When we open our homes to short-term renters, we do so with a sense of trust in the platform hosting us. But recent events across South Bend—from alarming late-night gunfire near neighborhood properties to parties getting wildly out of hand—have forced many of us to face a sobering reality. For neighborhoods like Sunnymeade and communities across our city, the current gap between corporate policy and real-world enforcement creates a safety loophole for which our neighbors are forced to pay.
As a local Airbnb host, I always believed the system worked. Like most hosts, I relied on the platform’s rules to keep my property and my community safe. But a closer look at how these platforms operate reveals a glaring safety blind spot: third-party bookings.
Airbnb explicitly prohibits booking a stay on behalf of someone else. Yet, in practice, this policy is treated like a suggestion. Because the platform does not require guests to verify their identities upon physical arrival—such as uploading a real-time photo matching their ID when checking in at the rental—there is absolutely no way to guarantee that the person who booked the home is one of the people staying on the premises.
This oversight creates a dangerous loophole. It means individuals who would fail a basic background check, or who are registered sex offenders, can easily bypass platform restrictions simply by having an associate book the stay for them. When a platform fails to verify exactly who is entering a residential block, a quiet neighborhood can transform into a public safety hazard overnight. While South Bend Police still have not made arrests in the massive spray of bullets in the Sunnymeade neighborhood over the Easter weekend, we do know that the Airbnb-style rental there was the target. Shots lodged into rooftops, broke through homeowners’ windows, and damaged cars. We even have reason to believe that the unearthed fire hydrant in the 1200 block of Longfellow was caused by the shooter(s) as they fled the scene.
We can no longer afford to let multi-billion-dollar platforms offload their liability onto South Bend neighborhoods. We must consider forcing Airbnb to actively enforce its own safety policies. If the company refuses to implement common-sense biometric or photo verification at check-in, our local city leaders and police department must step in, and local taxpayers should not carry this burden. Property rules should be backed by local enforcement, treating repeated unverified bookings as code violations or public nuisances.
Compounding this safety issue is a frustrating economic double standard. While neighbors bear the physical risks of unverified renters, local hosts bear the financial brunt of the platform’s increasingly guest-friendly cancellation policies.
In a town like South Bend, our entire seasonal rental economy is tied to Notre Dame’s success. If the team suffers a tough loss early in the season, the momentum changes instantly. The new, more renter-friendly cancellation policies mean hosts bear the economic hit when fans change their travel plans. Because the platform consistently prioritizes the renter’s flexibility over the host’s baseline security, local property owners are left holding empty calendars and completely wiped-out revenue with zero recourse.
Short-term rentals can absolutely be an asset to South Bend, providing vital lodging during peak university weekends and bringing tourism dollars into our local economy. But the current setup is fundamentally unfair. Neighbors should not have to worry about the identities of those staying next door, and hosts should not have to carry all the financial risk of an unpredictable, NIL-fueled football season.
It is time for our Common Council in South Bend and city governments around the nation to demand that short-term rental platforms start protecting the communities that make this parasitic business model possible in the first place.
© 2026 Brian S Collier. All opinions are those of the author. The author reserves all Rights and copyrights. To request permission to reprint any or all of this article, contact info@redresssouthbend.com.
Author’s Note: This story was partially written using AI assistance, but all reporting, local details, and interviews are real, original, and strictly fact checked.
Reprinted with permission of the author by Redress South Bend.
All opinions, research, and views in this piece are attributed to the author and are not necessarily the thoughts or opinions of Redress South Bend.
