JoePonzi's comments

JoePonzi | 11 years ago | on: Airbnb Is Raising a Round at a $20B Valuation

A huge chunk of the short term housing market is corporate. You're talking about stays of 30+ days and you need to book multiple rooms regularly with a single phone call. That's not Airbnb's sweet spot. The pricing in this market is also pretty competitive. I know because the investment bank I used to work at used corporate housing and the rates we negotiated for rooms in Manhattan were much better than what you can get on Airbnb for Manhattan.

If you want a publicly traded comp for short term housing, look at Extended Stay. $1.2bn in revenue. About $500m in EBITDA. $4bn market cap. And it offers a 3% dividend yield.

As for my motivation, you want the truth? It's Friday night and my wife is out of town. I had a long week and instead of sleeping with one of her boring girlfriends like I usually do I'm trolling you on HN.

JoePonzi | 11 years ago | on: Airbnb Is Raising a Round at a $20B Valuation

Yes, companies grow exponentially indefinitely regardless of addressable market size.

I must work for an Airbnb competitor, or a large hotel chain. Because everybody knows that astroturfing on HN is the best way to stop a company dead in its tracks.

JoePonzi | 11 years ago | on: Airbnb Is Raising a Round at a $20B Valuation

According to http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240527023038021045794510... revenue in 2013 was $250m. If you assume that doubled annually and now stands at $1bn, and that Airbnb has a similar profit margin profile to HomeAway, you need a crack pipe to get to a market cap of $20bn.

JoePonzi | 11 years ago | on: Airbnb Is Raising a Round at a $20B Valuation

I work in finance (hedge fund management) and my wife works in sales for big pharma. I've never heard any of our rich, yuppie friends say "just use Airbnb." It's more like "Where did you stay?" "The Four Seasons" Anecdotes are worthless.

JoePonzi | 11 years ago | on: Airbnb Is Raising a Round at a $20B Valuation

> Well according to this article[1]...

Be careful about headlines written by kids playing journalist. The value of the companies in YC's portfolio might be $30-$40 billion but that does not mean that the value of YC's portfolio is $30-$40 billion because YC doesn't own 100% of the shares.

> Pretty impressive.

Or scary. I heart Airbnb but the idea that it doubled in value in less than a year and is worth almost as much as say Marriott, which owns real estate, generated almost $2 billion in EBITDA in the past 12 months and returns cash to shareholders in the form of a dividend, is absurd.