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Airbnb's impact on cities

theguardian.com

141–150 of 153 posts

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#141
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't speak to Ireland, but here in the US, there's an extremely strong relationship between expensive apartments and a lack of new construction. Here's the graph: http://www.spur.org/sites/default/files/wysiwyg/asking.price... How difficult is it to build new housing in Dublin? Does the city allow new apartment buildings, or are most areas single family, detached residences only?

It's complicated. There are height limitations for residential buildings in the city (lower than those for commercial ones), and there's no culture of apartment living here comparable to other European capitals I know. Dublin is sprawling with single family homes. There's a debate going on right now about higher density zoning and the like, but it will take time. Regulations to improve building standards have added t…

The market is clearly signaling that you've already run out of time.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#142

Surely the projections cited in this article aren't accurate. > Already operating in 191 countries and 34,000 cities, analysts at financial services company Cowen & Co predict that, by 2020, Airbnb hosts will be taking 500 million bookings a night, rising to a staggering one billion by 2025. If the population of the world is about 8.2 billion in 2025, which is the UN's expectation [0], that'd mean one Airbnb booking…

Extrapolated from their numbers, in 2045 it will be an unbelievable 16 billion, 2 bookings a night per human. All that vacationing will lead to vacation fornication and generate the increase in population needed to sustain the growth. What a keen business model.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#143

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…

Again, for Dublin only. A quick search of all properties for rent in Dublin on the market leading website (daft.ie) comes up with 1,437 properties, and that's without any limitations to the search. A quick search on AirBnB for just the next weekend (in the middle of tourist season) finds "300+" listings. That's a very rough snapshot of course (e.g. there might be many double listings), but it hints at the potentially…

Dublin has a population of 530k/1.1M/1.8M for city/urban/metro. Having a thousand apartments off the market is irrelevant at that scale. It's is not a "large portion". Or even close.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#144
post #67
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…

> Here in Dublin, Ireland, rents are exploding, mostly because of a severe shortage in apartments[...] How bad is the shortage? I'm asking because Google has once again contacted me, this time for a position in Dublin. Or do they have their own housing for employees?

It's getting pretty bad, and AFAIK, no they don't. You'll find a place with a Google salary I'm sure, but it won't be cheap. Feel free to contact me if you want some advice.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, for Dublin only. A quick search of all properties for rent in Dublin on the market leading website (daft.ie) comes up with 1,437 properties, and that's without any limitations to the search. A quick search on AirBnB for just the next weekend (in the middle of tourist season) finds "300+" listings. That's a very rough snapshot of course (e.g. there might be many double listings), but it hints at the potentially…

Dublin has a population of 530k/1.1M/1.8M for city/urban/metro. Having a thousand apartments off the market is irrelevant at that scale. It's is not a "large portion". Or even close.

That's a pretty broad statement that doesn't take into account any of the pecularities of the local property market. First of all, ownership is quite high. Secondly, it's about proportion of available rental properties, not absolute numbers or proportion of population. Thirdly, if there's already a severe shortage, even absolute numbers matter.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#146
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is a post claiming residents deserve special privileges not ideological, but one claiming they don't is?

It's taking the thread into ideological generalities. Playing the monopoly-of-violence card is just upping the ideological ante in a way that can only polarize the argument, at the same time taking the discussion to so abstract a level that there is little of substance left to say. That combination of escalation and generality is one of the worst thing you can do in discussions like this; it's a kind of trolling whet…

I'm attempting to distinguish between a normative claim (residents should be treated the same as tourists) and a similar positive claim (residents will be treated the same as tourists). People often conflate such claims so I wanted to preemptively disambiguate. (I do this often, e.g.: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7724652 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11669705 )

Am I correct in understanding that you are detaching/penalizing my post because while it's positive claims are correct, and within the letter of the law, you think folks who disagree with me might have negative emotional reactions and perhaps behave badly?

That's quite the hecklers veto you are building there.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take it with a grain of salt: the Catalans will find any excuse to protest. I've lived all over the world and nothing even comes close to the number of street demonstrations I witnessed during my time in Barcelona.

Have you lived in South Korea? They've also got a very strong protest culture for a first world nation.

They really do

http://youtube.com/watch?v=cl4-StMGYAw

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#148
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>... every time Airbnb was more expensive than good hotels. Really? I thought the whole point of airbnb was to get accommodation for less.

I hoped for same. Maybe it's because I'm not looking for hostel-like rooms, but in BCN I saw even room in the boat (Airbnb) for $900 per week. It's just one of examples. This June our family (4 persons) spent 3 weeks in Barcelona apart-hotels (4 stars) with prices $1200-$1400 per week. It was less expensive than Airbnb.

I also vacationed in Barcelona this June and stayed in two different Airbnb rooms at $40 and $55 per night (including all fees). Both were private rooms, although bathroom was shared in both cases (I don't think I've been in an airbnb that had its own private bath). Granted, as a solo traveller I'm likely looking at different listings than you are, but the options on Airbnb were quite good, even during a major festival weekend (Primavera Sound).

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#149
post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, I'd agree with you if you'd left airbnb out of that list. I see something more menacing in airbnb, probably because I've witnessed families getting outbid for single family homes by owners who turn around and airbnb out the "spare" rooms - in a city where I grew up and where the percentage of children has plummeted from about 22% to below 14% in my lifetime (yes, I'm talking about San Francisco). Airbn…

Sounds similar to the problem of ticket prices and scalping. It absolutely sucks that families are getting displaced, but at the same time it's a correction in the market. I'd be curious to know why family residences are more valuable as short-term rentals. My guess would be that there's just more people that want to stay in SF than there are hotels available at prices people want to pay. The tight housing market isn…

>more people that want to stay in SF than there are hotels available at prices people want to pay

The price discrepancy is enormous. Last time I looked, I could generally find a room on Airbnb in the neighborhood of $90-100/night. The shittiest national chain at the airport (I'm deliberately excluding the Tenderloin) was going to be at least $200/night.

"Hotel taxes" is an intellectually lazy explanation. If you actually price out a hotel stay in SF, you'll see "taxes and fees" are around 10%.

Re: Airbnb's impact on cities

#150
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's taking the thread into ideological generalities. Playing the monopoly-of-violence card is just upping the ideological ante in a way that can only polarize the argument, at the same time taking the discussion to so abstract a level that there is little of substance left to say. That combination of escalation and generality is one of the worst thing you can do in discussions like this; it's a kind of trolling whet…

I'm attempting to distinguish between a normative claim (residents should be treated the same as tourists) and a similar positive claim (residents will be treated the same as tourists). People often conflate such claims so I wanted to preemptively disambiguate. (I do this often, e.g.: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7724652 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11669705 ) Am I correct in understanding that you ar…

No.
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