Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

needwant.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

331–340 of 386 posts

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#331

Post by anoncowherd »

drob wrote: post #279
jseliger wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Berlin is rapidly gentrifying, there's a R.E. bubble going on, poorer people are being pushed out of the city This is true in lots of fun cities, primarily because it's so hard to build new housing stock—which is a Bad Thing, as Matthew Yglesias describes in The Rent is Too Damn High . Britain is suffering from a variant of the "no building" problem too: http://www.buzzfeed.com/dlknowles/britains-dysfunctional-pro...…

It's not quite that simple. Building up can ruin the character of the neighborhood, which is often a big part of the allure. I do think we're chronically underbuilding in a lot of places (SF being an extreme example), but the existence of steel and elevators is not a panacea for the "gentrification problem".

> Building up can ruin the character of the neighborhood, which is often a big part of the allure.

Well then, less allure would lead to lower prices, right? What's not to like?

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#332

Post by hansjorg »

anoncowherd wrote: post #330
geebee wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rather than saying "don't do this", it would probably be better to say "Step 1: make sure it is legal to do this". As you've pointed out, there are plenty of places where it is perfectly legal to do this. My guess is that it's harder to find a profit opportunity, though, because the more profitable use (legal use as a short term hotel) is already priced into the unit. I suspect that one reason airbnb is so profitable…

> As you've pointed out, there are plenty of places where it is perfectly legal to do this. .. Why the everloving fuck would this be illegal? What sense could it possibly make? -You have some property and you're letting someone use it for a fee. I get that this actually might be illegal somewhere - I'm just trying to highlight the fact that it would be absolutely fucking insane.

> What sense could it possibly make? -You have some property and you're letting someone use it for a fee

This is the extraordinarily naive libertarian position. Most people would not welcome a brothel as their closest neighbor for example.

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#333

Post by faster »

hansjorg wrote: post #332
anoncowherd wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As you've pointed out, there are plenty of places where it is perfectly legal to do this. .. Why the everloving fuck would this be illegal? What sense could it possibly make? -You have some property and you're letting someone use it for a fee. I get that this actually might be illegal somewhere - I'm just trying to highlight the fact that it would be absolutely fucking insane.

> What sense could it possibly make? -You have some property and you're letting someone use it for a fee This is the extraordinarily naive libertarian position. Most people would not welcome a brothel as their closest neighbor for example.

Funny that you should mention that. My next door neighbor put herself through nursing school on her back, and by renting her place to others in the same profession when she was at school. They were far quieter and less disruptive than the aging couple on the other side of my place.

If it had been put up for a vote, I probably would have voted 'no', but the reality was not what I would have expected.

This of course is not relevant to the discussion, where someone bought a condo which requires accepting the declaration, bylaws and rules and regulations of the HOA. If those rules, which the buyer accepted, forbid short-term rentals, then there's no excuse for doing it anyway.

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#334

Post by marvin »

anoncowherd wrote: post #331
drob wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not quite that simple. Building up can ruin the character of the neighborhood, which is often a big part of the allure. I do think we're chronically underbuilding in a lot of places (SF being an extreme example), but the existence of steel and elevators is not a panacea for the "gentrification problem".

> Building up can ruin the character of the neighborhood, which is often a big part of the allure. Well then, less allure would lead to lower prices, right? What's not to like?

That's all well and good. But all the wealthy people who already live there will probably use their political clout to prevent new construction.

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#335

Post by arethuza »

lucaspiller wrote: post #182
arethuza wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's one for £65K in Brora - not the most attractive of properties but Brora is a pretty nice town (bit out of the way though): http://www.hspc.co.uk/details.asp?id=42481 [Brora is also home to my favourite whisky - Clynelish]

"bit out of the way" - I thought where I was living in West Dorset was remote :D

I wouldn't say Brora is that remote - it's about an hour from Inverness by car, is on the main A9 road and is on the Far North Line.

Somewhere like Arnisdale or, even better, Inverie in Knoydart are far more remote (the latter is probably the only village on Great Britain that has no road access).

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#336

Post by tempestn »

tedunangst wrote: post #267
tempestn wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think he's saying that the previous industry that airbnb is disrupting is "nothing". As in, there was nothing pre-existing that satisfied the same demand as airbnb.

No, both of us are saying that buying a house to rent out full time is no different than running a hotel. "nothing" is the difference. tptacek appears to have recognized the sarcasm, but apparently nobody else did. I win again.

Yes, you're right of course. I must have jumped the rails tracing back up through the thread.

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#337

Post by f7t7ft7 »

numbsafari wrote: post #301
jorgem wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> laws put in place to preserve the rights of neighbors. Sure about that?

If you lived in a high-rise condo and paid go money to do so, and the two places on either side of you started being rented out to random people who were there one week and gone the next, how would you feel? As others have pointed out, residential zoning laws aren't generally the product of corporate malfeasance. Usually they are there to help combat it. That's what NIMBYism is all about.

> If you lived in a high-rise condo and paid go money to do so, and the two places on either side of you started being rented out to random people who were there one week and gone the next, how would you feel?

I probably wouldn't care because there would be no way to detect if it was happening, without me standing outside my door all night like a sentry.

Sure, I'd be annoyed if some of the guests came and went at all hours of the night and that was waking me up regularly, but that could happen just as easily with more permanent neighbors, and I'd be able to do just as little about that.

Re: I Bought An Apartment To Rent Out On Airbnb

#340

Post by omonra »

jessedhillon wrote: post #258
omonra wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me the issue is scale. Just like people can hold garage sales or lemonade stand w/o a license vs running a bar. By same token - I don't mind someone renting out AN apartment. If the issue is tax - Airbnb can simply collect it on behalf of the renter. As far as consumer protection - the guest deals with AirBnB and not an individual host. If license was obtained by simply filling out a web form and paying a fee - I'…

If you live across the street from me and have a garage sale every day of the week, we're going to have a problem. Your casual dismissal of licensing and oversight, as merely protections for the entrenched, overlooks the fact that there is more than one interested party here. I have to agree with the upstream commenter's general sentiment that this idea gets all the support here because it lends itself to an easy nar…

Ok, so the issue is not really licensing, if we get honest.

Instead you don't want your next door neighbor to rent out his apartment on a full-time basis and see requirement to obtain a license as a measure that would prevent that from happening.

I do agree it's a valid concern - but I'm not really sure why we need extra laws for this. The guests are either doing something illegal or they are not - in which case, I don't see any problem.

Post reply on HN