verifying that a place is abiding by certain standards and has passed AirBnb's audit but still breaking local laws would probably anger lots of neighbors.
lots of illegal listings exist, and auditing would bring that to light even more.
paying a small team of auditors would probably do a ton more damage to the business in terms of losing listings than turning a blind eye or making other attempts for users to indirectly police the issue of misleading or fraudulent listings.
I recently had some issues with an Airbnb. It was not technically a scam, just an awful host making crazy demands that we cover for their illegal Airbnb.
It was extremely clear that the support wasn't interested at all in helping. I even asked if we could just cancel the reservation (the weirdness started before we arrived), the support agent pressed us to still go there.
In one reservation, Airbnb has moved from a company I liked to one that I will avoid as much as possible and only use if there aren't any hotels available.
I'm totally down for these audits, but expect the auditor to pay the fee like anyone else if he/she stays, or if he/she consumes the timeslot that I could have sold to someone else.
Even though AirBnB, like airlines has all the data, customers love leaving feedback on rentals.
Edit: it did not work on me
For example corporate auditors are paid by the company they're auditing and often actually make all their money providing other services to that same company. Guess how that works out (or read about Enron if you need a hint)
On the other hand I'd say something like the Paris MOU works. The inspectors (they're doing inspection not auditing, although the things they're inspecting are supposed to have already been inspected by the Flag State, so in another sense they're just checking that work) work for the Port State, so their interests aren't directly aligned with the ship owner and it makes sense to hold some vessels, but on the other hand, your ports aren't making money when they are full of ships being inspected or held for defects, so you don't want to go crazy.
One thing I particularly like about the Paris MOU is that it uses statistics to drive feedback. If inspections find that, say, South African flagged vessels (thus supposedly already inspected on behalf of South Africa) are often non-compliant, that flag goes on the Grey List or the Black List and there are MORE inspections of South African vessels. This has two effects, it drives up the cost of choosing the South African flag for your vessels, discouraging you from choosing a flag with bad inspection regime whether because it's cheaper or to save on vessel upkeep - and it enhances the ability to monitor other vessels that might fail too. On the other hand if say, South Africa is doing a great job, any time you inspect a South African flagged vessel it's like it just came out of the factory and every crew member is a world expert who is wide awake and handsomely paid, then South Africa goes on the white list and fewer of their vessels get inspected.
All those unfortunate things for you and me are risk mitigation/ cost savings for them.
At most AirBNB would have to prove damages, which would be difficult since they profit off dishonesty, or have proceedings that result in consequences for the hosts.
For example I’ve had multiple hosts that lie about the address of their tenancy because they’re renting and not allowed to sublet or short term rent the property as a term of their lease.
Verifying the listings, including deeds/leases would fix this.
Auditor signs up for a night in your house. Let's say your listing has fake pictures or fake amenities. Or you try to bait and switch the auditor by having them stay in some crappy other property because the main listing "is having plumbing problems".
Bam, audit failed, your account is frozen, your listings are removed, and you are banned from using AirBnB pending investigation.