@rotatingskull
If it allows people to rent out rooms or flats as if they were hotels, then any service. The issue is about areas which are zoned for residential being used as commercial (a short term rental, not a subrenter). Areas that are zoned for residential can be driven up in value because of the demand for commercial hotel space. So these services microcommodify the housing market.

@rotatingskull
Also the housing market has regulations to keep people in their space for as long as possible. Even a subrenter is usually protected to have no 'no fault' evictions. Airbnb turns spaces that could be rented or subrented on the housing market in to commercial spaces where renters are not people who will be staying in the community, and they cost more than they rent in the housing market. This drives up the cost and incentivise more property managers to remove housing for airbnb.

@eribloodlust @rotatingskull

Here in Portland there's a huge problem with AirBnB-type places.

Landlords get around it by putting up ads and taking $ for rental applications, then they just never rent it out and continue using it as a hotel room.

So they're getting people's app $, and the nightly stay money. And the regulatory agencies just shrug it off, cause there's ads for the space so it's not illegal, so they don't care.

And locals can't find an affordable rental because of it all.

@ThisQueerBashesBack @eribloodlust Then it sounds to me like we need the regulatory agencies to regulate. This is a political problem. It can have a political solution.

@rotatingskull @eribloodlust

Agreed! I'm just explaining how it works now, and how that contributes to the wider housing crisis.

@ThisQueerBashesBack @eribloodlust Cool. I think a solution to the housing crisis is to end rents. Renting is paying an owner for no labor, simply for the service of ownership, which is no service at all. We have more empty homes than homeless people in the USA. So start handing them out. Anything else is just tinkering around the edges.

@rotatingskull @eribloodlust
I agree with you there! But unfortunately most people don't, so we have to work on both fronts. We can work for free housing while simultaneously fine-tuning the rental system to make sure that people don't get left out in the meantime.

@eribloodlust What you’re saying makes sense, but it seems to require a political, community solution. Not just a few people maybe not using AirBNB for a while.

I would support a state ban on AirBNB. At the same time if an AirBNB is the best deal I’m taking it.

@trwnh @eribloodlust if having Tennant’s wasn’t such a pain in the arse then people wouldn’t change to short term stuff like Airbnb to pay for their investment. I agree it sucks.

@trwnh
Build more hotels in places that don't displace residential housing and don't let housing get turned in to hotels

@eribloodlust hotels are VASTLY more expensive than an airbnb, though -- more than 3x as much on average! when i last traveled (to nashville/memphis) i could never have afforded a hotel room at $150/night, $100/night or even $50/night. i stayed at an airbnb for $20, and without something like airbnb i couldn't have made the trip at all.

@eribloodlust i think a distinction needs to be made between letting someone sleep in an extra room vs. not living at a location at all. the underlying issue is that property "ownership" doesn't require usage -- such is capitalism.

@nore

Here is a link to an article about one such report: https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/05/03/nyregion/airbnb-rent-manhattan-brooklyn.html

"Airbnb makes it easy to rent apartments to tourists, taking units off the market for full-time residents, the report said."

Here's the link to the report: https://www.dropbox.com/s/u4s1fcync2gseyl/AirBnB_Report%20FINAL.docx?dl=0

@eribloodlust thanks!