21–30 of 162 posts
The main issue with going after airbnb is that its a true bandaid fix: the gains in supply are often offset by just a few years or months progression of the underbuilding of supply
I know it's always been a bit of a financial asset, but the past 40 years have really seen this accelerate to pretty crazy levels. The issue, when you boil it down to the basics is: wealthy folks, development companies, overseas oligarchs, hedge funds, etc. owning many properties where they try to extract as much value as possible. This means that rents go up and short-term-rentals become more viable. This also means that young middle-class families can't afford to purchase or to live there, so it pushes out locals (this is especially bad in Lisbon).
The solution seems to be government telling you what you can or you can't do with your private property, which does not sit well with me, but it's becoming more and more clear that this can't go on forever.
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This is not just a problem in Spain. Affordable housing is a problem in almost every Western metro, both in the US and in Europe. The problem is caused by the financialization of real estate. I know it's always been a bit of a financial asset, but the past 40 years have really seen this accelerate to pretty crazy levels. The issue, when you boil it down to the basics is: wealthy folks, development companies, overseas…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Looks like politicians all over will do everything in their power except actually building more apartments. This is the wrong way to frame this issue. A lot of cities like Paris and Amsterdam have this issue with short-term renting. "Build moar" is just not really an option for these type of city. Firstly, the constructible area of the city is limited. So build, but build where ? You can expand horizontally, but th…
if building up is bad for tourism, it kills two birds with one stone: more housing and less tourists who want airbnbs. so slowly build up until you stabilise the tourism at the level you want!
This is not just a problem in Spain. Affordable housing is a problem in almost every Western metro, both in the US and in Europe. The problem is caused by the financialization of real estate. I know it's always been a bit of a financial asset, but the past 40 years have really seen this accelerate to pretty crazy levels. The issue, when you boil it down to the basics is: wealthy folks, development companies, overseas…
Is it not a supply and demand problem? Then the only rational solution to get prices down is to build more housing.
But you still need to build more housing obviously
I distincly recall many articles stating that for ridiculous EUR like 50k you could buy housing in spain right after 2007 the crisis, for many years afterward. Because it was so overbuilt , at least outside of the big metros) that the builders and sellers were desperate to move. I wonder if they all wiped out by the crisis (subprime really hit spain hard), and what we are seeing now is the consequence of that wipeout…
As far as I understand this is the latest shot in the conflict between Spain and its lack of affordable housing. I'd put the symbolic start around 2004-2006 [1] with the movement called "you won't have a house in your fucking life" where people all over Spain started demonstrating against high apartment prices. I don't like AirBnB and I'm glad they got fined, but the Spanish government also needs to accept that they…
> Looks like politicians all over will do everything in their power except actually building more apartments. This is the wrong way to frame this issue. A lot of cities like Paris and Amsterdam have this issue with short-term renting. "Build moar" is just not really an option for these type of city. Firstly, the constructible area of the city is limited. So build, but build where ? You can expand horizontally, but th…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is it not a supply and demand problem? Then the only rational solution to get prices down is to build more housing.
More supply is crucial but efforts to reduce demand in the mean time probably won't hurt either. If tourists can stay in hotels and hostels that take up less housing that seems good? But you still need to build more housing obviously
I distincly recall many articles stating that for ridiculous EUR like 50k you could buy housing in spain right after 2007 the crisis, for many years afterward. Because it was so overbuilt , at least outside of the big metros) that the builders and sellers were desperate to move. I wonder if they all wiped out by the crisis (subprime really hit spain hard), and what we are seeing now is the consequence of that wipeout…
Problem is that it's in areas where people don't want to live. In the areas people want to live, the problem is the opposite, there isn't nearly enough housing, so you end up with some of the highest population densities in EU (#2 and #3 are both in Spain at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_European_Union_cities_... in "density per km2" for example, 50% of top 10 on that list is in Spain!) and prices keep going up.
Add in that salaries are pretty low so cost of living is subsequently low, so you end up with a ton of "expats" and other fun folks like "foreign investors" who purchase up all the livable/rentable properties with their "higher value" money, because everything is so cheap for them.
Owners realize this, and while the government is (now at least) trying to put a stop to all of this with limiting rent increases and more, owners still try to take advantage of it as much as they can.
Personally, I think we need to temporarily put a complete halt to non-residents buying any sort of properties or even land here, at least for a short period of time so the people who actually live and work here can recover from the situation.
For the average person with a normal job here and not working for foreign companies with a higher salary, it's short of impossible to be able to afford to eventually buy a house.