> The problem is, of course, that it increases rental profiteering, and that it caters to rich international tourists, not residents.
If I have a property, I can choose to let someone stay at my property for money. AirBnB facilitates this. This makes my property valuable as a result. The homeowners benefit as do people who need a place to stay. This is progress and occurs any time anyone creates a product or technology that creates value. What pathologies? Homes rightly appreciating in value due to a new revenue stream opened up for homeowners?
>I've long thought that AirBnB allows people to profit off something that others around them bear the negative externalities from
The more you think about it the more you begin to realise that this applies to almost everything you can think of. Our economic system is just bad at properly allocating rewards and value.
> Certainly there are still some people who are wealthy enough to keep their vacation homes vacant most of the time (and prefer it that way, since doing short-term rentals tends to involve quite a bit of wear-and-tear on a house and its furnishings). But many list on Airbnb now. I consider this a net positive for society.
You are missing a critical issue. Airbnb makes it way more affordable to have this second home, so now many more only-sorta-wealthy people can afford vacation homes while pricing people out of the local housing market.
Building something creates wealth. Changing the channel through which payment occurs doesn't create wealth. The host's revenue comes from displacing hotels; the guest's savings come from increased rent for other tenants. If you consider the negative externalities imposed on neighbors, there'd be a stronger argument that AirBnB destroys wealth.
> AirBNB has greatly increased the supply of housing in each city, thus causing price drops and forcing hotels to drop their prices in order to remain competitive.
That's 2-3 major claims that I just can't believe at face value. I'd like to, but you'll have to convince me.
People are converting rental properties to AirBnBs, which actually could mean less supply of rental properties and the same amount of people looking for them.
Is AirBnB leading to development of new housing to offset this? Maybe. idk
> Someone please tell me one benefit of Airbnb for society
It has been an enormous benefit to travelers of all kinds. It has made a huge variety of properties available for short-term rental, and because these rentals are often less expensive than alternatives, it has made travel possible for many who previously couldn't afford it.
The benefits are greatest for those who want to travel to expensive places, and to places that have few hotels -- that is, for travelers interested in most of the world's destinations.
Airbnb has also helped ordinary people to fight back against the powerful hotel lobbies. Perhaps this isn't a problem in some countries. But it is a grave problem in the United States, where the hotels fight hard to prevent any competition. See especially New York: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/16/technology/inside-the-hot....
(I've used Airbnb a few times but otherwise have no connection to it.)
> I am offering a genuine take that puts airbnb as sort of a weapon between the haves (house owners) and have nots (nomads).
AirBnB is one of the weapons being used to keep you as a have not, though. You're basically helping to pay for the rent increases that are keeping you as a have not.
> Certainly there are still some people who are wealthy enough to keep their vacation homes vacant most of the time (and prefer it that way, since doing short-term rentals tends to involve quite a bit of wear-and-tear on a house and its furnishings). But many list on Airbnb now. I consider this a net positive for society.
why? Do you think the average person is renting out vacation homes for extended stays?
Yes, having cool places to stay is fun but there are better ways to accomplish that then rich people renting out their 2-nth homes.
> It definitely is a bigger issue, but i do think that AirBnB has to be held accountable as well.
Why? AirBnB only serves as a middleman. In order for any property to be listed in AirBnB's catalogue, the property owners need to put in the work themselves.
> I would have no problems with AirBnB if it was actually used for the initial problem that it tried to solve. But you do see people buying 2nd or 3rd property just to AirBnB it, and also not renting them to long term renters who actually live and work in the city.
You said it yourself: you see people buying property to rent.
> With the rise of AirBnB, however, houses became valued based on the income-generating-potential of the house, favoring investors while shunning regular homeowners.
Highly doubt AirBnB is a big contributing factor to housing prices.
Rentals? Sure.
But considering travel (the use case for AirBnB) has been locked down and housing prices continued to soar makes this pretty dubious.
And tons of condo buildings don't even allow you to use the unit for AirBnB anyway.
>I still don't understand how society would benefit from AirBnb not existing and us being where we started with the hotel cabal.
Many of the people on this site don't see or experience the downsides, as we are privileged enough to own our own properties or have our own space not impacted by airbnb. However, consider for example a family living in inexpensive housing with parents that work and children that are in school. There have been many cases of wealthy individuals purchasing/renting blocks of cheap apartments/condos and turning them into defacto hotels with no rules leading to partying, destruction of property, increased crime, and other issues. How would you feel if where you lived was suddenly overrun with short term tenants that are having a negative impact on your way of life, and not being able to afford to move?
That is how society would benefit form AIrbnb not existing. It may not benefit engineers making 100k+, but it would positively impact many in lower socioeconomic classes
>I think the bigger issue is if the externalities imposed by normal usage are so high that, when properly internalized, AirBNB no longer presents a compelling value proposition in the majority of cases. This is certainly possible.
Sounds a lot like Bitcoin and some other tech stuff. Where the conceit is that is doesn't have all of the externalities, until it's realized that they are functional and useful.
> When people live and work in a city, and if they cannot or do not want to buy a property, they are looking for a rental agreement that typically guarantees them a place for a year, and is renewable.
I had to stop here.
1. It is not always the case but that person (fortunately) has the freedom to choose another location.
2. Guarantees don't really exist unless you are talking physics theory and even that sometimes surprises people.
> much more money is to be made with Airbnb, because people who are staying for 5 days pay rates that are was higher than the typical yearly rental fee for the same place.
You made my original point. This transaction is a win-win for both parties involved.
The rest of your argument centers around stifling this transaction to subsidize an artificial-non-sustainable market.
Yes, this effects real people in real ways but they need to take _personal_ action and do what's best for them personally instead of effecting change on the rest of the area.
> I think AirBnB would be a force to help people keep their housing, driving rents up but allowing people flexibility to generate more income if they are falling back.
Until it becomes the new normal, and market rents will factor that in. Then, people who, for whatever reason, cannot rent half their apartment out on AirBnB will just be priced out.
> Perhaps people like you could spend a minute thinking things through and consider why there is demand for offers somewhere between hotels and long-term rentals, which frequently are completely out of reach of those who have to move to a new city in a short notice.
Like a lot of HN, many people have lots of opinions on things they have neither done or have experienced first hand but seem to be most vocal on such matters.
Agreed, I don't blame Airbnb or it's counterparts in other countries, they are just capitalizing on the larger (systemic but ultimately manufactured) housing crisis because the greater issue is with making real estate holdings the only way to accrue or retain any wealth as more and more of the real economy gets hallowed out.
I personally leveraged my first Airbnb stay as an early adopter and did what they say 'you should never do' and ultimately cut them out as a needless middle man and made return trips for several years without them in the off-season and got an even better rate!
Alternatively, I've paid rental agencies who did nothing but list their property on their website and provided a day to see the place and not much else as I met with the owner's myself had to find translation solutions and ultimately saw how they added just as much if not less value than Airbnb in the over all process of finding a rental home/apartment and saw that it's a symptom not the cause of the malaise we see since 2008 crisis and perhaps even before in the dotcom bubble in 2000 that made 2008 inevitable.
People want an easy scapegoat, and while I agree real-estate and landlords are predatory by design I still don't think Airbnb is to blame here and I don't even think they are a 'good' business, in fact I stopped using them entirely despite being an early adopter, but they've used their platform to house more people in certain crisis' than even some nation-states have.
> but adding more will help, along with adding laws to limit the number of Airbnbs allowed.
Right exactly. You build more and you limit the number of AirBnBs.
> As much as you're afraid there is, there isn't infinite demand for Airbnbs. There are only so many hosts with so much money and only so many tourists and staycationers with only so much money.
I largely disagree with this, but it depends on where you live. They are subject to some market forces sure, but also induced demand and simply supplanting residents that might be forced to move between AirBnBs, and even in off-seasons it can be a situation where the owner just leaves the property empty to capitalize on appreciation.
> I used to love staying in Airbnb’s but can’t stand the cheapness of it all as of late due to them turning into pure investments and no longer real homes.
That's nice that you prefer one type of rental over the other. Why not allow both, so that others who prefer not having a homeowner intruding on their privacy don't need to deal with that?
If I have a property, I can choose to let someone stay at my property for money. AirBnB facilitates this. This makes my property valuable as a result. The homeowners benefit as do people who need a place to stay. This is progress and occurs any time anyone creates a product or technology that creates value. What pathologies? Homes rightly appreciating in value due to a new revenue stream opened up for homeowners?
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