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Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

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Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#281

Post by uwuhn »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #231
uwuhn wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/23131937 10 people per room.

It appears to be aimed at students, not homeless people who want to get off the street for one night. As the Wikipedia article I linked states, flophouses were typically rented by transients -- what we generally call "the homeless" these days. The term "flophouse" originated with hobos and propagated out to the larger culture. I was homeless for several years. The prices listed in the thing you linked are comparable…

I'm not a student and I airbnb'd there while in between leases. Most of the other people I met there weren't students either.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#282

Post by ratfaced-guy »

sfotm wrote: post #164
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why should zoning laws be fought tooth-and-nail? Because infringing on people's right to do what they want with their property deserves a hell of a lot more scrutiny than it gets right now. Trying to centrally manage what can be done where doesn't scale. See SF housing prices. >Can I open a nightclub in my house? As long as it meets the standards that night clubs have to meet then sure. You're unlikely to be able to…

These examples vary in how outrageous they are, but some of them have the ability to singlehandedly depreciate someone else's most valuable asset by tens of thousands of dollars without any sort of recourse. Even if the nightclub or parking ventures aren't successful you'll probably have a hard time getting the same value out of that house. And that's fine?

Yes, it's fine. You bought your lot, not your neighbor's. Zoning and land use laws are one of the primary reason why America has such shitty yet simultaneously expensive cities.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#283

Post by nate_meurer »

RankingMember wrote: post #275
nate_meurer wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great question. In my case, the home is consistently occupied by more people than would otherwise be living there full time, and they're much more active than a family of permanent residents would be. They eat out a lot, drive around the town and up mountain roads, and if they're skiiers or outdoor sports-people, they're in and out of town every day. Guests are usually groups of blended family and friends, so there a…

Unsolicited recommendation from one person on the other end: don't charge for toilet paper. If your concern is environmental, I don't think it'll make an impact as people will just pay the $1 or $2 and use the same amount. If your concern is money, just raise your rate. Hosts who nickel and dime for that kind of stuff come off like major cheapskates and tend to have reviews that reflect that. I've stayed at places th…

This is good advice. I hate nickle-and-dimey stuff too, so yeah, good point.

You know what else I hate? Fucking Keurig. I hate the packaging, I hate the shitty brewing machines that don't brew hot enough or saturate the pods, and I hate the racketeering company. Nevertheless, one of the most consistent compliments I get in reviews is about this dinky little coffee and tea station we have set up on a bread rack. Nothing fancy, just a Keurig and another normal coffee machine and some boxes of tea and cocoa and stuff. To me it looks kind of chintzy, but a lot of guests are super charmed by complimentary coffee pods and variety packs of tea. So I grit my teeth and keep the little drawer stocked with pods.

Toilet paper again: at some point I intend to install bidets in the bathrooms. Toto makes one that reviews well. Then I'll put up some signs with cute bears and bunnies and a maybe a folksy limerick about conserving and some encouragement to wash before wiping. If people used them it would cut way back on our paper consumption.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#284

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

nate_meurer wrote: post #266
siruncledrew wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your story shows an example of doing things the "proper way" - you operate by-the-book, you take responsibility for the property, and you're an active local small biz participant. The bigger issue is the people not doing these things. There are hosts (and guests) that simply don't give a fuck about others. Hosts (especially ones that don't live in the area) couldn't care less about their impact on the neighborhood as…

I don't disagree regarding AirBNB specifically, but sweeping generalizations about vacation rentals are destructive in communities that really need them to survive. Dozens of towns across Colorado are depending on this sort of longer-duration vacation tourism for their survival. The ones who do it well will thrive without too much change to their character (and without being colonized by casino companies). And like I…

I’ve spent a lot of summer trips hiking around small vacation towns in Colorado, and I’ve always found regular hotels to be a great way to do it. Occasionally I need to drive a bit more, but it’s not too bad.

What I like about hotels is the consistency of service and cleanliness, availability of nearby food or other services.

Don’t get me wrong: even though I’ve had some bad experiences with individual hosts on Airbnb, overall many host rentals are nice too.

I just don’t understand your negative comments towards hotels. They pay their taxes, they bear their own costs of demonstrating compliance with the law, provide a good standard of safety, cleanliness and service.

Obviously the hotel lobbying sucks, but I don’t see how anyone can think it’s worse than what Airbnb does. The hotel lobby is gaming a system in terms of competition, but from within a system overall that is not trying to in principle externalize all the burden onto citizens by skirting taxes.

Airbnb is doing something very different, trying to flip tax collection and demonstration of compliance around to make it an optional nicety they choose to extend to local governments on their own terms.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#285

Post by ratfaced-guy »

braythwayt wrote: post #115
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why should zoning laws be fought tooth-and-nail? Because infringing on people's right to do what they want with their property deserves a hell of a lot more scrutiny than it gets right now. Trying to centrally manage what can be done where doesn't scale. See SF housing prices. >Can I open a nightclub in my house? As long as it meets the standards that night clubs have to meet then sure. You're unlikely to be able to…

There's nothing stopping you from buying a piece of land and having no zoning controls. Then you can market it as a neighbourhood for people who want to be free. Good luck finding anyone to live in that kind of neighbourhood by choice. If you have an area with zero controls, it quickly will become a race-to-the-bottom. The kinds of people who want to live in a nice neighbourhood, and be nice neighbours, will go live…

You know most of the world has much more lax zoning and land use laws than the USA right? Somehow they manage to have nice neighborhoods with nice neighbors.

There's also nothing wrong with gated communities and in fact that would be vastly preferable to having a few rich people make everybody in the city abide by their own arbitrary regulations.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#286

Post by drstewart »

pjc50 wrote: post #83
drstewart wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like an easy solution. Raze all the vacant hotels that surely have been put under by the lack of demand as it shifts to Airbnb and make those apartments you can buy instead.

The hotels usually remain full. There's a huge pent-up demand for tourism.

Now you get it. Airbnb is providing a service there's a huge demand and need for, not some evil provider that's forcing something down people's throats.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#287

Post by leesalminen »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #272
ProAm wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is that AirBnB's fault? He wouldn't have been there if it wasn't for AirBNB. He likely could have asked the concierge at the hotel he was staying at for help finding his room in his drunken state.

He also wouldn't be there if his friend wasn't getting married and he didn't go to a bachelor party, along with a million other vendors and people he interacted with prior to getting irresponsibly inebriated and harassing a stranger. Regardless of Airbnb's legality or whatnot, the blame in this specific story lies simply on the person who chose to get too drunk.

Agreed. We had a similar situation in my town a few years back. The homeowner shot and killed a drunken intruder in the middle of the night. It turned out to be a drunk college student who didn’t know where they were. The homeowner was charged, but later acquitted by a jury.

I was glad to hear the jury agreed that the action was appropriate.

Drinking to excess has consequences, including death. Either from liver failure or lead poisionong.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#288

Post by koboll »

e1ven wrote: post #131
gbacon wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

koboll is almost certainly familiar with the concept of zoning. Your reply is non-responsive to the question.

His post doesn't give that impression. "But outside of that structure, what gives someone the right to dictate to their neighbors what they can and can't do with their own property?" Zoning. Literally, most cities and towns have laws about where someone can run a hotel. A huge number of AirBNB rentals are highly illegal.

I specifically addressed zoning and the idea that short-term rentals are "hotels" in my parent post.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#289

Post by exolymph »

sfotm wrote: post #164
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why should zoning laws be fought tooth-and-nail? Because infringing on people's right to do what they want with their property deserves a hell of a lot more scrutiny than it gets right now. Trying to centrally manage what can be done where doesn't scale. See SF housing prices. >Can I open a nightclub in my house? As long as it meets the standards that night clubs have to meet then sure. You're unlikely to be able to…

These examples vary in how outrageous they are, but some of them have the ability to singlehandedly depreciate someone else's most valuable asset by tens of thousands of dollars without any sort of recourse. Even if the nightclub or parking ventures aren't successful you'll probably have a hard time getting the same value out of that house. And that's fine?

Yeah. You have no right to ROI on any investment.

Re: Airbnb’s ‘Guerrilla War’ Against Local Governments

#290

Post by koboll »

lukewrites wrote: post #222
koboll wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In the end it was just a horrible situation to open up what was a hotel, right in the middle of our association / neighborhood. By joining a HOA, you've delegated away to the collective the right to dictate to your neighbors what they can and can't do with their own property. In your case, the system worked - because you are in a HOA. If people want to exert that kind of collectivist control over their neighbors, th…

> All kinds of small businesses are routinely run out of residential zoned properties. Yup. And they typically have something in common - they don't bother the neighbors or create an atmosphere that is noticeably different than that of a residential neighborhood without the home business. Work from a home office? No one will notice (other than the fact that you're home a lot). Teach piano lessons? As long as your stu…

>A vacation renter is gone pretty much before you can pursue any existing legal processes apart from calling the cops to come by and tell them to turn the music down. So, the AirBnB renter doesn't have to live with much/any consequences; the AirBnB "host" doesn't necessarily have consequences since they'll say "I won't rent to them again"; but the folks in the neighborhood do suffer from it.

Perhaps the law differs where you live, but where I live, local ordnance on repeated noise complaints gradually ramps penalties up from warnings to fines, so hosts have a strong interest in preventing partying at their properties. That seems a more appropriate legislative response than banning short-term rentals entirely.

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