I want to tell you to NEVER USE Booking.com, as I have had problems with them a few times and customer service sucks. Unfortunately, they are sometimes the only real option and they have fixed most of the problems eventually. Sometimes the only way to get a room in an area is through Booking.com.
AirBnB.com works great, and you should use them when at all possible. Booking, well, the way I use them most is to get an idea as to what is available in areas and relative prices then I call the hotel directly. I do this because of things like the following example.
We needed a multi-room place. There were some AirBnB options, but none that looked great. A few of our party were staying at a fancy place that also had a two room suite that was listed for a reasonable price on Booking.com.
The price listed on the hotel's website was $30 more than Booking. I called the hotel, but could not get a better price or get anything comp'd. The extra $30 made the hotel not really a great deal compared to other options, so... I booked with Booking.
The price, right up until I said yes, charge me, was the lower price. The actual charge, and my receipt, was for the $30 higher price.
I called, and they could see the lower price on their web site, right in front of them, but they told me that in the 25 minutes that I was on hold that the price had gone down. They have price match guarantee, but apparently that does not work unless you can prove you found a lower price, but they won't accept a screen shot of their site, or their own eyes looking at their site as proof of a lower price.
I called the hotel, but since I booked through Booking, there was little they could do than call Booking. Booking finally came through and gave me a refund for the difference but it took too much effort and time.
I may have figured out how this all happened. I booked on my phone using the App. The app seemed confused as to which account to use. I have two, one that I have used for a while, the other that was pretty much a mistake. The one I usually use gives me a 10% discount. The other does not. If I log into the mistake one, it shows one hotel rented, but if I log into the other, it shows that one plus another. If I log in to the proper one on my PC, it does not show the one hotel, but it shows the other, plus all others I have rented in the past. The mistake account only shows the one on the PC. Pretty screwed up. I deleted the mistake account, so hopefully everything will work correctly in the future, still......
So... In the future, where possible, I will only use Booking to find out what hotels I might want to call in an area.