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This article explains some of the problems caused by short-term rentals such as Airbnb: http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-fi-airbnb-housing-market-2

This article explains some of the problems caused by short-term rentals such as Airbnb: http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-fi-airbnb-housing-market-20150311-story.html http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-fi-airbnb-hous... Also, it seems reasonable that hotels and Airbnb comppete on a level playing field in terms of tax and regulation. All that said, I think they need to find solutions that accomodate all parties: Hotels, short-term rentals, and the housing market for renters.

marssaxman 11y ago
Is it reasonable that hotels and my friend with a couple of spare bedrooms in his house should have to compete on a level playing field in terms of regulation, inspection, taxation, and the like? Because as far as I can tell Airbnb does not operate anything; they are just a booking service for people who rent out spare bedrooms. It doesn't seem reasonable that my friend with the big house should have to jump through all the same hoops as the professionals running the Marriott or whatever.
- JoeAltmaier 11y ago
  Well, as the guy staying there, I'd like to have SOME guarantee that the place isn't unsafe, unsanitary, cheating me or spying on me. So as a consumer, then yes I do want them to jump through all the hoops.
  - mason240 11y ago
    Then don't go to AirBnB places. Go to hotels. It really is that simple. Don't deprive other people of choice because you don't want to choose.
    - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
      We can say that, but it doesn't end there. Paying folks money means I get value in return. There will be disputes about the value; lawyers get involved. The whole hotel-thing is 100's of years of working that out in law. Now we start over? Just because AirBnB is cool, and we want it to succeed? I don't think this is going to end well.
    - hackuser 11y ago
      > Then don't go to AirBnB places. Go to hotels. That doesn't address safety and taxation issues.
      - mason240 11y ago
        It does. If you are concerned with safety issues, then don't go there.
        hackuser 11y ago
        > It does. If you are concerned with safety issues, then don't go there. The 'free market' doesn't address safety well; that's why we have regulations. For example, it's not sufficient to say, 'if you are concerned about the safety of this restaurant's food, don't eat there'. No consumer has enough information to make that judgment reliably, and many consumers have additional challenges (consider the elderly, travelers from other countries who lack English or culture literacy, etc.). Also, the remedy (the Airbnb host gets bad reviews) is too late if someone is injured or loses their property; the system has failed at that point.
        humanrebar 11y ago
        > The 'free market' doesn't address safety well; that's why we have regulations. We also have bonding, insurance and civil liability, which serve the same purpose in a more flexible way.
        hackuser 11y ago
        > We also have bonding, insurance and civil liability, which serve the same purpose in a more flexible way. Those solutions are useful, but only sometimes work and when they do they only provide money after the fact. In many cases, such as injury, death, or crippling fraud (e.g., an elderly retiree loses their home and savings), that's not sufficient.
        humanrebar 11y ago
    - eropple 11y ago
      That choice inflicts negative externalities on everyone else. I understand that the concept of negative externalities throws a wrench into this sort of shallow pseudoeconomic theorizing, but they exist and must be considered in a credible discussion.
  - marssaxman 11y ago
    For an opportunity to stay in some random person's spare bedroom, a web site with reviews from people who have stayed there previously sounds like a perfectly reasonable level of guarantee. Requiring people to act like professional hoteliers in their spare time seems likely to kill the whole project, which would be a shame as it makes travel both cheaper and more fun.
    - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
      The cheaper part is the issue. How cheap? What can they skip? Smoke alarms? Clean bathrooms? Hotels have to meet a minimum bar. Does AirBnB? Why not? This is going to end up in court sooner or later. Does hotel law cover it? If not, we have to write those all over again, for AirBnB.
      - marssaxman 11y ago
        Who cares? These are hypothetical problems. Don't fix what ain't broke.
        JoeAltmaier 11y ago
        Just yesterday somebody posted about their house getting trashed by AirBnB renters. So its started already. Who's insurance is responsible? Is it a civil matter, or criminal? What rights do the owners have, to charge the renter's credit card for damages?
        AnkhMorporkian 11y ago
        AirBnB takes out insurance for that very purpose, damages are insured up to 1 million dollars.
        JoeAltmaier 11y ago
        Until its criminal; then its a matter of law.
        11y ago
- hackuser 11y ago
  > It doesn't seem reasonable that my friend with the big house should have to jump through all the same hoops as the professionals running the Marriott or whatever. I agree. The regulations were written for a different market; new regulations are needed that provide a level playing field for competition, which means hotels aren't at a 14% price disadvantage and short-term rentals can cost-effectively comply. It's going to take some innovation. (I'm assuming the hotel regulations are too onerous for short-term rentals, but I don't know much about them.)
  - marssaxman 11y ago
    Maybe. All I see right now is the traditional scream of the incumbent big business freaking out that a clever new business model is threatening the service monopoly underlying their profit model. The safety concerns are maybes and could-bes.
    - hackuser 11y ago
      > All I see right now is the traditional scream of the incumbent big business freaking out Yes, I see that too, but they and the public do have valid concerns. > The safety concerns are maybes and could-bes. All safety issues are maybes and could-bes, if you are doing it right. 'Why do we pay for this anti-malware system? We haven't had a virus in years!'
JoshTriplett 11y ago
> Also, it seems reasonable that hotels and Airbnb comppete on a level playing field in terms of tax and regulation. Sure. So why does that automatically need to be resolved in favor of increasing regulations on AirBnB rather than decreasing them on hotels?
- hackuser 11y ago
  > why does that automatically need to be resolved ... ? Did someone say that it did? One issue is how to fund government services if revenue from hotels/short-term rentals are decreased.
  - JoshTriplett 11y ago
    Hotel taxes are popular because they primarily tax non-residents, who don't have a say in local policy. As long as they're not so high that they counterproductively decrease tourism, they can be almost arbitrarily high. That doesn't necessarily make them sensible, just less controversial because non-residents don't get to vote.
    - hackuser 11y ago
      Agreed, though that only seems to add to the problem: Hotel taxes are politically difficult to reduce, which means that short-term rentals taxes will be the same. Come to think of it, why shouldn't Airbnb renters pay the same tax as hotel customers? It doesn't seem hard to implement and shouldn't cause a shortage of tourists (there were plenty staying at hotels/motels before Airbnb became an option).
ahallock 11y ago
Yeah, I hope they can find some middle ground; there's a definite need for AirBnB. I remember back when I worked at a Motel 6 and all the hotels in the area would sell out on weekends when there was a popular event. The hotels were also able to charge "surge" pricing so to speak, and some people had no choice but to pay the huge costs. AirBnB could have handled the overflow. So maybe some regulations could allow for special events. I think that was original use case, anyway.

marssaxman 11y ago

Is it reasonable that hotels and my friend with a couple of spare bedrooms in his house should have to compete on a level playing field in terms of regulation, inspection, taxation, and the like? Because as far as I can tell Airbnb does not operate anything; they are just a booking service for people who rent out spare bedrooms. It doesn't seem reasonable that my friend with the big house should have to jump through all the same hoops as the professionals running the Marriott or whatever.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
Well, as the guy staying there, I'd like to have SOME guarantee that the place isn't unsafe, unsanitary, cheating me or spying on me. So as a consumer, then yes I do want them to jump through all the hoops.
- mason240 11y ago
  Then don't go to AirBnB places. Go to hotels. It really is that simple. Don't deprive other people of choice because you don't want to choose.
  - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
    We can say that, but it doesn't end there. Paying folks money means I get value in return. There will be disputes about the value; lawyers get involved. The whole hotel-thing is 100's of years of working that out in law. Now we start over? Just because AirBnB is cool, and we want it to succeed? I don't think this is going to end well.
  - hackuser 11y ago
    > Then don't go to AirBnB places. Go to hotels. That doesn't address safety and taxation issues.
    - mason240 11y ago
      It does. If you are concerned with safety issues, then don't go there.
      - hackuser 11y ago
        > It does. If you are concerned with safety issues, then don't go there. The 'free market' doesn't address safety well; that's why we have regulations. For example, it's not sufficient to say, 'if you are concerned about the safety of this restaurant's food, don't eat there'. No consumer has enough information to make that judgment reliably, and many consumers have additional challenges (consider the elderly, travelers from other countries who lack English or culture literacy, etc.). Also, the remedy (the Airbnb host gets bad reviews) is too late if someone is injured or loses their property; the system has failed at that point.
        humanrebar 11y ago
        > The 'free market' doesn't address safety well; that's why we have regulations. We also have bonding, insurance and civil liability, which serve the same purpose in a more flexible way.
        hackuser 11y ago
        > We also have bonding, insurance and civil liability, which serve the same purpose in a more flexible way. Those solutions are useful, but only sometimes work and when they do they only provide money after the fact. In many cases, such as injury, death, or crippling fraud (e.g., an elderly retiree loses their home and savings), that's not sufficient.
        humanrebar 11y ago
  - eropple 11y ago
    That choice inflicts negative externalities on everyone else. I understand that the concept of negative externalities throws a wrench into this sort of shallow pseudoeconomic theorizing, but they exist and must be considered in a credible discussion.
- marssaxman 11y ago
  For an opportunity to stay in some random person's spare bedroom, a web site with reviews from people who have stayed there previously sounds like a perfectly reasonable level of guarantee. Requiring people to act like professional hoteliers in their spare time seems likely to kill the whole project, which would be a shame as it makes travel both cheaper and more fun.
  - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
    The cheaper part is the issue. How cheap? What can they skip? Smoke alarms? Clean bathrooms? Hotels have to meet a minimum bar. Does AirBnB? Why not? This is going to end up in court sooner or later. Does hotel law cover it? If not, we have to write those all over again, for AirBnB.
    - marssaxman 11y ago
      Who cares? These are hypothetical problems. Don't fix what ain't broke.
      - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
        Just yesterday somebody posted about their house getting trashed by AirBnB renters. So its started already. Who's insurance is responsible? Is it a civil matter, or criminal? What rights do the owners have, to charge the renter's credit card for damages?
        AnkhMorporkian 11y ago
        AirBnB takes out insurance for that very purpose, damages are insured up to 1 million dollars.
        JoeAltmaier 11y ago
        Until its criminal; then its a matter of law.
        11y ago
hackuser 11y ago
> It doesn't seem reasonable that my friend with the big house should have to jump through all the same hoops as the professionals running the Marriott or whatever. I agree. The regulations were written for a different market; new regulations are needed that provide a level playing field for competition, which means hotels aren't at a 14% price disadvantage and short-term rentals can cost-effectively comply. It's going to take some innovation. (I'm assuming the hotel regulations are too onerous for short-term rentals, but I don't know much about them.)
- marssaxman 11y ago
  Maybe. All I see right now is the traditional scream of the incumbent big business freaking out that a clever new business model is threatening the service monopoly underlying their profit model. The safety concerns are maybes and could-bes.
  - hackuser 11y ago
    > All I see right now is the traditional scream of the incumbent big business freaking out Yes, I see that too, but they and the public do have valid concerns. > The safety concerns are maybes and could-bes. All safety issues are maybes and could-bes, if you are doing it right. 'Why do we pay for this anti-malware system? We haven't had a virus in years!'

JoshTriplett 11y ago

> Also, it seems reasonable that hotels and Airbnb comppete on a level playing field in terms of tax and regulation. Sure. So why does that automatically need to be resolved in favor of increasing regulations on AirBnB rather than decreasing them on hotels?

hackuser 11y ago
> why does that automatically need to be resolved ... ? Did someone say that it did? One issue is how to fund government services if revenue from hotels/short-term rentals are decreased.
- JoshTriplett 11y ago
  Hotel taxes are popular because they primarily tax non-residents, who don't have a say in local policy. As long as they're not so high that they counterproductively decrease tourism, they can be almost arbitrarily high. That doesn't necessarily make them sensible, just less controversial because non-residents don't get to vote.
  - hackuser 11y ago
    Agreed, though that only seems to add to the problem: Hotel taxes are politically difficult to reduce, which means that short-term rentals taxes will be the same. Come to think of it, why shouldn't Airbnb renters pay the same tax as hotel customers? It doesn't seem hard to implement and shouldn't cause a shortage of tourists (there were plenty staying at hotels/motels before Airbnb became an option).

ahallock 11y ago

Yeah, I hope they can find some middle ground; there's a definite need for AirBnB. I remember back when I worked at a Motel 6 and all the hotels in the area would sell out on weekends when there was a popular event. The hotels were also able to charge "surge" pricing so to speak, and some people had no choice but to pay the huge costs. AirBnB could have handled the overflow. So maybe some regulations could allow for special events. I think that was original use case, anyway.