We're considering an Airbnb ordinance where I live. A major motivating factor is that Airbnbs are used frequently here to stage parties. It's difficult for homeowners to effectively police their properties for these (part of the reason they're Airbnb'ing them is that they're not living in the immediate vicinity).
Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
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Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#32In the book "Evicted" by Matthew Desmond he discusses how high turnover in residents negatively affects a neighborhood's sense of community. The book is insightful. Depressing but still insightful.
Editorial: This is one of things that led me to conclude that poverty is more than a financial condition. In fact, more and more I believe that poverty is a symptom of other "conditions." Conditions that aggregate to manifest and perpetuate poverty.
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#33A common quote on HN (and one that I firmly believe in) is:
> It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.
This so applies to AirBnB. It's not salary per se but those that benefit by renting out units or those for whom this has saved them money I've found typically get so defensive about AirBnB to the point of calling detractors NIMBYists and the like.
I've long thought that AirBnB allows people to profit off something that others around them bear the negative externalities from but I think it's even worse than I would've pegged it. Clear negatives:
1. Reduces housing supply;
2. Creates safety problems;
3. Creates nuisance problems; and
4. Brings temporary residents into neighbourhoods that have no tie to that neighbourhood.
To be clear, I don't have a problem with people renting out rooms or an ADU on their property. Most cities don't either.
But AirBnB is clearly used to create illegal hotels and that's the problem.
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#34We're considering an Airbnb ordinance where I live. A major motivating factor is that Airbnbs are used frequently here to stage parties. It's difficult for homeowners to effectively police their properties for these (part of the reason they're Airbnb'ing them is that they're not living in the immediate vicinity).
Did you know Airbnb has a full ban on parties? If you're a neighbor and you find a party, you can call Airbnb and have it dealt with: https://www.airbnb.com/neighbors
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
These penalties are never high enough to actually discourage the behavior. It's better to just ban accumulating more than X homes, where X could be as low as 1.
Im good with that idea on investment properties. Though I have no issue with people having vacation homes. Theres a natural limit to how many vacation homes someone can have without a revenue source on the asset.
And that limit is enforced by upkeep costs.
Owning homes isn't free, you know. It is a physically depreciating asset, that you have to take care of, whether you use it actively or not. Doing so costs money, so depth of your wallet puts a firm limit on the amount of properties you are capable to take care of.
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#36This paper has some big flaws. See https://www.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/olwous for an in-depth critique.
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#37We're considering an Airbnb ordinance where I live. A major motivating factor is that Airbnbs are used frequently here to stage parties. It's difficult for homeowners to effectively police their properties for these (part of the reason they're Airbnb'ing them is that they're not living in the immediate vicinity).
Did you know Airbnb has a full ban on parties? If you're a neighbor and you find a party, you can call Airbnb and have it dealt with: https://www.airbnb.com/neighbors
I'm sure they have full bans on all sorts of abuse. I'm glad they have a web page for people to find, but that's obviously not a solution to the problem.
The municipality I live in does not give a single fuck about Airbnb's "Neighborhood Support Team". They're simply going to license Airbnb rentals, and permanently revoke the licenses of any resident who doesn't meet an onerous (and likely to become more onerous) set of criteria set out in the ordinance. Neighbors hate Airbnbs, and usually with good reason.
It doesn't help Airbnb that they have irritated basically every faction of our board. The more conservative board members are responsive to resident complaints about nuisances and safety. The lefty board members are responsive to concerns about Airbnb displacing housing stock. Restrictions make everyone on the board happy. I don't have a dog in the fight (I've enjoyed several Airbnb stays) but I'm not going to be sad when this happens in the next couple months. Abuses stemming from people (and companies) turning single-family houses into unlicensed hotels aren't tech company tech support problems.
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#38From micro economic levels, it makes sense, short term rental in many cases are more lucrative, thus prevalence of AirBnB can push out long term residents.
But from a macro level, that would mean the city is getting more tourists, more business and job opportunities for its residents, ultimately leading to a more prosperous populace, right? Or are there other forces at play preventing locals from benefiting from more tourism?
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#39The AirBnb "effect" has directly led to increased home prices. A home turning a profit thus becomes more important than how its guests impact a neighborhood and community. Ignoring or spinning the social costs is a primary goal of Airbnb's PR machine. It has made many neighborhoods more transitory (i.e. less homesteading, more short term rentals). Acknowledge the social costs to community and it's not surprising to r…
No, the difficulty of increasing supply has directly led to increased home prices.
Re: Airbnb raises violent crime rates in cities as residents are pushed out
#40As this topic becomes more and more mainstream, I look forward to the numerous Twitter posts sure to come from Airbnb employees about the taxing social implications that come with working at Airbnb, how it weighs on their conscious, and and their ultimate decision to follow what’s right and leave. But only after their RSU’s have vested, of course.
More seriously, I’ve been very disappointed with Airbnb recently. I spent the last two weeks in Manhattan. Every night at the radio city apartments/hotel (a nice, if average, hotel right near Times Square, 49th x 7th) was cheaper than all surrounding Airbnb’s, with the exception of one, which for several days listed cheaper at $90/night. As luck would have it, that Airbnb was infested with bedbugs, and I got a full refund from Airbnb after documenting the photos with proof.
Years ago, it used to be both cheaper and often higher quality to book stays via Airbnb. Nowadays, the majority that are priced reasonably (ie within $100 of local hotels) feel like high-priced hostels.
Another issue: each listing will almost always include an exorbitant cleaning fee, to the tune of 20-X% of the actual listing (I saw multiple rooms advertised around $150-200 with cleaning fees of $100).
In my opinion, Airbnb came to disrupt the hotel market, but hotels have caught up, and now they’re just disrupting communities.