4 ms·
Constantly amazed by how many people rock up here, like clockwork, to defend an the unlimited take on this business model: "Oh, it's just the hotel industry tha
by glangdale 9y ago
Constantly amazed by how many people rock up here, like clockwork, to defend an the unlimited take on this business model: "Oh, it's just the hotel industry that hates this", "If only we just built like crazy Airbnb wouldn't be a problem". Riiiight, all we need to do is live in unregulated megacities and the magic of the market will deliver.
Here's the thing: a lot of people out there bought homes and apartments in countries that had these funny things called 'laws', where they expected that they were going to live in communities, not surrounded by rentiers running random hotels sans staff and regulation. A lot of apartment buildings in Sydney are essentially now completely fucked by this - you buy an apartment and find out you're living in party central and your neighbours are a never-ending collection of randos.
I think it's pretty clear from the extent that these companies go to obfuscate the actual addresses of the houses that they are not working with clean hands here. That aspect of the business model should be flat out illegal. Oh, you're going to operate a hotel, but you're not going to tell anyone where it is?
- geoffmac 9y agocool story bro
- sctb 9y agoPlease stop posting unsubstantively.
- nsnick 9y agoAirBnB provides an invaluable service. Without them, it would be completely impossible to move somewhere for a month or two to find out if you want to live there. Without AirBnB there is no short term rental market. No one outside of AirBnB will give you a lease of less than a year. I have no idea how people moved to other cities for a short period of time before AirBnB.
- skylark 9y agoBefore AirBnB, people would sublet their apartments - I've never personally had trouble finding one to three month accommodations. You're correct that the extremely short term rental market (2 weeks and below) didn't really exist before, and AirBnB did streamline the entire process.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- kspaans 9y agoMultiple other services are listed in the article: VRBO (a subsidiary of Homeaway) and Kijiji. Not to mention actual B&Bs.
- megablast 9y agoYes, there was, just not as many. What I have done in the past is stay in hostels (when I was younger), hotels or serviced apartments. They exist in all major cities.
- sintaxi 9y agoBy all accounts the free market HAS delivered and any nation that has attempted to circumvent the free market has essentially collapsed. So yeah, as much as short term rentals are creating some unpleasant situations I remain firmly in the free market camp.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- glangdale 9y agoSo, 'zoning' == 'communism leading to essential collapse'? Strangely enough, Europe appears to be full of countries that place all sorts of 'circumventions' on the free market and that have failed to collapse on schedule. More specifically, none of the 'free market' economies in the West have had anything approaching open slather on zoning and appear to have survived so far (not saying zoning policies are always good, just that they don't seem to lead to obvious disaster). Suggestion: any time you find yourself having to lard statements with phrases like "By all accounts" and "attempted" and "essentially" you should strip out these circumlocutions and ask yourself whether the statement that remains is obviously untrue.
- SomeStupidPoint 9y agoFree markets have categorically failed to deliver; competitive markets have been successful. I'm starting to suspect that there's an intentional disinformation campaign to obfuscate that point. (Okay, I'm being coy: I'm fairly certain that people who dislike functional capitalism are using the term "free markets" to lead us away from working capitalism and back into serfdom.)
- sintaxi 9y agoI'm feeling like people have forgot what made the west what it is as if people think its some sort of fluke accident that made the west prosperous.