sort of fraudulent activity, and this host and this listing have been permanently removed from Airbnb,” said a spokesperson.

“When we receive complaints about fraudulent activity, our team works quickly to review it. We regret that we did not review this more quickly, and we have reached out to these individuals and apologised.”

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San Francisco police would not say how many complaints they handle related to Airbnb, but advised anyone using the service to take precautions when renting out their property and to lock valuables away.

“Anyone who is a victim of crime should contact the police and notify Airbnb,” said officer Albie Esparza. “We work closely with Airbnb anytime there is a theft or criminal conduct. People must register to use those services, so there are ways to backtrack or trace a person who rented.”

The Guardian contacted the housesitter, who did not immediately want to comment.

John and Ed have decided to ask a friend to look after their apartment the next time they go away, and will not be using TrustedHousesitters again.

“It was strange coming home to find things moved,” said Ed. “The blankets I put on the back of the couches for the cats had been removed, and I still can’t find my laptop charger.

“And our cardboard cutout of Niall from One Direction had been moved – someone had taken him out of the living room and put him in the garage.”