Riot police evict hundreds from Airbnb after ‘gender reveal' gets out of hand
Matt Genesis, 33, said he agreed to rent his 10-bed £635,000 house in the village of Norden, Greater Manchester, out to a group of eight people who booked it through Instagram for an event.
But photographs show the moment hundreds of people crowded into the home, with the party spilling out onto the street as attendees parked on neighbours' driveways.
Neighbours complained to Mr Genesis on June 25, but when he tried to log-in into the property's external security cameras he found they had been disconnected at the £450 a night rental.
Police in riot vans had to disperse party-goers, some of whom had travelled from as far as London.
Mr Genesis, the director of Fairway Building & Remedial Contractors, the company which owns the property, said he found 150 people when he arrived at the house at 9.30pm.
Mr Genesis said: 'Whilst we were there, minibus after minibus was turning up – I'd say one every 15 minutes, a minibus full of six to eight people walking in.
'It was out of control – police turned up. We called them, obviously neighbours had called them. It was out of our control.
'Even the guy who booked it, it was out of his control on his behalf – he said he didn't expect anywhere near the amount of people, but it's been passed around group and groups.'
Mr Genesis said the operation had been 'calculated' – with guests disabling the home's security systems.
Mr Genesis said: 'Usually if guests are checking in we have cameras on the property, but as soon as they entered they turned the Wi-Fi off.
'That disabled the cameras, so we weren't able to deal with it any sooner than they could. It was very much 'Project X'.'
Project X is a 2012 teen movie based on real life events when a house party attracts hundreds of unexpected revellers after details are posted on social media.
£2k in losses
The Airbnb owners were forced to say sorry to neighbours and cancel their next booking as they worked to replace broken furniture and deep clean the damaged house, suffering a total of £2,000 in losses.
The property, which previously underwent a £200,000 renovation and includes a hot tub and pool tables, took three staff 12 hours to clean after the party.
The only money the owners received in return is the £450 a night charge, plus a £250 damage deposit.
Mr Genesis said: 'It was so structured, before we emptied the house out the people who were there said 'where do we go?'
'Guests had travelled from as far as London for it, so it was very, very calculated. It hit us – we seem like the bad guys, but at the same time it did ultimately hit us as well in the pocket.'
James Gartside, 80, and Jane Gartside, 84, have lived next door to the home for more than 50 years, and remembered when it was previously owned by an older couple who had passed away.
Mrs Gartside said she was asked if a visitor could park in their driveway, adding: 'I think I knew it was going to be quite busy, you just got that feeling quite quickly.
'Nine o'clock one of the owners arrived and said 'I'm sorry, this is what's happening' and said the police had been sent for. They got everybody out. It was just that night was out of control, when the police came.
'They calmed it all down – there was no fighting or anything like that. We had a meeting, we went around, they invited us all around and everybody felt very upset. They were very apologetic.'
Mike Law, who lives on the other side of the property, said: 'They did very well to disperse them, in my opinion. In a way it was a problem at the time, but it's not lasted.
'There were certainly more than 200 people, I would say, it was a nuisance – but we can be a nuisance to our next door neighbours.
'I didn't know how they were going to fit in there. Before the big masses came I did offer our drive to park on, but I think the owners learnt a lesson on it and will obviously improve it.'
Airbnb said it had looked into the situation and found the booking had been made through a third party, with no reservations made for the property on its platform.
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