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Airbnb's impact on cities

theguardian.com

31–40 of 153 posts

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#31
It'd be awesome if Airbnb integrated each city's regulation into its software. e.g. it ensures that you can't host more than X nights a year.

It could even extract the taxes from each host's incomes and pay them directly to each city council.

Prediction: if Airbnb doesn't do it, someone else will and councils will rule out competitors as illegal.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But when dogs pee on every street every day and night - it's ok :) As for tourist, dogs urine is the biggest disadvantage of this awesome city. I don't like drunk tourists either but if "tourists is a pain" for Barcelona - I will visit other cities, despite my huge love to Barcelona.

I don't think the urine itself is the problem so much as the loutishness and disrespect. If oh are visiting someone's country, be respectful and polite. That usually includes not peeing on things :)

Trust me, I never did it :) I agree with your statement, but I also think there should be either police (guardia urbana?) taking care of drunk tourists, or just close hotels and don't invite tourists. Otherwise it looks like one part of citizens is happy to take tourists money, and other just hate them - not fair to tourists.

And I need to mention I've never seen disrespectful or hateful locals in Barcelona - almost every local citizen I met was kind and polite, even if our talk was possible only with Google Translate.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#33
So the argument is that since Airbnb makes travel cheaper, it is ruining the cities?

Suggesting that hotels were keeping the prices artificially high to limit tourists and hence conserve the cities?

Try harder next time.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious solution to a severe shortage in apartments is to build more. Why doesn't Ireland do this? Pigeonhole principle: if K people want to be in Ireland at any one time, and there are N < K apartments, K - N people will have a problem. All the folks criticizing AirBnB want to do is make sure they aren't the ones who face the problem.

Not quite - Airbnb shifts demand from traditional tourist accommodation like hotels and guest houses into standard domestic units. I'm not arguing that this is necessarily bad, but it's really interesting to look at the reasons why this is happening and the negative effects it can have. Increasing domestic prices because of underutilisation is one.

As I said: All the folks criticizing AirBnB want to do is make sure they aren't the ones who face the problem.

Tourists are people too, and need a place to live. The folks in Barcelona just want to make sure it's the tourists, rather than them, who suffer from the housing shortage.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#35
post #7

Here in Dublin, Ireland, rents are exploding, mostly because of a severe shortage in apartments, and it's a fair question to ask if AirBnB is partially to blame. From [1]: > The average rental value of a two-bed apartment in the city centre at €2,000 per month, less a management fee, would equate to the apartment being occupied for just 120 nights of the year through Airbnb. > Investors have confirmed that if correct…

Any change in the housing market it bad for someone. Rents going down can cause owners to lose their homes. Rents going up upsets people who want the security of living in the same place but are't willing to pay for that luxury by buying their own house.

More interesting is what the long term picture would look like if the AirBnB is left to carry on unimpeded. Whatever it is will surely be better for people in general. It might hurt some people who feel entitled and got caught by surprise, but that's how progress works. There are usually losers along with people overall being winners.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#36
post #35
post #7

Here in Dublin, Ireland, rents are exploding, mostly because of a severe shortage in apartments, and it's a fair question to ask if AirBnB is partially to blame. From [1]: > The average rental value of a two-bed apartment in the city centre at €2,000 per month, less a management fee, would equate to the apartment being occupied for just 120 nights of the year through Airbnb. > Investors have confirmed that if correct…

Any change in the housing market it bad for someone. Rents going down can cause owners to lose their homes. Rents going up upsets people who want the security of living in the same place but are't willing to pay for that luxury by buying their own house. More interesting is what the long term picture would look like if the AirBnB is left to carry on unimpeded. Whatever it is will surely be better for people in genera…

Not just those who aren't willing to pay - many (like me) aren't able to pay yet.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#37

Answer? Probably not. Especially if you don't provide housing stock numbers. The last AirBnB complaint I read was in Seattle which had a whopping 1000 units on the market. Which is jack shit. If you want top argue that AirBnB is a problem then you have to list the number of houses, apartments, hotel rooms, and AirBnB units. I'm not convinced it's s talk problem in any city in the world. Now regulations that inhibit n…

Some numbers for Berlin can be found here: http://www.airbnbvsberlin.com

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not quite - Airbnb shifts demand from traditional tourist accommodation like hotels and guest houses into standard domestic units. I'm not arguing that this is necessarily bad, but it's really interesting to look at the reasons why this is happening and the negative effects it can have. Increasing domestic prices because of underutilisation is one.

As I said: All the folks criticizing AirBnB want to do is make sure they aren't the ones who face the problem. Tourists are people too, and need a place to live. The folks in Barcelona just want to make sure it's the tourists, rather than them, who suffer from the housing shortage.

Tourists before AirBnB would simply not visit somewhere if the hotel price was beyond what they could afford.

Is there any justification at all that could prioritise tourists over residents for living space?

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious solution to a severe shortage in apartments is to build more. Why doesn't Ireland do this? Pigeonhole principle: if K people want to be in Ireland at any one time, and there are N < K apartments, K - N people will have a problem. All the folks criticizing AirBnB want to do is make sure they aren't the ones who face the problem.

Not quite - Airbnb shifts demand from traditional tourist accommodation like hotels and guest houses into standard domestic units. I'm not arguing that this is necessarily bad, but it's really interesting to look at the reasons why this is happening and the negative effects it can have. Increasing domestic prices because of underutilisation is one.

The upside of AirBnB-like approaches is flexibility. Each person doing one or more rentals (of units that they don't usually live in) has low total capex, meaning expanding to serve increased demand is very quick compared to building a hotel. But it's obvious that this increases both volatility and prices on both the rental and housing markets.

I wouldn't be surprised if this becomes a problem and affected cities introduce heavy taxation on short-term renting out dwellings which you don't usually live in and which are not planned for commercial use.

OTOH, "semi-commercial" actors renting out apartments has existed for a lot longer than AirBnB. We stayed in one of these in Rome for a week in '09, found through some website for private rentals (AirBnB went international in '11). So it's not really a new thing, just a slicker UX which may or may not increase total demand for such services.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#40

It's not only Airbnb in Europe, but also Erasmus (twice a year they make finding housing very difficult), Uniplaces (like Airbnb but for EU students), local classifieds sites (which now just double as Airbnb and Uniplaces listings) and being known as an affordable city (like here, in Lisbon, which is being called "the new Berlin" as well as the new "startup capital city"). Over the past 3 years, rental prices here ha…

Why do you see this as something bad? Some people are willing to pay more than others for housing, so others have to move elsewhere; this is normal market at work, why would anyone want to stop it?
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