“My experience has been great as a host. In this really silly way, it’s a way people can connect. It’s been very fun,” she said. “I told all my neighbors I was doing this.”

Milne said she would alert neighbors when she had renters coming in, something the other Richmond Airbnb hosts say they do, too, and Milne usually drove by the house a couple of times a day to ensure everything was all right. But it wasn’t the renters that caused the complaint.

“It was that damn party,” Milne said.

Milne said she hosted a party at the end of July — a kind of neighborhood block party — that of course included the pool. Milne said everyone in the neighborhood was invited, and she thought they were, but a few neighbors didn’t get an invitation. She’s sure the complaint was likely from one of them, but regardless, the complaint triggered an order to cease operation immediately.

Milne knows she was in the wrong for having an Airbnb in the first place.

“I’m not trying to appeal it because the city is supposed to be legalizing them anyway, so to go down that route seems really ridiculous,” she said. “But it’s the selective enforcement that’s really wrong. I have friends who would lose their homes if they couldn’t Airbnb them.