Re:Airbnb dominated by professional landlords
by brandur on Sunday August 06, 2017 @12:17PM
(#14941891)
Sure, AirBnB certainly isn't the only cause of rising rents in Berlin. The city's become an incredibly attractive place to be over the last decade, and that's almost certainly the foremost reason for rent increases.
But AirBnB is contributing something to those rising rents, and unlike the desirability of your city, it's something that you can control for.
I (along with probably most people that share a similar position) would argue that regulating AirBnB is good, but not adequate. Pretty much every large urban development in the world (SF, London, NY, Berlin, HK, etc.) is experiencing the same problem that because they're desirable they're also automatically unaffordable. We need to figure out how to put roofs over people's heads by building much more, and much more cheaply.
But AirBnB is contributing something to those rising rents, and unlike the desirability of your city, it's something that you can control for.
I (along with probably most people that share a similar position) would argue that regulating AirBnB is good, but not adequate. Pretty much every large urban development in the world (SF, London, NY, Berlin, HK, etc.) is experiencing the same problem that because they're desirable they're also automatically unaffordable. We need to figure out how to put roofs over people's heads by building much more, and much more cheaply.