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New York’s crackdown on Airbnb began Tuesday
- davewritescode 3y ago> Opponents of the measure, though, claim that the new measure will do significant damage to the tourism industry in New York City — potentially driving would-be visitors to New Jersey Just LOL If you believe is that New Jersey is just waiting in the wings to take tourism from NYC I've got a bridge in Brooklyn available for a good price.
- nine_zeros 3y agoI chuckled myself. Tourists spending thousands to visit the city aren't going to stay 2 hours away in another crap apartment in Jersey.
- cardamomo 3y agoI don't know about that. They're already spending $$$ on crap apartments in deep Brooklyn. That's at least an hour to lower Manhattan, easily two hours to upper.
- mancerayder 3y agoFair point but deep Brooklyn is still NY, and for that matter Brooklyn has sparked curiosity in Europe a lot in the last decade. There's a ton of European tourists. And deep Brooklyn has some things to see. Prospect Park, BK Museum, and some old school ethnic enclaves that pop up in Time Out type guides.
- cardamomo 3y agoAlso a good point! I recently moved away from Brooklyn, but I lived there for 9 years and would heartily recommend a Brooklyn-only tourist itinerary. Thanks for the perspective.
- gruez 3y ago> I chuckled myself. Tourists spending thousands to visit the city aren't going to stay 2 hours away in another crap apartment in Jersey. Isn't new jersey right across the river from new york, with rapid transit lines going into new york? Your "2 hours" estimate seems wildly inflated.
- CharlieDigital 3y agoYes it is. In fact, it's probably cheaper/easier to park in JC and take the PATH into NYC.
- routerl 3y ago> Isn't new jersey right across the river from new york, with rapid transit lines going into new york? In Chongqing, map apps will often recommend a "nearby" restaurant which actually is several hundred meters away, vertically; you'll have to descend many stair steps before arriving at that restaurant, even though it looked so close on the map. In other words, the restaurant was not actually "close", when it comes to the time and energy investment required. In this same spirit, New Jersey is absolutely not "close" to Manhattan, even if it looks close on maps. Traffic sucks, public transportation sucks, bridges and tunnels suck.
- yunwal 3y agoThe PATH is pretty good as long as you can stand a few minutes without internet and aren’t staying up until 4am. It used to be regularly late and require a different subway card which was annoying, but those issues have been fixed. The cars and stations are also typically cleaner and less crowded than the nyc subways. Staying in Jersey City or Hoboken could definitely be an option for people who don’t need to be stumbling distance from bars.
- midoridensha 3y agoThere's many other places in northern New Jersey that are less than 1 hour away from Manhattan by bus too.
- toofy 3y ago
- borissk 3y agoSo you think everyone visiting NY is a millionaire, who won't trade 2 hours of his/her time for saving money on accommodation.
- CharlieDigital 3y agoIt's literally a 10 minute max PATH ride from Exchange Place in Jersey City.
- kbos87 3y agoThe anti Airbnb narrative always assumes we are talking about some crappy apartment that someone was duped into staying in. Let's entertain the idea for just a minute that you are an extended family visiting NYC. You need 2-3 bedrooms, some amount of space to spread out, and a kitchen could potentially save you some real money vs. eating out for every meal. Hotel rooms like that really don't exist, at least for normal people. On Airbnb you could probably find a comfortable luxury condo that checks every one of those boxes and saves you thousands of dollars compared to booking 3 hotel rooms.
- wombat-man 3y agook well it's a 2-3 bedroom apartment a family or roommates can't live in then. Plenty of hotels have rooms with two queens that can comfortably sleep 4 people.
- flashgordon 3y agoCome on. As much as i hate Airbnb this doesn't paint hotels in a good light for larger groups or those with kids. When you have stricter dietary restrictions cooking our own meals is highly desirable and affordable hotels in this area - nil. Travelling in a group .. okay good luck. What I hate about Airbnb is all the hidden fees and ridiculous homework you have to do when leaving. Regulation could have gone to fix that but yeah here are some flying pigs!
- wombat-man 3y agoCome on, people live in this city and rent is high as you might have heard. People are getting priced out so middlmen can make bank renting these things? If staying in a hotel isn't convenient or affordable I'm sorry? Perhaps one day you can figure it out.
- mellavora 3y ago> What I hate about Airbnb is all the hidden fees and ridiculous homework you have to do when leaving. Regulation could have gone to fix that but yeah here are some flying pigs! Airbnb could have gone to fix that. Why leave it to regulation?
- wombat-man 3y agoSure, let em stay there and commute in for sightseeing. oh noooo
- borissk 3y agoDo you mean New Jersey won't be happy to host more tourists? Why is that?
- paulgb 3y agoI've commuted from NYC to NJ to rent a car with Turo (the AirBnB of cars, which is not allowed to operate in NY). Granted, I probably wouldn't do it again, but I could imagine Jersey City AirBnBs being appealing to NYC visitors on a budget.
- mancerayder 3y agoJust think of the views from Edgewater or West New York! Jersey City has become fairly interesting, but I don't see tourists from Sweden going to stay there so they can visit the Empire State Building.
- rcme 3y agoJersey City seems to have a lot of tourists, but they also restricted AirBnB a few years back.
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- kylecazar 3y agoMy commute from Paulus Hook, NJ to the World Trade Center was 7 minutes.
- ahstilde 3y agoJersey City Waterfront is significantly underrated compared to inaccessible areas like Brooklyn's Williamsburg.
- rr808 3y agoJersey City banned AirBnB many years ago already. No rentals allowed <28 days. Edit - actually they are just strictly regulated. I know my friend gave up hosting after the law went in. https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2682 https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2682
- throwoutway 3y agoIs it irony that the opponents of the measure didn't even know this when they complained this would happen? Or just ignorance
- runnerup 3y agoWhile it’s good to give the benefit of the doubt, in politics it’s foolish to rule out malice without evidence against malice.
- fasthands9 3y agoI think they just mean people will stay in New Jersey - which would be extremely plausible if NJ allowed more hotels to be built. Most of the tourist stuff in NYC is in midtown which is a 15/20 minute public transit ride from the port authority/penn station/broadway area. I have family that stays in Stamford Connecticut whenever they want to do stuff in NYC, because they find it cheaper/easier to stay there and take the train in.
- lacrimacida 3y agoI wouldn’t see the problem with that. Tourists would still flock to NYC during the day and businesses need not worry from a drop in business, it’ll work out.
- HWR_14 3y agoSo tourists still spend all their time/money in NYC, with the exception of paying for sleeping accommodations (and taking up beds) there? Isn't that the ideal goal of this legislation?
- fasthands9 3y agoHotel tax is one of the easiest ways governments collect taxes from people who are not its own citizens - in NY its 6 percent. I am understanding of the arguments against Airbnb's, but they really need to allow more hotels to be built. The amount of money they can bring in (raised entirely from people out of state) is large and shouldn't be thrown away.
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- lotsoweiners 3y agoI guess Lin-Manuel was right…everything is legal in New Jersey.
- paulgb 3y agoExcept pumping your own gas.
- lotsofpulp 3y agoAnd buying beer/wine/liquor at 90% of restaurants and retail stores.
- cnasc 3y agoI’m not sure what the context here is, but as a lifelong NJ resident I can assure you that there are a lot more legal burdens here than you find in most other states. Of course we do ignore most of the driving laws
- paulgb 3y agoThe context is a lyric in the musical Hamilton referring to the Hamilton-Burr duel, which took place in NJ. Apparently dueling was already illegal in NJ. Lin-Manuel didn’t invent the phrase, and I wonder if the original meaning was more in the spirit of “New Yorkers can get away with violating NJ laws” rather than “New Jersey literally has no laws”. https://www.revolutionarywarnewjersey.com/new_jersey_revolutionary_war_sites/towns/weehawken_nj_revolutionary_war_sites.htm https://www.revolutionarywarnewjersey.com/new_jersey_revolut...
- philwelch 3y agoI just assumed it was comparing NJ to NY, which is even more restrictive.
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- listenallyall 3y agoOf course NJ isn't get to take the majority of NYC tourists but for those who are in town go to a game at Yankee Stadium, or perhaps this week's US Open, or people who just have a business meeting near Wall Street, there are far more convenient and economical places to stay than midtown Manhattan, or Manhattan at all.
- wombat-man 3y agoI hope the effort is successful. I live there and the sight of confused tourists with suit cases had become pretty common. Idk how much it'll help with rent prices but interested in seeing how it works out.
- teaearlgraycold 3y agoAs much as I've enjoyed AirBnB, the housing crisis is more important - and the industry needs more regulation if it's to exist.
- yunwal 3y agohas the sight of confused tourists with suitcases ever not been common in Manhattan? I’m pretty sure that’s not new with airbnb.
- eappleby 3y agoI think the biggest benefactors of these laws (outside of the hotel industry) are real estate agents. The value of real estate agents has dwindled for years, but if they can help connect homeowners with short term renters, they can provide a lot of value and potentially skirt these laws.
- gaadd33 3y agoIf real estate agents in NYC can do that I would be very impressed given they generally struggle to find and rent apartments when given basic criteria as to what is acceptable. It would definitely improve the entire profession if they could replace airbnb.
- JumpCrisscross 3y agoNew York rental agents are awful. But the usual workaround for these laws is an N-day lease with <N use days. So the law winds up being a rate limit, versus a ban, which I think keeps everyone happy.
- jmyeet 3y agoGood. Airbnb is cancer. I just hope there's an actual enforcement mechanism. The optimist in me hopes the housing crisis may finally start to wake people up to how most of us are being systematically exploited and we live in a society that deliberately withholds shelter, which quite literally kills people, so a tiny number of people can profit from it.
- mancerayder 3y agoNYC is a place where enforcement is connected to who's in power and what the issue of the day is. The issue of the day today is the astronomical rent increases since the pandemic ended. Blame is everywhere. And Airbnb certainly has at least somewhat of a role to play.
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- matthewfelgate 3y agoYour post makes no sense. Maybe reword it so people can understand?
- JumpCrisscross 3y agoTwo hotels in the centre of Manhattan—the Redbury and Paul—just converted to refugee motels. There is a layer to this popular discourse is missing, and I’m unclear what it is.
- mancerayder 3y agoHousing availability is gruesomely low, but not so low as to challenge the Sanctuary City concept born of another political moment. I'm suspecting this might change, as NYC is more politically diverse than places like San Francisco and Seattle, and pendulums swing hard back and forth historically.
- lacrimacida 3y agoWhat do you think will change?
- mancerayder 3y agoAt some point the city will move more to the Right as will the state. There is a misunderstood demographic that is large, diverse and at odds with the young Progressive crowd (many of whom are out-of-state transplants). Evidence of what I've just said can be seen in the breakdowns of which mayoral candidates were most popular by neighborhood. The most pro-police ones were in the poorer and less white boroughs, while the most radical left-wing ones were in the white, upper-class hipster neighborhoods. Immigration is just another one of these types of these issues that's not well understood by upper-class liberals, is my speculation. Conversations with people and observations are making me think the migrant issue has potential to galvanize the working class to oppose it.
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- the_doctah 3y ago
- pvg 3y agoDiscussed a week or so ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37277680 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37277680
- jmclnx 3y agoI wish every City does this. I believe Airbnb is one of the big reasons rents are raising in these Cities. Personally if it was up to me, I would have a 90% tax on receipts from Airbnb customers. If you are caught without being registered, your property is taken and sold off in a auction.
- coredog64 3y agoI worked in Manhattan for just over a year prior to the pandemic and spent quite a bit of time in AirBnBs while I was getting to know the city. All but one of them were people renting out a spare room in their owner-occupied space. I appreciated that I was able to experiment with different neighborhoods without being limited to those where hotels were available.
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- balderdash 3y agoWhat portion of the housing supply would need to be Airbnbs to raise rents say 10%? I just can’t seem to get the math to pencil so that the amount of investor owned Airbnbs would make a meaningful impact on the rents/prices…
- nprateem 3y ago10%, or is this a trick question?
- xboxnolifes 3y agoIt's not a trick question, and it's not as simple as matching the percentages. Rents can raise by more than 100%, but total supply caps at 100%. If AirBnB controlled every rental unit, rental prices wouldn't go up exactly 100%.
- chatmasta 3y agoIt's nice that this will theoretically lower rental prices, but in practice there's no way that will happen. Demand is just too high. I don't believe that the number of short-term rentals was the difference between supply matching demand. The real solution is to build more apartment units and crack down on people subletting rent-controlled apartments where they haven't lived for years.
- dh2424 3y agoIt will not solve the problem, but it will help.
- sfpotter 3y agoWhat percentage of NYC apartments are rent-controlled?
- DANmode 3y agoAccording to the Rent Guidelines Board in New York City, as of 2020, approximately 44.6% of apartments in NYC are rent stabilized or rent controlled. However, it's important to note that within this percentage, there is a distinction between rent stabilized and rent controlled units. Rent stabilization accounts for the majority of this percentage, while rent-controlled units represent a smaller portion. The exact breakdown between these two categories may vary over time due to changes in regulations and market conditions. - you know what
- totallywrong 3y ago
- drpgq 3y agoWhy has NYC made building new hotels harder?
- kbos87 3y agoI don’t doubt that Airbnb has had some effect on housing prices in many cities, but I suspect the effect of STRs isn’t quite as strong as people think it is. Desirable places like NYC have always been competitive markets to rent in, and we know that there’s a long term trend of migration toward population centers which is slowly making things worse. But there’s another factor that seems like it isn’t getting it’s fair share of blame - the accelerant that is social media. There’s been a huge rise in micro-influencers showing us what the good life looks like in desirable places, whether we are talking about a neighborhood of NYC or a western mountain town. A decade or two ago, these desirable places were on the radar of a small number of people (relative to today) as viable places to build a life in, now the pool is much larger. Airbnb deserves some criticism, but it certainly seems like short term rentals are getting more than their fair share of blame because they are a convenient boogeyman to point at. The end result is that we see regulations like this one that are more punitive than effective.
- tetris11 3y agoIts not just social media. I can't count the number of cheesy, narcissistic/artistic films I've seen centred around New York/Paris/London where people's accents are overblown beyond credibility and the main protagonist is exceedingly rich to live out the life that they do... but is unaware of their exceeding wealth and is therefore unable to communicate that to the audience. As a decent earner, I cannot find myself relating to these characters in these settings since its like watching a millionaire discussing their financial problems.... but my girlfriend and her friends all seem to love and relate to the characters and the depicted "normal" lifestyle, despite sharing nothing in common.
- yieldcrv 3y agothe discrepancy is because those shows are about Prince Charming, in a 20th century setting and that fantasy of being subsidized by said obliviously wealthy is probable enough to attain by your girlfriend and her friends if they focus on that part of their culture if this option was available for you it would be something to fawn over and much easier to relate
- 3y ago
- diebeforei485 3y agoAre they saying housing supply matters? Why not allow more housing to be built by upzoning?
- sparrowInHand 3y agoWell, the major culprit is not AirBnB, its illegal washed money and other investment money, parked in cities worldwide. They want a return on those gambling chips, and AirBnB is simply better there. I highly doubt that regulating the value of the pokerchip stacks in the safe down against the interests of the planetary elites will work.
- DANmode 3y agoCan you reword this more coherently? There's value here.
- fragmede 3y agoI'm not sure that there is, but here's my attempt at rewording it. > the "planetary elite" invest their (ill-gotten) money in real estate, and Airbnb simply offers the best return. but that's not Airbnb's fault. GP further doubts that reglations affecting the interests of said elites will work.
- yowzadave 3y agoI believe they're referring to the practice of the extremely wealthy buying real estate in hot markets, not to actually use it, but in order to launder the source of their money. There are large numbers of never-occupied units in these cities; there are also efforts underway to stop the practice: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-set-unveil-long-awaited-crackdown-real-estate-money-laundering-2023-08-10/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-set-unveil-long-awaited-...
- HWR_14 3y agoI can reword it because I've seen it written before. I am not sure if I believe what they are saying or not, and have no real desire to get involved on either side of the argument going forward. Rewritten: > A large percentage of real estate is being purchased as investments and geopolitical hedges by extremely wealthy individuals. In many cases, this can be be literally to assist in money laundering. This effect is especially pronounced in "global cities" (NYC, London, Paris, LA, Singapore, Tokyo, Shanghai, etc.), and especially in politically stable countries (So that probably excludes Shanghai). These are usually left empty, because income isn't their primary goal. This is considered to be a significant effect because the property types are those intended to be purchased by owner-occupants (e.g. condos), and therefore the supply is consumed. The complaint is not that the new owner of a massive apartment complex is a different major corporation/rich person. Really rich people will prevent any form of correction to the market so they do not lose wealth.
- dano 3y agoA capacity utilization study of housing in major metropolitan areas with an gap analysis would lead to better planning of new construction.
- jackleeb 3y agoairbnb pays more than FAANG and is fully remote. senior engineer above $400k and staff engineer close to $600k. i hope the cities don't crack down on my employer :( fully remote without pay reduction + top pay + great WLB (less than 30 hours/week) = awesome job. taking away airbnb's eligibility would just be disastrous for the employees who worked hard to get in
- thefurdrake 3y agoI feel so ambivalent about this. I can understand how AirBnB might raise rent prices. I can understand how that's a serious problem, and agree it should be dealt with. But seriously, as a home-owner, why shouldn't I be allowed to rent out any amount of space in my own property arbitrarily to whoever I so please for a short term without seeking a loicense from my central government? This isn't meant to be argumentative. Why should anyone have the right to tell me who I can and cannot shelter under my own roof if they aren't a criminal? Or, more-specifically, because concerns like this have to be weighed by effect: is the problem really so bad that it merits usurping someone's right to use their property in order to counteract? I do own a house, but I don't live in a metro area, so I could use some perspective.
- dh2424 3y agoThe same reason you can't start drilling for oil in your back yard. Negative externalities.
- tharmas 3y agoThat was the original intent of AirBnB. What the problem is is "investors" etc buying up properties to effectively turn into hotels and rent out as short term rentals THAT THEY DONT LIVE IN. Workers need a place to live. They cant forgo a place to live if they cant afford it like they can with a big screen tv. These AirBnB entrepreneurs are taking housing stock out of circulation for local workers to rent/live in. Housing is not your typical commodity.