New York is facing a housing shortage that Airbnb is no stranger to. According to an article by Curbed published on May 18, despite several laws prohibiting short-term rentals in apartment buildings, the city has far fewer apartments for rent than Airbnb rentals. A reproach often made to the company.
The concrete jungle lacks housing
A report by Douglas Elliman, an American real estate company, revealed that the neighborhoods of Manhattan, Brooklyn and part of Queens had only 7,669 residences for rent. Far from the Airbnb apartment and house rental figures estimated by AirDNA and Inside Airbnb, two third-party sites that retrieve data from the housing service. These estimates are respectively 10,572 and 20,397 dwellings.
In China, the easing of the repression against the digital sector is confirmed
In 2011, New York had already limited short-term rentals, less than 30 days, in apartment buildings without the presence of the owner. She also made it illegal to post such ads in 2016.
Some owners use outbuildings attached to their main residence to rent them out all year round. According to Curbed10 years ago, this type of accommodation would have been more available to people looking to rent on the long term.
An Airbnb spokesperson reacted to Curbed“ Over the past couple of years, the set of rentals we list in the city has declined and is only a fraction of the city’s percentage of rental units as rental prices tend to increase and permits issued by the city for new housing construction are still down by double digits “.
The principle of Airbnb raises many questions
Since the creation of Airbnb in 2008, the Californian company has been accused by the real estate market regulatory authorities of monopolizing available residences, leading to an impoverishment of the real estate stock and an increase in rental prices in large cities. In Manhattan, the average rent price reached $3,925.
Problems known in France. Since 2019, the legal limit for renting a property is 120 days per year. Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris, had said that she was not against occasional rental, but that massive and multiple rental deprived the city’s residents of housing.
Paris had already sued Airbnb because of the dissemination of rental ads that did not comply with French law. French law obliges individuals wishing to rent their accommodation to provide their advertisement with a registration number in order to inform the city of their rental practices. Many ads posted on the rental giant’s site and app did not have one.
Since July 1, 2021, if a seasonal furnished rental ad in a large city (Paris, Lyon, Lille, Marseille, Nantes, Nice, Strasbourg and Toulouse) is not registered, the lessor is liable to a fine of 5000 euros per dwelling and 12,500 euros.