It's like when people still refer to Ubers in San Francisco as 'illegal taxis'. There's nothing illegal about them, they're regulated by the California PUC.

Sort of like how running a user-generated content site is legal, but people who upload movies/albums/etc. to it in violation of copyright are on the wrong side of the law.

In most cases it isn't that "AirBNB is illegal" it's that people using AirBNB aren't complying with all local regulations.

This is a very disingenuous statement, because it is illegal only because it's made illegal to kill the service model they are using. It's like GM sponsoring a law banning Toyotas and then saying - well, look at those criminals - they are making illegal stuff! How shameful of them! No, it's shameful to use the law as a club to bash competition and prevent innovation instead of what it was meant to - to protect people from harm.

Yeah, no.

Various jurisdictions may be tightening up laws, and the original intent of AirBnB may not have been anything illegal, but the way it has developed it does promote activities that were never legal to begin with in most jurisdictions. And renting your home out via AirBnB can void your homeowner's insurance because it is commercial use of a residential property. Many people do not realize this and do not notify their insurance company and only find it out if an AirBnB tenant damages something, they try to file a claim and get told "You aren't covered for that and, now, you aren't covered at all."

I have not paid real close attention, but my understanding is that this started as more like a paid form of couch surfing or a means to find a short term roommate and then someone eventually asked "Can I just list my entire property for rent, rather than just a portion of it?" and now that format is most of their listings.

So, as I understand it, they kind of slippery sloped their way into their current model. But their current model is basically illegal in most jurisdictions and always has been.

Some jurisdictions may be tightening up laws to make it easier to combat and perhaps that is the wrong way to handle this because it fosters misconceptions of the type you have. But residential property was never meant to be treated like a hotel and the fact that the internet makes it possible to do so in ways that were never before possible does not change the fact that rules concerning residential property is intentionally different from rules for commercial property and always have been.

I generally try to stay out of discussions about AirBnB. I don't think the founders are nefarious people who intentionally tried to do anything bad. I think this very much was a case of slippery slope. Like a lot of slippery slopes, it started out as not necessarily a bad thing but has gradually turned into something seriously problematic.

As they say: The devil is in the details. Law is very often all about insidious details. When the people who run AirBnB agreed to something that was not part of their original vision and then that happened to work to rake in the dough, well, they are responsible for what they agreed to without apparently really thinking it through carefully enough. I get the appeal of that, but it doesn't make it right that they were just trying to make money and not intentionally trying to fuck up entire cities. I am totally fine with the existing war on AirBnB.

Rather than acting all surprised and like cities are being unreasonable, maybe they should rethink their business model and stop behaving like Theranos and basically demanding that the world rise up and drag them out of there kicking and screaming because the allure of the all important goddamn dollar is too fucking strong for them to care about what their business model does to the fabric of entire cities. "Not their problem -- LA LA LA NOT LISTENING" all the way to the bank.

The problem is, the people renting out their rooms on AirBNB are in many cases violating local law, lease terms or insurance contracts. They're also in moral hazard -- they are paying for homeowners/renters insurance while running a roominghouse.

AirBNB's legal position has to be "buyer (ie. landlord) beware". But their marketing position is that it's easy to cover your expenses by renting out your apartment. That paradox is a variation of Napster's old "people are just sharing music like they always have" line.

The only constraint I see in Germany come from your rental contract in case the room / appartment you rented out via AirBnB is not your own property. In this case technically you would need the OK from your land lord. If it's owned by yourself, you would have a legal contract with the person staying over. But I'm not a legal expert on that.

EDIT: What puzzles me are some of the comments here. I rather expected them to be along the line of "of course it is, WTF are you thinking it souldn't be???? And "how I like it, great product". But maybe it's just me, I really had a... weird day today! :-)

Edit: The majority of uses that I have encountered of both people who use and list on AirBNB in NYC are of the strictly illegal kind.

For instance, renting a room inside your home to visitors, while you continue to occupy the home, is perfectly legal almost everywhere. Often, there is little or no regulation to comply with. (For example, actual BnBs.)

But many, many, many of AirBnB's rentals are illegal flophouses. Entire-apartment rentals inside established buildings, or flophouses with 2-4-6-8 bedrooms rented to unrelated strangers, with a maintenance service that comes by to turn down the beds. Those are where the money are at.

In fact, it's quite the opposite. The ruling is broad enough to be applicable to pretty much anything.

Is there actually a legal use case? I can imagine that this law is virtually unenforceable against private individuals renting out a spare room for a few days, but I suspect it still (notionally) applies.