Sultan*, 26, thought that starting an Airbnb venture with his closest friends would bring them closer together. They’d done almost everything together since university, from surviving exams to figuring out life after school. But a few months into starting the business, with bookings low and tempers high, he realised money could test even the strongest friendships.
As told to Aisha Bello
When I first conceived the idea of starting an Airbnb business with my friends, it wasn’t really about the profit. I just wanted to feel that kind of closeness we had back in school when life was simple, and it felt like the world was waiting for us to win together.
There were five of us. We met in our first year of university, and from that point on, we did almost everything together: reading, attending parties, sharing food, and covering each other’s bills. We built a rhythm of trust that never really broke, even after graduation. I was the glue in the group — the one who remembered birthdays, kept the group chat alive, and always found one excuse or another to make us gather.
After school, life moved fast. Everyone got busy; some relocated, while work consumed others. But in 2023, a year after graduation, we managed to pull something off together. The iPhone 15 had just been released, and we decided that everyone deserved to own one. We contributed ₦150k monthly for one person each month until everyone got theirs. Five months, five iPhones. It worked perfectly. It made me believe that joint ventures were the future. I remember saying, “See? If we can do this, imagine what we could do with real investment.”
That thought stayed with me.
***
By January 2024, I began to feel the distance. The group chat had gone quiet. Nobody was initiating hangouts. I thought maybe we needed something bigger to keep us bound. Something that wasn’t just vibes but a project we could all pour energy into.
That’s when I brought up the Airbnb idea. I had been seeing people on Twitter and YouTube talk about shortlets and passive income. It sounded like the kind of big move we could pull off. Plus, I work remotely, so I had time to manage the daily runaround. Everyone else had corporate 9–5s in banking, consulting, and agencies.
The idea caught on faster than I expected. I handled market research and scouted locations. Eventually, I found a 7-bedroom house in Kano owned by a family that had relocated. We got the apartment on a three-year lease for ₦5 million, which felt like a steal at the time. Everyone in the friend group agreed to contribute ₦1 million each, paid in ₦200k instalments over six months.
The owner agreed to our instalment plan, so we made payments monthly, and the property would only be handed over once we’d completed the full amount.
The place was old but solid: white walls, wide corridors, iron gates with peeling blue paint, and an open yard that we could easily turn into a small garden.
I was proud. This was something tangible we could point to and say, “We did that.”
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The first two months went smoothly. Everyone sent in their contributions. The group chat was active again — ideas flying about how to design the rooms, what name to give the property, even how to scale it to Abuja later.
Then the delays started.
By the third month, one person missed their payment. Another said he was “sorting some personal things.” I had to start sending reminders; small nudges at first, then direct calls. It started feeling like I was begging grown men for money they had already promised. When I brought it up in the group, it led to a small argument about responsibility, tone, and “the way you talk like we’re your staff.”
It hurt because that wasn’t my intention. I was just trying to keep us accountable. We eventually resolved the issue, and everyone paid up. By June 2024, the lease payment was complete.
But that was the easy part.
The real trouble started when we went live.
***
We listed the property on Airbnb, set up a social media page, and even built a simple Wix site to give it a professional look. We priced it at $45 per night, about ₦65k. On paper, it made sense: if we secured just 15 bookings a month, we’d cover all expenses and even make a profit. We raised an additional ₦500k to furnish the place with basic items, including curtains, rugs, interior decor items, and a few wall frames that featured phrases like “Home is where your story begins.”
Then, silence.
Weeks turned into months with no bookings. Perhaps it was the season, the location, or maybe we overestimated demand. We got only five rentals for the rest of the year, with most of them in December.
Everyone got restless. Messages became shorter. I could sense irritation in their tone, with subtle jabs like, “So what’s the update?” or “You sure this thing dey move?”
I tried everything: tweaking pricing, taking better photos, and cleaning the rooms myself. The electricity bills, repairs, and maintenance costs continued to accumulate. I was paying cleaners and security out of pocket. I didn’t mind at first. I thought that if we could just get through the slow phase, everything would fall into place.
By the start of 2025, one of our friends who lived out of town started demanding his capital back.
***
It felt like betrayal.
One even said, “Bro, if you knew you couldn’t handle it, you shouldn’t have rushed us into this.”
I felt something collapse inside me. They had trusted me with the legwork but never wanted the weight of the work. They wanted returns, not responsibility.
By March 2025, the group was fractured. Some stopped replying to my messages. One quietly removed himself from the WhatsApp group.
That’s when I decided to move into the house. It was empty anyway, and I was tired of paying rent elsewhere. So I packed up and came here.
Living here has been strange. It’s too quiet. Sometimes, when the wind blows through the corridor, it echoes like a reminder of what once was. The rooms are neat but lifeless. The space that was supposed to host guests from all over now holds just me and my regrets.
Occasionally, one or two of the guys who still live in Kano come around to stay the night, but the energy is never the same. Conversations are awkward. Everyone pretends to be fine, but there’s a wall now.
The irony is that the house is beautiful when it’s full, laughter bouncing off the walls, music spilling from someone’s phone. But those moments don’t last.
***
This year, we have had only two rentals, one in April and another in July. After that, nothing. I’ve even stopped trying to market it.
Some days, I think about refunding part of their capital just to find peace, even though no one asks about it anymore. It still hangs over me. On other days, I wonder if I should just rent it out to a family for the rest of the lease and relocate to another city to start over.
What I didn’t realise when we started was how fragile friendships can be when money enters the equation. We trusted each other, but we didn’t plan. There was no documentation, no contract, no clear expectations, and no exit strategy in place. We built everything on vibes and history.
I used to believe that business would bring us closer together, that success would strengthen our bond. Now I know that failure tests friendship more than anything.
***
There are nights I sit in the living room, lights off, just staring at the faint glow from the street lights outside. I scroll back through our old group chat sometimes — the jokes, the plans, the voice notes filled with excitement. It’s almost hard to believe we were that close.
We used to call ourselves “The Syndicate.” Now, we’re just strangers with a shared loss.
I don’t hate them. I just wish things hadn’t ended like this; maybe if I’d been more patient, less desperate to make it work, a little less hopeful.
For now, I’m still in the same house we all paid for, surrounded by the echoes of what we built, something once beautiful, now quietly broken.
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