Usually, it starts innocently enough with a bit of Coldplay but then you know it’s game over when Whitney Houston comes on and they start on I Will Always Love You.
So says my poor friend, Jessica*, who lives in a beautiful barn conversion in an area of outstanding natural beauty in the Cotswolds – and also right next door to an Airbnb property which sleeps ten and has a hot tub in the garden.
‘The middle-aged women are always the worst. The minute they arrive and I hear the pop of the prosecco bottle, my heart sinks,’ she laments.
One time, Jessica’s seven-year-old son ran into the kitchen, eyes wide with shock, to tell her there was a naked man in the garden next door. ‘He’s carrying a tray and his willy is hanging down underneath it!’ he shrieked.
It turned out he was a ‘butler in the buff’ who had been hired by the hen party group next door.
Georgina Fuller says Cotswolds residents have to endure hordes of out-of-towners and, in the words of a friend, ‘lots of ghastly Americans’
But the worst was probably the young ‘Z-Lister reality TV stars’, who accidentally set fire to the tree house in the garden after using a smart silver ice bucket as a makeshift fire pit. Jessica had to call the fire brigade.
Welcome to life in the Cotswolds where, alongside Daylesford, Jeremy Clarkson and Soho Farmhouse, we endure hordes of out-of-towners and, in the words of another friend, ‘lots of ghastly Americans’.
Every weekend, they invade our villages, pubs and farm shops, all thanks to the surge of homes-to-hire in our quiet,
honey-coloured villages, which have become a mecca for tourists and Instagrammers.
The Cotswolds District, which covers counties including Warwickshire, Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire, has, as of mid-September this year, more than 1,940 Airbnb property listings.
I feel fortunate to live on the scruffy edge by the Oxfordshire/Warwickshire border but, as we are less than half an hour’s drive from Soho Farmhouse – the upmarket members club and hotel, part of the Soho House chain, that attracts thousands of Londoners – many of our neighbouring villages are chock-full of overspill Airbnbs, party houses and holiday lets.
One friend, who lives on the other side of our nearest town, down-to-earth Banbury (which, despite its close proximity to Chipping Norton, retains a liberal dose of pound shops), has three Airbnb and holiday let cottages on her quiet no through lane.
She is forever getting blocked in by weekenders ‘up from’ Belsize Park or Wandsworth, who often knock on her door to ask where the nearest pub is when they can’t get Google maps to work.
‘I wouldn’t mind that much but it litters up our lane with hideous white Range Rovers!’ she says.
One of her neighbours also happens to be an interiors influencer with 26,000 followers and advertises their picture perfect ‘quaint Grade-II thatched cottage’ (‘ten minutes from Soho Farmhouse, 20 minutes from Blenheim Palace, Daylesford and Bicester Village’) on Instagram.
Alongside a plethora of noisy Americans, the cottage, which is available to book for £500 a night (including a Daylesford hamper), attracts a fair share of random ‘fans’ and wannabe influencers.
Our friend adds: ‘Most want to have their photo taken outside her cottage which is, I suppose, “Insta famous” – but once we had an angry troll throw eggs at her windows and doors. It terrified our 80-year-old neighbour.’
A recent chat with a local lady who runs a small shop in the heart of a lovely nearby village also revealed that there were at least seven Airbnbs and holiday lets in the centre, including a gypsy-style caravan and a house which sleeps eight but has no parking outside.
‘People come from all over, often in electric cars despite the fact we have nowhere to charge them round here,’ she says. ‘We get all sorts – families, tourists and rowdy groups of lads. They end up parking outside the shop and post office and curbing our business.’
The Cotswolds is bursting at the seams with rambling country houses rented for parties and events on various sites, writes Georgina (file image)
A colleague who lives on the other side of the Cotswolds, towards Bristol, had a group of blokes turn up next door with beer crates a few months ago. They were complaining loudly that there was cat poo on the gravel and they didn’t like the decor. They then discovered that, not only were they at the wrong house, they were also on the wrong street.
And then there was the couple who spent the evening moaning in the local pub that the house they were staying in was full of drug paraphernalia – only to discover that the supposed cannabis pipes were actually kazoos, musical instruments belonging to the children who lived there.
Airbnb says it’s not the firm’s fault. A spokeswoman for the company points out that the term ‘Airbnb’ is often used generically and many properties are advertised on multiple platforms.
‘Airbnb is often used as a catch-all term to describe a number of different types of short-term letting activity, and we have previously been incorrectly linked to issues involving other platforms,’ she says.
It’s worth noting also that Airbnb officially banned house parties in 2020 (initially as a temporary measure before making it a global policy in 2022).
‘Listings rented on Airbnb in the UK for more than 90 nights account for just 0.17 per cent of UK housing stock and, in the Cotswolds, the average host rents their home for fewer than four days per month,’ Airbnb says.
‘Parties are banned and we have seen a 75 per cent drop in the number of party reports in the UK since we introduced this ban.
‘While the overwhelming majority of our community are respectful neighbours and travellers, our reservation screening technology aims to detect and prevent parties before they start and we take action on anyone who violates our policies.’
When it comes to parking, Airbnb points out that it also works with Neighbourhood Watch ‘to educate hosts through different online sessions and webinars on how to host responsibly, and this includes guidance on respecting local rules around parking’.
Last year, 30,000 Airbnb hosts attended webinars led by Neighbourhood Watch, I’m told.
And no, in this part of the world, it’s definitely not just Airbnbs causing problems. We are bursting at the seams with rambling country houses rented for parties and events on various sites.
Some sleep more than 30 people and come with all the facilities necessary for hosting wild parties such as pools, hot tubs and games rooms. These wisteria-clad Cotswold-stone mansions and Jacobean manor houses don’t come cheap either, often costing more than £5,000 for just two nights.
The famous Arlington Row of picturesque cottages in Bibury, probably the most photographed location in the Cotswolds
One can only imagine how these guests are received by local villagers – but if those in Bibury, currently trying to ban coaches to help ease the traffic, are anything to go by, it’s not well.
A friend, who used to live near the famous Arlington Row of picturesque cottages in Bibury, probably the most photographed location in the Cotswolds, was once sunbathing French style (if you catch my drift) in her back garden only to find a tourist who had got lost walking past the gate. She was horrified and, after it happened one too many times, decided to up sticks and move to the less touristy Stroud.
Then there is Bourton-on-the-Water, aka the ‘Venice of the Cotswolds’ with its ornate stone bridges, where a number of residents are trying to convince the parish council to explore the radical solution of banning vehicles and introducing a drop off-point for tourists a 30-minute walk outside the village. In the hope, perhaps, that they’re too lazy to bother and get back on the coach.
As for my friend, Jessica, she is just relieved that summer is over and that autumn, which is usually much quieter, has arrived. Although with October half-term just around the corner, there will no doubt be a few bookings from families in the house next door.
‘One time I came home to find two little boys in our playroom using my son’s Xbox,’ she recalls.
‘They’d seen the back door was open and wandered in when their parents weren’t looking.’
Naked butlers, entitled children and traffic jams of white Range Rovers – no wonder the placid residents of the Cotswolds have had enough.
*Name has been changed
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