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I wonder how much Airbnb is to blame on the raising rents around the world. Why charge a "local" rate when you can charge 5x that rate for a tourist paying in

I wonder how much Airbnb is to blame on the raising rents around the world. Why charge a "local" rate when you can charge 5x that rate for a tourist paying in $$$? Even if you don't, just knowing about Airbnb's extremely high prices will most likely put inflationary pressure on rents.

davidw 4y ago
I live in a touristy place in the US, and while STR (short term rentals) clearly don't help, the city's own statistics show they're not a huge factor. More than anything, NIMBY neighbors keep killing less expensive forms of housing... 100's of homes, I would say, in the time since I started observing the situation. STR's make for a convenient bogeyman that people can point their finger at. It's a bit more disturbing when you realize it's actually your neighbors; kind, ordinary people in most regards.
- bombcar 4y ago
  STRs almost by definition can't be the entirety of the problem, except in cases where there's an absolute limit on available units, and it's highly desirable as a tourist destination (Venice, for example). STRs just slipped past the NIMBYs because they weren't on the lookout for it; it won't happen again!
dorchadas 4y ago
In August 2019, ~1600 places were up for rent in Dublin. In August 2020, it was double that. Mostly from tourist hotspots with AirBnB people trying to shift to long term lets. They're back on AirBnB now, and housing is even shittier than it was before. Yes, there's other issues, but AirBnB has been a known problem in Ireland since at least 2016 when I was first looking at places to rent in the country. The government has said they're going to start tackling the issue of short term lets this month. I'll believe it when I see it.
- nickpp 4y ago
  Didn’t Ireland have a campaign against greedy landlords with rent controls, 52% tax, no deductions, no evictions?! That would explain much better the disaster in rental market…
NoLinkToMe 4y ago
Not that much, Amsterdam is a notorious city for lots of tourism and high housing prices. But pre-covid Airbnb was about 10% of the total stays versus Hotels. And tourists in total were about 6% of the overnight population throughout the year on average, again the majority in hotels. And after corona this is a lot less due to new legislation (which caps it to max 30 days per year without a hotel license). But yes, tourism obviously pushes up prices, but there's a big benefit to the local economy of course as well.
glanzwulf 4y ago
It's quite a high blame I'd say. I actually have a friend who does this. He's been in the Airbnb game since pretty much they showed up and he now has 4 or 5 flats. He could rent them out, but the long term rent contracts would not net him the same amount in a year than what he gets in just the summer months. Plus, long term contracts have a lot of other expectations from him as a land lord, whilst Airbnb is pretty chill. From his point of view, airbnb is amazing, from my point of view when I was searching for a flat, I wanted to stab him in the face. It is what it is.

davidw 4y ago

I live in a touristy place in the US, and while STR (short term rentals) clearly don't help, the city's own statistics show they're not a huge factor. More than anything, NIMBY neighbors keep killing less expensive forms of housing... 100's of homes, I would say, in the time since I started observing the situation. STR's make for a convenient bogeyman that people can point their finger at. It's a bit more disturbing when you realize it's actually your neighbors; kind, ordinary people in most regards.

bombcar 4y ago
STRs almost by definition can't be the entirety of the problem, except in cases where there's an absolute limit on available units, and it's highly desirable as a tourist destination (Venice, for example). STRs just slipped past the NIMBYs because they weren't on the lookout for it; it won't happen again!

dorchadas 4y ago

In August 2019, ~1600 places were up for rent in Dublin. In August 2020, it was double that. Mostly from tourist hotspots with AirBnB people trying to shift to long term lets. They're back on AirBnB now, and housing is even shittier than it was before. Yes, there's other issues, but AirBnB has been a known problem in Ireland since at least 2016 when I was first looking at places to rent in the country. The government has said they're going to start tackling the issue of short term lets this month. I'll believe it when I see it.

nickpp 4y ago
Didn’t Ireland have a campaign against greedy landlords with rent controls, 52% tax, no deductions, no evictions?! That would explain much better the disaster in rental market…

NoLinkToMe 4y ago

Not that much, Amsterdam is a notorious city for lots of tourism and high housing prices. But pre-covid Airbnb was about 10% of the total stays versus Hotels. And tourists in total were about 6% of the overnight population throughout the year on average, again the majority in hotels. And after corona this is a lot less due to new legislation (which caps it to max 30 days per year without a hotel license). But yes, tourism obviously pushes up prices, but there's a big benefit to the local economy of course as well.

glanzwulf 4y ago

It's quite a high blame I'd say. I actually have a friend who does this. He's been in the Airbnb game since pretty much they showed up and he now has 4 or 5 flats. He could rent them out, but the long term rent contracts would not net him the same amount in a year than what he gets in just the summer months. Plus, long term contracts have a lot of other expectations from him as a land lord, whilst Airbnb is pretty chill. From his point of view, airbnb is amazing, from my point of view when I was searching for a flat, I wanted to stab him in the face. It is what it is.