4 ms·

It's not a "zoning problem." It's much simpler than that. * Airbnb flophouses are not obliged to conform to fire, health, or safety codes, and they don't pay

It's not a "zoning problem." It's much simpler than that. * Airbnb flophouses are not obliged to conform to fire, health, or safety codes, and they don't pay taxes. Right off the bat, they're scads cheaper than hotels because they don't bear those costs. * Visitors and residents have very different incentives. Tourists may wish to stay in cute residential areas, but they are not necessarily interested in being neighborly -- they're not particularly invested in the comfort and safety of the people around them, because they'll be leaving soon. * People do a lot of gross stuff in a hotel that you probably don't want to encounter in your apartment building. Drugs, prostitution, loud parties. No amount of "zoning" is going to make the commingling of apartments and hotels attractive to full-time residents, nor will any change in "zoning" make flophouses less profitable.

graeme 7y ago
>No amount of "zoning" is going to make the commingling of apartments and hotels attractive to full-time residents, nor will any change in "zoning" make flophouses less profitable. In most old cities, hotels, bed and breakfasts, hostels etc all exist in residential areas. And boarding houses used to be common in these same areas too.
manfredo 7y ago
> Airbnb flophouses are not obliged to conform to fire, health, or safety codes, and they don't pay taxes. Right off the bat, they're scads cheaper than hotels because they don't bear those costs. Because Airbnbs aren't flophouses. They're holding usually just a couple or family, maybe a dozen people tops unless the place being rented is a really big detached house. Expecting them to be held to the same standards as hotels is not necessary. If this lack of compliance is so dangerous, then why are letting people live in these places full time? > Visitors and residents have very different incentives. Tourists may wish to stay in cute residential areas, but they are not necessarily interested in being neighborly -- they're not particularly invested in the comfort and safety of the people around them, because they'll be leaving soon. Tourists also spend more money while on vacation, especially on small businesses like restaurants and bars. More importantly, they bring this money in externally. More tourism attracts the ire of residents that now have to deal with out-of-town people walking around their neighborhood, but I have rarely seen someone complain about negative economic impact of tourism let alone make a coherent argument about why it's bad. > People do a lot of gross stuff in a hotel that you probably don't want to encounter in your apartment building. Drugs, prostitution, loud parties. Plenty of people do these things in their apartments, condos, and houses, too. > No amount of "zoning" is going to make the commingling of apartments and hotels attractive to full-time residents, nor will any change in "zoning" make flophouses less profitable. Tourists generally don't want to visit residential areas. Airbnb-ing instead of renting a hotel is usually less convenient because the former are further from the city center. When I used an Airbnb in Iceland it was more of a hassle because I effectively needed to rent a car (and then subsequently park a car) to get to the center of the city. It was worth it because of cost. If there were hotel rooms available at the same cost of Airbnb then I would have used that. However, the number of hotels is usually kept artificially limited. This drives up the cost of renting hotel rooms, which benefits hoteliers. This is the main reason why Airbnb is so much cheaper than hotels. Hoteliers don't want to build more hotels because that would drive their costs down and their expenses up.
- UnFleshedOne 7y ago
  > More tourism attracts the ire of residents that now have to deal with out-of-town people walking around their neighborhood, but I have rarely seen someone complain about negative economic impact of tourism let alone make a coherent argument about why it's bad. Tourism is an economic curse similar to the curse of resources. It makes most unrelated economic activity less viable.
  - manfredo 7y ago
    > Tourism is an economic curse similar to the curse of resources. It makes most unrelated economic activity less viable. Got any source to back up this claim? Plenty of regions with strong tourism industries have other viable industries. San Francisco, LA, and New York are all heavy tourist destinations but no reasonable person would say that this tourism has made unrelated economic activity less viable. Same with London and Paris. Large tourism industry, but plenty of other industries. It may be true that as other economic opportunities are exhausted, communities try to use tourism to bring in money to the community (e.g. Leavenwoth, WA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leavenworth,_Washington https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leavenworth,_Washington). Underdeveloped countries that don't have the ability to participate in many industries lean on tourism more heavily (especially eco-tourism since the lack of development is actually an asset for that industry) which makes tourism take up a larger proportion of their GDP. But I am highly skeptical of your claim of a causal link between growth of tourism and inability to sustain other industries.
    - sokoloff 7y ago
      I don't know that it's a negative overall, but in general the most economically lucrative sector of commerce in an area does tend to out-compete the others. Much of Silicon Valley used to be farmland. Tech surely disrupted and ejected many farming uses of that land. Gambling disrupted the previously sleepy area of Las Vegas. Disney disrupted parts of Orlando. The auto industry disrupted much of Detroit. I think it's generally a good thing overall, but if I were a buggy whip manufacturer around Detroit in 1920, I wasn't as happy with my lot in life 20 years later...
    - 7y ago
mattr47 7y ago
I dont know about the cheap part. When I travel in the US I stay in hotels that normally run about $150/night, and they are usually pretty nice. When I look at comparable AirBnB rentals they are the same price or even more with those cleaning fees. For the most part I stick with hotels.

graeme 7y ago

>No amount of "zoning" is going to make the commingling of apartments and hotels attractive to full-time residents, nor will any change in "zoning" make flophouses less profitable. In most old cities, hotels, bed and breakfasts, hostels etc all exist in residential areas. And boarding houses used to be common in these same areas too.

manfredo 7y ago

> Airbnb flophouses are not obliged to conform to fire, health, or safety codes, and they don't pay taxes. Right off the bat, they're scads cheaper than hotels because they don't bear those costs. Because Airbnbs aren't flophouses. They're holding usually just a couple or family, maybe a dozen people tops unless the place being rented is a really big detached house. Expecting them to be held to the same standards as hotels is not necessary. If this lack of compliance is so dangerous, then why are letting people live in these places full time? > Visitors and residents have very different incentives. Tourists may wish to stay in cute residential areas, but they are not necessarily interested in being neighborly -- they're not particularly invested in the comfort and safety of the people around them, because they'll be leaving soon. Tourists also spend more money while on vacation, especially on small businesses like restaurants and bars. More importantly, they bring this money in externally. More tourism attracts the ire of residents that now have to deal with out-of-town people walking around their neighborhood, but I have rarely seen someone complain about negative economic impact of tourism let alone make a coherent argument about why it's bad. > People do a lot of gross stuff in a hotel that you probably don't want to encounter in your apartment building. Drugs, prostitution, loud parties. Plenty of people do these things in their apartments, condos, and houses, too. > No amount of "zoning" is going to make the commingling of apartments and hotels attractive to full-time residents, nor will any change in "zoning" make flophouses less profitable. Tourists generally don't want to visit residential areas. Airbnb-ing instead of renting a hotel is usually less convenient because the former are further from the city center. When I used an Airbnb in Iceland it was more of a hassle because I effectively needed to rent a car (and then subsequently park a car) to get to the center of the city. It was worth it because of cost. If there were hotel rooms available at the same cost of Airbnb then I would have used that. However, the number of hotels is usually kept artificially limited. This drives up the cost of renting hotel rooms, which benefits hoteliers. This is the main reason why Airbnb is so much cheaper than hotels. Hoteliers don't want to build more hotels because that would drive their costs down and their expenses up.

UnFleshedOne 7y ago
> More tourism attracts the ire of residents that now have to deal with out-of-town people walking around their neighborhood, but I have rarely seen someone complain about negative economic impact of tourism let alone make a coherent argument about why it's bad. Tourism is an economic curse similar to the curse of resources. It makes most unrelated economic activity less viable.
- manfredo 7y ago
  > Tourism is an economic curse similar to the curse of resources. It makes most unrelated economic activity less viable. Got any source to back up this claim? Plenty of regions with strong tourism industries have other viable industries. San Francisco, LA, and New York are all heavy tourist destinations but no reasonable person would say that this tourism has made unrelated economic activity less viable. Same with London and Paris. Large tourism industry, but plenty of other industries. It may be true that as other economic opportunities are exhausted, communities try to use tourism to bring in money to the community (e.g. Leavenwoth, WA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leavenworth,_Washington https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leavenworth,_Washington). Underdeveloped countries that don't have the ability to participate in many industries lean on tourism more heavily (especially eco-tourism since the lack of development is actually an asset for that industry) which makes tourism take up a larger proportion of their GDP. But I am highly skeptical of your claim of a causal link between growth of tourism and inability to sustain other industries.
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    I don't know that it's a negative overall, but in general the most economically lucrative sector of commerce in an area does tend to out-compete the others. Much of Silicon Valley used to be farmland. Tech surely disrupted and ejected many farming uses of that land. Gambling disrupted the previously sleepy area of Las Vegas. Disney disrupted parts of Orlando. The auto industry disrupted much of Detroit. I think it's generally a good thing overall, but if I were a buggy whip manufacturer around Detroit in 1920, I wasn't as happy with my lot in life 20 years later...
  - 7y ago

mattr47 7y ago

I dont know about the cheap part. When I travel in the US I stay in hotels that normally run about $150/night, and they are usually pretty nice. When I look at comparable AirBnB rentals they are the same price or even more with those cleaning fees. For the most part I stick with hotels.