What happens when you turn your home into your workplace? This question often arises when analyzing how accommodation-sharing platforms like Airbnb continue to blur the lines between personal space and professional service. In the hospitality industry, it is important to understand that personal space and professional service are often blurred. gig economyThe growth of in-home hosting is redefining business models and shifting the boundaries between family and work life.
This article explores recent research on the human experience behind the Airbnb model, revealing how freedom and flexibility often collide with the emotional cost of turning one’s ‘home’ into a hotel. We suggest data-driven recommendations based on survey and interview results to help platforms and host co-create more supportive and sustainable hosting environments.
The Human Cost Of The Gig Economy
What does it mean for you to host strangers at your home as a job? What are the effects on your personal life? Not just physically, but also psychologically.
This article explores the main questions raised by the article “Work-family Integration and Segmentation in the Gig Economy: An Exploratory Study on Airbnb Hosts’ Experiences” by de Janasz and Kim, Schneer Beutell Wong. This research, which is timely and needed at a time where gig work has become more common in the domestic market, offers a lens on the human aspect of the platform economy.
This study is a reminder that freedom has its price, especially when you use your home as your office. Airbnb hosts face a more complicated reality when it comes to the “be your boss” narrative. Hosting involves juggling between the roles of a business owner and a private resident. It also requires balancing the warm hospitality of ‘home’ with the personal boundaries of a host and the emotional demands that come from being available 24/7.
In a survey conducted with 136 Airbnb hosts we looked at how the emotional and societal landscape of hosting affected well-being, the family and the desire to continue hosting. In our survey, we found that there was a growing gap between the ideal of the self-directed and happy host versus what individuals actually experience.
Airbnb Hosting Challenges
Drawing on ‘boundary theory’, (a classification model based on the management of boundaries between different life contexts, especially work and home), the authors examined how Airbnb hosts manage their work and personal lives, especially when their preferences for segmenting or integrating these spheres don’t align with the realities of gig hosting. Segmentors Integrators prefer to blend the work and personal life.
The study examined the effects of segmentation and integration on work-family conflicts, satisfaction and intentions to remain in hosting jobs. The sample consisted of a wide range of hosts. Some provided non-shared accommodation (entire apartments and homes) while others hosted their guests in their living spaces.
It was evident that hosts who prefer to keep family and work separate experienced higher levels of conflict when work interfered with family or vice versa. This friction was often reflected in lower job satisfaction and a decreased desire to host.
Misalignment: A Source of Stress
The research examined the much-praised concept of flexible work in the gig economic. Flexible working is not always a good thing, or at least, it isn’t for everyone. The value of flexibility depends on the alignment between a person’s job and their life. If there’s mismatch, the freedom that’s being sold can become strained.
Those who invite guests to share their home space face significantly more challenges in defining boundaries than those living in separate homes. The cohabitation of physical space amplified psychological role blurring. It’s unsettling to have strangers in your home while you are trying to prepare your child for the school day or relax after a stressful day. They are more than just inconveniences. They strike at the core of what home is.
Airbnb, like many other platforms, promotes hosting as a simple way to make money. But the reality is much more complex. The hosts are judged by their guests and expected to reply to messages in an hour or less (regardless of time zone). They are also penalized if they cancel, even for legitimate family emergencies.
The platform’s expectations constantly disrupt the hosts’ routine and sense of privacy. Airbnb is a part of the home, so it’s hard to get away. Even integrators more comfortable with a work-life balance can be affected by the emotional toll of hosting.
What Support Can Do for You
Good news: not all hosts face these challenges in the same way. Interviewees confirm that social support from friends, family members, other hosts and loyal guests played a crucial protective role. Those with regular support networks reported feeling less isolated and reporting greater well-being even under pressure. Many online labor platforms assume that flexibility is sufficient. Our findings indicate that long-term host viability is not dependent on autonomy alone, but rather connection.
How Platforms Can Step up
Airbnb, for example, needs to move away from the self-service model and towards a shared-care model if it wants to continue to be a viable platform that is human-centered. Here’s a possible model.
- Peer networks for a purpose Create regional and topic-based groups online that are intentional, moderated, and supervised. Airbnb could offer live chats and peer mentoring. For example, you can ask seasoned hosts “Ask Me Anything”. Not just forums, but real interaction.
- Integration of mental health and wellbeing: You can invite resilience coaches, or work with wellness apps like Headspace and Calm, to offer well-being support. Self-care can be encouraged by mindfulness check-ins, digital rest days or even digital rest.
- Redefined ‘success’ metrics: You can do more than just cancelling and responding quickly. Recognize consistency, warmth or creativity in the guest experience, and not just algorithms.
- Job crafting Showcase hosts who have redefined their roles by, for instance, adding breakfasts, tours or local activities. A badge or spotlight that says “crafted host” could inspire others to do their jobs better and give them a greater sense of purpose.
- Feedback loops Introduce optional tools for reflection that will allow hosts to reflect on how they are feeling, the challenges they face, and the support they require. This data can then be fed into future features of the platform.
Hosting Tips to Protect Your Well-Being
In addition to platform changes, hosts must also protect themselves against burnout or disconnection. Here are some strategies based on our research.
- Use space intentionally: It’s important to consider the set-up for those who are considering hosting. This is especially true if you know that your home and work life should be kept separate. Hosting a unit that has its own entrance, and has minimal overlap with the personal living area, can help reduce stress.
- Join or build your own host community Consider channels other than Airbnb’s official channels. There are many private Facebook groups, WhatsApp groups or informal local meetups that hosts can use to exchange struggles and tips.
- Establish expectations in advance: It is possible to avoid much tension by simply defining boundaries. Let guests know when you are available, what time your response is or if shared spaces are open. This will protect your wellbeing and save your valuable time. You can reduce the pressure by using tools like auto-replies, or working with a host in another time zone.
- Your work will be more meaningful if you add meaning. Introduce small rituals like guest notes, cultural welcome hampers or local tips. These small touches can help you to reconnect with your host identity.
- Check in on your wellbeing regularly Use a simple check-in every week: “Am i still enjoying it?” Feeling isolated or fulfilled? Your well-being is as important as the response rate as a key performance indicator.
Independent Hospitality Work: A Rethink
This study highlights the importance that fit plays in flexible gigs. The autonomy alone is not enough. What’s most important is the way that autonomy intersects with physical realities and emotional bandwidth. We need to know what the cost is and what work this gig offers as more professionals join the gig economy.
For those in the hospitality, education, or policy-making industries, these insights reveal how behind each platform profile lies a person who is navigating tensions within work and personal life. To do this, we need to create systems and mechanisms of support that acknowledge these boundaries.
Airbnb has brought this philosophy into our homes. What happens if the host is not included in the hospitality equation. Our research shows that autonomy without support can lead to strain. The idea of host care as a shared responsibility that platforms and individuals share can preserve the best features of the peer-topeer model, without damaging the individual at its core. Supporting host is not a luxury. Instead, it’s a foundation for a sustainable hospitality eco-system.
References
de Janasz, S., Schneer, J.A., Beutell, N. The following are some examples of how to get started: Kim, S. The 2025 report, “Flexible yet disconnected: Airbnb host’s social isolation, the work-family balance, and mental health”, Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights, Vol. 8 No. 1, pp. 183-197. https://doi.org/10.1108/JHTI-05-2023-0371
de Janasz, S. C., Kim, S., Schneer, J. A., Beutell, N. J., & Wong, C. (2022). “Work-family segmentation and integration in the gig economy” Tourism and Hospitality Research, 23(1), 60-71. https://doi.org/10.1177/14673584221085211
