The Hotel Industry’s Plan to Combat Airbnb | Hacker News Reader

The Hotel Industry’s Plan to Combat Airbnb

nytimes.com

153 pointsuyoakaoma348 comments

So the hotel industry's plan revolves solely around more legislation and regulation?

How about competing by innovating and providing the consumer with a better or improved experience?

Does the industry really believe that theres nothing they can do to improve on the consumer experience? It feels like its changed very little if at all over the years.

How about stop charging $15.00 a day for internet. It's 2017 charging for internet like charging for power in the room.

How about getting rid of inflexible checkin/checkout times?

How about lobbying local governments to reduce the exorbitant double digit taxes and fees consumers pay on hotels stays instead.[1]

Example tax rates:

18.27% New York City

17.76% Nashville

17% Houston and Indianapolis

16.75% San Antonio, TX and Columbus, OH

[1] http://www.travelandleisure.com/articles/understanding-hotel...

Agreed. I find it utter insulting when they charge for internet.

Is this an US thing?

I travel a lot and I can't remember the last time I had a hotel to charge for the Internet access separately.

My parents went on a trip to Europe a few years ago and we used Skype on every location they stayed at. The only place where they didn't have to pay separately for Internet access and where the connection wasn't dogcrap was Austria. And I don't remember where it happened, but in one case it was so outrageously expensive they just waited until their following destination to call.

But indeed, they later traveled to the US and had to pay as well. Nowhere I have stayed at in our third world country (Uruguay) this is a thing.

I've stayed in hotels all over Europe and never once paid for internet. I did pay in India, however.

>"Is this an US thing?"

I think its mostly a big corporate hotel chain thing as I have also experienced this in the EU as well(although it might have been an American hotel chain) at times but it's definitely a common practice in the US yes.

Equally annoying is that these hotels will use some horrible third party captive portal that you need to re-log in to at regular intervals. I've often been disconnected because some arbitrary timer expired while I was in the middle of something important.

You will almost never see a small boutique hotel in the U.S charge for internet access or have a captive port however.

More precisely, it is a big corporate hotel chain thing for those properties that are more likely to host business people who can expense the cost.

It's less common than it used to be but it still happens in the US. As someone else said, mostly business chain type places although it's often waived if you belong to their loyalty club, book directly with the hotel, have a corporate rate, have a conference rate, etc. So it's nominally there for a fair number of hotels but I'm not sure the last time I actually ended up paying.

A lot also have a free base level and a additional-charge premium internet service that allows higher speed and/or more devices.

Fair enough. Though I find the base-level service has generally improved over the past few years. Personally, I never upgrade. If streaming video doesn't work, I always have local-stored video with me when I travel anyway.

It's a market segmentation thing. Hotels that cater to business travelers can charge extra because the employer will pay for it. Hotels that cater to families usually have free internet.

> Hotels that cater to business travelers can charge extra because the employer will pay for it.

More likely, IMO, hotels that cater to businesses have separate charges for internet because business (especially government) travel offices often have fixed (sometimes location-sensitive) caps on reimbursable lodging rates (but may, or may not, separately reimburse for other services during the stay with appropriate justification), so pulling non-core services out of the core rate means that more travellers will stay there.

Families, conversely—while price sensitive—will compare amenities and rarely have strict caps for the base lodging rate irrespective of what other services are included.

>"It's a market segmentation thing. Hotels that cater to business travelers can charge extra because the employer will pay for it."

What does this actually mean any more though to "cater to business travelers"? Once upon a time a hotel that catered to business travelers had a "business center" which meant there was an auxiliary room with a fax machine, a photo copier and a couple of PCs", that is largely anachronistic now though. And I think this kind of illustrates how stuck in a different era most of these hotels are.

Another response below correctly answers your question. In business hotels, rates are set to be eligible for corporate booking. Expensing the internet separately is a non-issue for these customers.

Definitely not only US thing.

I've seen this in many other places.

Happens quite often in Germany and I've also run across it in Spain.

Most of the major hotel chains in the US have phased out this practice.

You only find it nowadays in the top tier chains, and even then, they usually offer free internet to members of their frequent traveller programs.

The hotels would find more success in lobbying city governments to levy a tax on airbnb stays rather than trying to get the hotel stay taxes reduced.

Bonus points if it's the same tax rate as us charged to hotels.

Extra bonus points if it's more than the regular hotel tax rates to compensate the municipality for the zoning changes caused by transients staying in residential areas.

AirBnb is also collecting occupancy tax in many cities [0]. I don't have a view on whether this tax is well justified, but it does seem like if hotels are required to charge it, then full time airbnb hosts should be required to charge it as well.

[0] https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/653/in-what-areas-is-occ...

I understand that AirBnB is now collecting an Transient Occupancy Tax on a county by county or city by city basis. I'm not arguing that whether AirBnB should be required to charge it. But when you stay in a hotel you as a guest get hit with both an occupancy tax and a sales tax.

The PDF here is a few years old but its a good overview of the tax regimes:

https://www.hvs.com/article/6856/the-2013-hvs-us-lodging-tax...

So fking sick of Corporatism.

Been waiting for someone to open a direct to door check in too. Just insert ID and credit card in a door that says Vacant, and boom you are in.

Local governments always charge these kinds of rates, it's easy to get "doesn't cost me" taxes to help make up budget shortfalls. Same with sin taxes.

Maybe it isn't that they can't innovate, but that it is more cost effective to lobby than to innovate. The return on investment for getting new regulations passed that helps them is higher than the return on investment for providing a better service that attracts customers. Maybe paying the government to ban your competitor is the wiser business move.

> Does the industry really believe that theres nothing they can do to improve on the consumer experience? It feels like its changed very little if at all over the years.

You must not travel alot, or at least not in the US. There has actually been a lot of innovation amongst the big brand chains in recent years. Hilton for example allows online/app check-in/check-out and they've been aggressively rolling out digital room key compatibility across their properties (via bluetooth in the app). This has allowed me in recent stays to completely avoid the front desk / human interaction - from check-in to check-out.

> How about stop charging $15.00 a day for internet. It's 2017 charging for internet like charging for power in the room.

WiFi is mostly free for most of major chains in the US (Hilton, Marriott, IHG) - especially their secondary brands (Hampton Inns, Springfield Suites, Courtyard, etc.). Those that charge usually offer it for free to members of their loyalty/points programs.

These days, I mostly see paid-internet in the top tier hotel brands in tier-one cities. Think the Ritz in NYC, etc. Again the internet is usually free for members of their frequent traveller programs.

> How about getting rid of inflexible checkin/checkout times?

All the major brands have check-in / check-out flexibility. I've never been denied late check-out requests, especially with advance notice. Most hotels will allow early check-ins no problem and most chains allow you to request this via the web / app.

Early check-in / late check-out is also typically _guaranteed_ for elite members of their frequent travel programs (at least this is the case for Hilton and Marriott).

> How about lobbying local governments to reduce the exorbitant double digit taxes and fees consumers pay on hotels stays instead.[1]

It's worth remembering that those taxes go towards meeting various regulatory requirements, like ensuring safety standards, etc.... things it's important to remember that AirBnB lacks. If all AirBnBs are required to have working fire alarms for example, I'm sure AirBnB will tack on a "safety" fee, just like Uber did when they had to do driver background checks.

As a frequent traveler (so far over 40 hotel stays this year), I always prefer a hotel to an AirBnB. It is 100x more convenient for mostly a marginal difference.

Pro-tip: for hilton properties use hiltonfamilymvp.com for 10-30% off the rack rates.

>You must not travel alot, or at least not in the US."

I spend a little over half a year on the road. I've recently been charged for internet at an Omni, a Wyndham, and a Westin hotel in the U.S.

>"All the major brands have check-in / check-out flexibility. I've never been denied late check-out requests, especially with advance notice. Most hotels will allow early check-ins no problem and most chains allow you to request this via the web / app."

I am referring to being able to specify my checkin and checkout time when I book. All of the online reservations systems I have used still mandate 3:00PM check in. I am not talking about picking up the phone and calling the front desk after I am already in the room.

>"It's worth remembering that those taxes go towards meeting various regulatory requirements, like ensuring safety standards, etc.... things it's important to remember that AirBnB lacks."

Really 15% of a $300 dollar a night hotel for 3 days(roughly $135) goes to meeting safety inspections? None of the $300 a night goes towards meeting that?

I'm sorry but I don't think that a hotel having an app for your smartphone is some great innovation in the industry.

> I spend a little over half a year on the road. I've recently been charged for internet at an Omni, a Wyndham, and a Westin hotel in the U.S.

Your experience is really becoming more and more less common. I would say, especially so for a frequent traveller such as yourself. Just in the past 4 weeks I've visited the following cities: * Boston * San Francisco * New York area * Atlanta * Denver * Houston

Free internet the whole trip. Stayed in a mix of Hilton and Marriott properties (Hilton, HGI, Hampton, Doubletree, Springfield Suites, Towneplace Suites, and Marriott Courtyard) with one stay at a Holiday Inn.

If you travel so much, you should really get on the various frequent travel programs that the hotel chains offer. In fact, one of the hotels you stayed at, Westin, provides free wifi if you're enrolled in SPG's rewards program (you don't even need to have status). This has been the policy since 2015 (1).

> I am referring to being able to specify my checkin and checkout time when I book. All of the online reservations systems I have used still mandate 3:00PM check in. I am not talking about picking up the phone and calling the front desk after I am already in the room.

Yes, Hilton allows you to specify the check-in times and also ask for late check-out via their app. Most, if not all, hotel chains also allow you make additional requests via a comments field when you make the booking on the web. In any case, making a quick phone call is really not that much of a hassle, and not that much more convenient than sending a message to your host on AirBnB.

> Really 15% of a $300 dollar a night hotel for 3 days(roughly $135) goes to meeting safety inspections? None of the $300 a night goes towards meeting that?

Taxes cover many costs, some portion of it, likely due to regulations. Bringing up the room rate is a bit of a misdirection, that rate is determined a host of variables, of which regulations is likely not one (or really low on the list). In any case, AirBnB tacks on a litany of fees to their "rack rate". I'm not sure what your point here - the hotels don't set the taxes...

> I'm sorry but I don't think that a hotel having an app for your smartphone is some great innovation in the industry.

Well your original complaint was that the hotel industry is not innovating, and you cite things like charging for wifi and not being able to check-in early / check-out late as supporting evidence.

I'm highlighting to you all the various things that the hotel industry is currently doing to "innovate". It's not just about having an app, its about the various features and functionalities that the app offers, which as a consequence, brings "innovation" to the user experience. At my recent Hilton stays, I was able to do everything (book a room, check-in, choose my room, unlock my door, check-out, receive my invoice, etc.) without any human contact involved at all. How is that not innovation?

Honestly, I'm pretty surprised that you hold these views given that you travel "a little over half the year". I would highly suggest you: 1) Enroll in each hotel chains' customer loyalty program; 2) Try to focus your stays in one/two chains as to build status. Also, take some time to do some basic research. Lots of popular travel blogs to start with and you always have FlyerTalk to default back to if you're into the discussion board format.

I started my career as a management consultant traveling every week (one year I had over 175 hotel stays!) and find myself traveling nearly as much in my current job. In the US at least, the hotel industry has changed/innovated, quite a bit in the past decade. I'm confidant that if you post your views on say FlyerTalk, people will back up my points.

1. https://spgpromos.com/internet/?action=main.faq

>". I would highly suggest you: 1) Enroll in each hotel chains' customer loyalty program; "

Why do I need to sign up for every individual hotel's loyalty program in order to receive "special treatment" when those things are a considered basic amenities and practices elsewhere? Why do they need to be part of "special program"? Creating some artificial status is not really innovation.

>"I'm confidant that if you post your views on say FlyerTalk, people will back up my points."

Now why would I do that? I'm not competing with you. This was a discussion.

There are a lot of people innovating in business today. I don't think for most people hotel chains would be there first thought as an experience that has changed with the times.

> Why do I need to sign up for every individual hotel's loyalty program in order to receive "special treatment" when those things are a considered basic amenities and practices elsewhere? Why do they need to be part of "special program"? Creating some artificial status is not really innovation.

You're shifting the argument and haven't really addressed all the other examples I've cited for how the hotel industry is trying to innovate. If you can't be bothered to take a few minutes to sign-up for some programs, then I guess you'll have to keep on paying for WiFi and complaining about it on online forums :P

Plus these customer loyalty programs are pretty much par for the course in every travel industry - and soon I'm sure - will be adopted by AirBnB as well. United MileagePlus program for example has existed for like 30 years... so it's not like this is a new phenomena. I'm sure there are other customer loyalty programs that predate that.

The "I hate doing this and don't see a reason to do it" argument is not very convincing. You're projecting.

> Now why would I do that? I'm not competing with you. This was a discussion.

It's a discussion in the sense that we're both talking, but you're not really addressing any of the points or examples I've cited. If you dislike hotel chains, so be it, but clearly hotels are trying to innovate and have innovated in the past decade.

You might want to consult FlyerTalk because that forum is geared towards frequent travelers, like yourself, and frequented by subject matter experts. If you're open to learning about how the industry is innovating, I'm sure you find even better examples than the ones I've provided.

> There are a lot of people innovating in business today. I don't think for most people hotel chains would be there first thought as an experience that has changed with the times.

I agree with you, but don't you see that you're shifting the argument? Your original point is that hotels are not innovating. Now it has shifted to: the hotel industry is not as innovate as other industries.

It's always been interesting to me that the paid internet thing only happens at the low end and high end, but rarely ever in between.

At least in the states, my anecdotal observation is that it's being phased out completely. It seems both the rich and poor alike hate paying for the internet :D

Now the scheme has morphed into free "basics" internet vs paid "premium" internet.

Reading through the comments, I feel like I might be one of the few that prefer AirBnB not for money savings, but because they always feel more authentic to me.

I've been to several different countries in the past year, and have stayed at AirBnB's every time. Sure, there were some issues here and there that would not have occurred at a hotel. But I'll be damned if it wasn't nice to stay nestled into the local neighborhoods, and meet (and sometimes drink) with the hosts, who were always gracious and helpful in pointing out the best places to check out that are off-the-beaten-path.

For what it's worth, dedicated buildings for AirBnB's really rub me the wrong way, because it often takes away from the charming/local feel of the place/host. I try to avoid booking places like this.

Same here. I just stayed in an AirBnB house on the water in a coastal city. The hosts lived next door and gave us a ride in their boat.

If you're not traveling with a family, I've found hostels to be by far the best experience. They tend to be cheaper than both hotels and AirBNB, and have a very social atmosphere that's great for meeting other travelers and finding interesting off-the-beaten-path places to go.

After 30, I really valued my privacy and a personal kitchen.

You lasted longer than me. I gave up on hostels after age 17.

Dagnabbit I remember using outhouses with the whole neighborhood! You spoiled whippersnappers!

Once I got older, and especially once my employer was footing the bill, I'd much rather have the comfort and privacy of a hotel room. Hostels are more for when you're in your 20's and exploring the world on a budget.

Hostels are also a way to meet other travellers though - that is a lot harder to do in a hotel. I find travelling alone for extended periods can become a bit lonely

My experience in Europe has been very hit-and-miss. AirBnB for the most part is as expensive as a hotel but without any of the guarantees or protections. And most of them seemed to be professional operations, with "Super Hosts" controlling 10 or more properties in the same city.

The locations are usually nice compared to a business hotel, but rarely special. The "local knowledge" is no better than that from Lonely Planet / Trip Advisor. And if something goes wrong then I have much less recourse than I do with a hotel. If the room is noisy or smelly, I can't simply get a resolution by talking nicely to the guy at the front desk.

This has been my experience, hell I even got bed bugs in one in Berlin and there was fuck all I could do.

Yes, you are one of the few. Most who are far from home want reliability, safety and consistency most of the time.

> they always feel more authentic to me.

This might have been the case early on in AirBnB's existence. Now most of the places I've been able to find are just small-time hoteliers. The owner may have half dozen listings in Airbnb with the same generic IKEA furniture.

I've gone back to regular hotels. While I really enjoyed AirBnB in the past there were too many hit or miss experiences. I've had a few owners pull our reservation at the last minute.

This.

Even in Murmansk I visited few months ago, airbnb 'studios' meant, a guy, who bought big apartment and divided it into three to four separate 20m studios. All ikea refurbished.

The only folklor I got, was local 'manager' who arrived in ultra old (suprise it still worked) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZAZ_Zaporozhets

I've stayed in that kind of generic AirBnB, and even those are way better than a hotel. You're still staying in an apartment, which feels more homey, and you still have access to a kitchen.

I've also stayed in truly fantastic AirBnB apartments in Europe that made my short stays feel like I was staying with a dear friend.

The most exquisite AirBnB I stayed in was in Croatia. The owner set up the apartment like a hotel, but offered homemade liqueurs and chocolates to his guests. He even picked us up from the train station and gave us a list of places to go and restaurants to try. The rate was insanely affordable, too.

How much was it and how much was a "nice" hotel?

It was 60 euros total a night, split between two people. Nice hotels were at least 200 euros per night.

My wife and I have developed a vacation strategy we call "M&M": markets and museums. We usually book an AirBnB near good transit and food markets. We buy food for breakfast and dinner at the markets and cook it or have a picnic. So a real kitchen with a fridge and full size stove and often a dishwasher removes a lot of the hassle of eating out every night when we're tired from exploring 8 hours a day. Last place in Paris even had a washer/dryer. Two weeks in heaven. We did have the stay from hell in Queretaro, MX, though.

As for the hosts, with one exception they have been extraordinarily helpful: pickups at the airport/bus station, free tickets to a Paris musical(!!!), free lodging with the owner's friend after a devastating hurricane(!!!). I generally have an ongoing conversation with the host via email over the course of the stay, and the cool local tips flow freely.

We intensely detest corporate hotels these days. Gonna be in one in Atlanta for two days this week. Yuk.

I was in the middle of scoping out the area around the Fair Market in NYC when they passed that recent anti-AirBnB law.

AirBnBs are fantastic until you have a bad experience. When that happens, you realize how little recourse and options you have; you're basically screwed and need to scramble for solutions. This is not so bad when you're on a vacation and have some flexibility. It is 100% a total nightmare when traveling for work and have other responsibilities to attend to.

Hotels have the advantage of: 1) Consistent product quality 2) Established process and channels for addressing complaints 3) Recourse when things go wrong

AirBnBs have the advantage of: 1) Cost, cost, cost 2) Uniqueness in accommodation environments 3) Greater flexibility (especially as it relates to cost) in terms of location and specific accommodation needs (kitchen, multiple beds, etc.)

Those who rave about AirBnB, I suspect, have never had a really bad experience. I used to AirBnB all the time, but a few bad experiences really turned me off on the whole platform. You get what you pay for, and with hotels, that extra cost provides "insurance" for when things go south.

These days I'll occasionally AirBnB when on vacation if the costs are significantly lower than a hotel (and this is only ever the case if you're booking relatively last moment). Never on business trips - only if there are literally no other accommodations (at sane prices), which is only ever the case when booking last minute in specific cities (SF, NYC, Tokyo, etc.).

This is exactly the feeling i've got too. After a couple of weeks in various apartments i stopped using AirBnB and went back to staying in Hotels. This was in 2015, it might have changed since then, but then AirBnB wasn't issuing an invoice. Since i was travelling for work, good documentation of costs is necessary, and i don't wan't to argue with my accountant each time i tried to pass some printed page from AirBnB site as "invoice" or "receipt". Ryanair also does not issue an invoice, and i've only once done the mistake of buying a ticket from them. I have not yet had a hotel so far that refused to issue an invoice for the company when i requested it so.

On a side note, both AirBnB and Ryanair had the "company name and address" fields on their web-forms, which made me believe those data will be used for printing an invoice, but those are not used nor displayed ever after being entered. What a deception.

This is some kind of misery that Irish companies do. Companies that are based in Ireland operate by Irish law, and it seems that Irish law does not require them to issue an invoice. I don't know how much money AirBnB and Ryanair are saving by not providing a printable PDF invoice on their sites, but they might just be losing customers from other EU countries where the invoice was and is the basic document of business transactions.

Then there is the rest of the problems with AirBnB. I absolutely needed an apartment with stable internet connection, to be able to work remotely. I was promised that, but when i got there it wasn't working. I was told to "restart the router", well it didn't help either. So i had to buy a 50EUR data-stick with crappy slow internet to be able to connect. Most hotels are not better in this regard either, but with hotels i can at least avoid the bad ones. With AirBnB each apartment is a new unique situation. Maybe it has bad wifi, maybe its smelly, maybe its without air-conditioning, maybe the neighbors are noisy. Like the previous poster wrote, hotels provide a more consistent service.

So, haven't people been doing things like short-term rentals with their condos, spare rooms, etc for quite a while without Airbnb using things like VRBO, craigslist, other websites, newspaper ads, word-of-mouth, etc? Was the hotel industry very upset about people doing those things before Airbnb and lobbying against it because it was concerned these rentals didn't follow exactly the same regulations hotels did? I can't seem to find information about that, although it wouldn't surprise me.

What seems to be actually happening though is now there is a successful and popular marketplace for this type of rental that has gained alot of traction (Airbnb), and under the guise of 'safety, standards, etc' the hotel lobby is fighting (to actually try to get their large share of the market back).

I don't necessarily think laws and regulations are bad to have in place as it often protects the consumers. But for the hotel industry to pretend this is their motive is inauthentic, just be honest that it's about the money. What disgusts me about all this is the corporate speak that goes under the guise of values and concern for customers (same could be said of Airbnb marketing lingo).

Agreed. I'm not going to argue that Airbnb is above regulations, but the spitefulness on behalf of the hotel lobby is ridiculous. It's exactly the type of lobbying that works against consumer interests for no good reason.

How do we stop this?

Certainly the hotel industry's lobbying is self-interested, but I wouldn't say it's entirely against consumer interest.

Sure, travelers are interested in paying the lowest price for the best accommodation, but the needs of residents are often conflicting with that.

There are reasons that zoning laws exist, and that I couldn't just decide to buy a house and turn it into a hotel in many places. But that's essentially what Airbnb allows.

There's always an important balance between regulation, and freedom, and I'm certainly not arguing for outlawing Airbnb. But in this case that self-interest of the hotel industry might be aligned closely with the self-interest of residents in the communities where Airbnb operates.

I think it is also unfair to neighbors who didn't realize they were moving into a home right next to someone who has a revolving door of tourists like a hotel. If you know there is a hotel on your street and you choose to live where you live, then that's your choice. But Airbnb makes it possible for anyone to turn your little street into something unexpected, especially in touristy areas, and I don't think that's right.

>There are reasons that zoning laws exist

The reasons aren't compelling to me. It's essentially biased toward money changing hands. Invite different people over every night and do drugs, get drunk and have sex? It's your god given right! Let guests stay for free for a year in your absence? Your property, your rules.

Money changed hands!? Oh my Gosh zoning laws, community rights, etc

If there are safety or community character concerns, and laws created to address them, the laws should be completely neutral to commercial aspects like money changing hands, which are only relevant to special interests who want to stifle commercial competition.

It's very similar to Uber. Both sides do have a point though -- Hotels want Airbnb to be either out of business, or inconsequentially competing. However, people using AirBnb can get around zoning and land usage rules, or lots of other regulatory issues. I think it'd require input from both AirBnb and Hotel chains for proper regulations, so that they aren't functionally banning AirBnB, but aren't also giving Hotels or AirBnB a massive market advantage.

Agreed. Why not let the consumers vote with their dollars, and let the free market do its thing?

I'm not taking one position or the other but the hotels' argument is that the market isn't free, it's distorted against them.

whining.

Because if you got rid of the regulations fire-trap accommodation would come back.

.. and people will stop going there. the problem resolves itself.

Except the problem clearly didn't resolve itself last time, resulting in people dying, resulting in fire safety regulations.

Having used AirBnB for a while, I now prefer to stay in a hotel. Staying in AirBnB I don't feel safe at all and 80% of the AirBnB's I stayed had one problem or the other. There is no importance given for the safety or even a proper door. I dont want to deal with problems when I stay somewhere for pleasure or business. And No, I dont want to read hundreds of reviews before I make my decision. I am back to hotel stays. I hope their lobbying finds success.

>I hope their lobbying finds success.

Your opinion piece is fine until your last line where you support using the state to ban other people from making the choice that you prefer not to make.

> Your opinion piece is fine until your last line where you support using the state to ban other people from making the choice that you prefer not to make.

What's wrong with that? Virtually every regulatory law does this. Unless you are arguing that the state should not be able to regulate anything, I don't see why supporting regulations in one industry or another is a bad thing.

How about this: I hope the hotels successfully lobby to enforce existing zoning laws. I don't want my neighbors running a business out of their house. If they break the law, punish them. Simple as that.

> I don't want my neighbors running a business out of their house

Why?

Common concerns:

* Increased traffic

* More noise

* Greater odds of criminal activity

* Resultant reduction in nearby property values

These are not theoretical and are part of the reason why zoning laws exist.

Related to most of the above: a lot of people like to know their neighbors so that they can be comfortable talking to them if there's a problem. Full time rentals mess that up. Now you might well find yourself going to complain to a stranger who couldn't care less what you think, and it's a different stranger every weekend.

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-airbnb-party-hou...

>Neighbors of what critics say is a “party house” in the Glenwood community told the Glendale News-Press that the constant partying in the 1300 block of Norton Avenue was interfering with their sleep in the early-morning hours. They said they’d find beer bottles in the street, people fighting on the sidewalk in the early-morning hours, parking clogged and loud music blaring.

>Frank Higginbotham, who lives across the street from the house, said he saw tour buses with about 30 people pull up to the residence for a party about two weeks ago.

>Earlier in December, neighbors, said, there was one party that had to be shut down using a powerful spotlight from a hovering police helicopter and several police officers.

>“This was like a war zone,” he said, adding that parties have been going on every weekend for months. “Every night I came home, I was scared to think about what I was going to find here.”

I'd be amazed if they were violating no laws. Surely the law would help the neighbors regardless of whether or not the party host was an AirBnB.

Because I live in a residential neighborhood with residential zoning, and I don't want to deal with itinerant neighbors with little regard for the neighborhood. You want to run a B&B? Go through the proper legal channels and build a legitimate business.

But, we want govt to ensure our safety at work, from the drugs we buy at the pharmacy. An ordinary person doesn't have the tools to verify this information for himself.

Then stay in a hotel.

Last time I checked, running an unlicensed hotel was still illegal

Would you get a haircut from an unlicensed hairdresser?

No. I don't want to get lice or a scalp infection.

I guess I've been lucky so far.

In Sweden there is no such thing as hairdresser licensing. I guess I've been at mortal risk all this time!

I do it all of the time when I cut my own hair. I cut hair for other people when they ask. I don't charge money, but obviously I am unlicensed.

What's a hotel though? Where I'm from, running a bed and breakfast (defined as 4 or fewer rooms and 8 or fewer guests) doesn't require any kind of special licensing.

Of course running it out of an apartment runs afoul of every rental agreement I've seen.

A common zoning distinction is that a bed & breakfast is a private home where the host lives in the home. If the host does not live there, many cities/towns would then consider it a hotel and subject it to different rules.

I think a lot of the arm waving about airbnb is because of the latter situation. I don't think many people seem to have issues with renting out a spare room.

We don't have zoning in my country. I've had two companies, their address was always my apartment. I was also manager for a company - it was located in an apartment, then a house, then finally a commercial place (when we got to over 25 people).

It's against the law because it's illegal? Well, I can't argue with that logic.

Zoning laws.

That is a general rule with prohibitionists. "I don't drink, so nobody else should." "I don't do drugs, so nobody else should."

"I don't die in a fire because the short-term rental I stayed at doesn't have a working smoke detector!"

Yeah, that's really the prohibitionist mindset there.

As opposed to having your rental be burned down by a long-term renter? That's an oddly specific preference..

a long term renter has a much greater vested interest in preserving the quality of life of the community and mitigating impact on the neighbors.

the fire safety issue is a bit of a red herring. that's something that is the responsibility of the landlord and the local fire safety inspector anyway, not really part of the long term vs short term rental debate.

the issues related to ABB tenants are about their lack of responsibility and accountability within the community, since they will be gone (forever) in a short period of time. the issues related to ABB hosts is that they evade regulations that their competitors cannot evade, and that (in some situations) they violate community laws or norms that exist for good reasons.

> the fire safety issue is a bit of a red herring.

Which was the only point I was making.

> that's something that is the responsibility of the landlord

So you agree it's red herring because fire safety is already regulated..

> the issues related to ABB tenants are about their lack of responsibility and accountability within the community

If I could demonstrate that responsibility and accountability were already regulated in communities - would you agree that your objections are red herring as well?

"I don't avoid local safety and service regulations, so nobody else should."

In fairness, the non-caricature prohibitionist is more like, "I don't like drunken fights breaking out in the street, so I think anyone profiting from public drinking should follow measures to reduce the risk of such fights breaking out."

The beginning of the slope is always benign.

There's a general rule about people who harm others with externalities. They always loudly wonder why the people they victimize can't just mind their own business.

You can't sell an unsafe car. You can't run an unsafe restaurant. You can't build an unsafe building. You can't rent an unsafe home. You can't drive in an unsafe manner. You can't allow an unsafe number of people in your business. You can't run an unsafe salon. You can't practice medicine in an unsafe manner. You can't sell unsafe food.

And you can't run an unsafe hotel.

Your usual airbnb property is not "an unsafe hotel." My flat is presently being let on airbnb and isn't suddenly unsafe because someone else is in it rather than me.

In my experience, the vast (90+%) of Airbnb properties share more in common with a hotel room than an apartment that is occasionally rented out.

My experience is the opposite - 90% of the places I've stayed have clearly been people's homes or cottages. At least in the US. In Europe it was different but for me that's a much smaller sample size.

I have the same experience as yours. Of the 7-8 AirBNBs I have stayed at, only 1 felt like a hotel (it was in Hong Kong, and the cheapest place I could find.)

On the other hand, some of my best travel experiences have been eating meals with hosts, staying up talking about life and drinking by a bonfire with hosts, and otherwise getting the authentic AirBNB experience. Of course I wouldn't say that the hotel-type experience isn't out there (it may even be cheaper than hotels) but that's not why I do AirBNB. It would be a shame (both for hosts and guests) to have fewer opportunities like this available.

Are you looking for a kind of place that keeps you away from the illegal hotels? Is there a price point thing, or neighborhoods you tend to stay in? I have the same experience as you do, but I'm avoiding the kinds of searches that would ever put me in an illegal hotel.

I'm sure I am, because I prefer staying in actual flats and cottages, which is why I use Airbnb in the first place (that and price). On the other hand I don't see many listings that don't fit that description, and I always select the 'entire home/apt' filter, which presumably is where hotel-like operations would show up. It must vary a lot by local market.

When I read stories like these and think about my condo-owning NYC friends complaints about Abnb, I usually start wondering if the kinds of searches I'm giving Abnb are just not representative of the majority of users, and so I'm not really noticing the negative externalities they're creating.

> My flat is presently being let on airbnb and isn't suddenly unsafe because someone else is in it rather than me.

You might not have changed the smoke detector batteries in a decade, though. Fine if you want to risk your own life that way, but we've decided as a society that renting a hotel room means extra safety requirements and checks to protect the guests.

>Fine if you want to risk your own life that way, but we've decided as a society that renting a hotel room means extra safety requirements and checks to protect the guests.

Sorry, how did "we as a society" decide that? Governments are deciding the things you're talking about. What we as a society can do, is post and read reviews on hotels and Airbnb rentals, and we certainly do this.

You are engaged in the political process aside from once-every-few-years voting, right? That's how "we as a society" decided it.

If all you do is punch a ballot, yeah, that's lazy, and yeah, you're basically letting other people decide these things for you.

>You are engaged in the political process aside from once-every-few-years voting, right?

I certainly have and do, and it is a pretty frustrating thing with which to deal. Thank goodness society is not bound by what government can do.

>That's how "we as a society" decided it.

I think that's a pretty low standard for judging society's opinion on anything. You get a lot more feedback on what society thinks by examining the day to day transactions and exchanges we're all doing.

> Governments are deciding the things you're talking about.

Governments are made up of our elected representatives and those our elected representatives appoint/hire. If we're unhappy with those decisions, we vote for someone else and tell them to change them. See Trump and the EPA for a current-events sample of this in action - the Right feels things are too regulated, they won the election, and now we're getting a bunch of regulations removed (to our likely detriment, IMO).

>Governments are made up of our elected representatives and those our elected representatives appoint/hire. If we're unhappy with those decisions, we vote for someone else and tell them to change them. See Trump and the EPA for a current-events sample of this in action - the Right feels things are too regulated, they won the election, and now we're getting a bunch of regulations removed (to our likely detriment, IMO).

This paints a rosier picture about the possibilities of change in such systems than I think are warranted, though I know some might argue that the sclerosis of politics is a feature as much as it is a drawback. That said, we make decisions, sometimes daily, regarding things we want in life. It may be as simple as which kinds of coffee to drink, or which laptop to buy, and those choices result in areas of society that can and do change with some speed.

Those daily decisions are usually far removed from their externalities. Yes, people will choose the $5 shirt over the $10, but it's hardly a sign that people in our society endorse the child slave labor that's happening behind the scenes. Government regulation happens a lot when individual small decisions eventually lead to things society as a whole doesn't like.

>Those daily decisions are usually far removed from their externalities. Yes, people will choose the $5 shirt over the $10, but it's hardly a sign that people in our society endorse the child slave labor that's happening behind the scenes. Government regulation happens a lot when individual small decisions eventually lead to things society as a whole doesn't like.

If people knowingly help that child labour scene to flourish, by what metric do we decide that "society" doesn't, in fact, like it, despite its actions? Election results? Pulling a lever or filling in a ballot every X years, by comparison, doesn't involve anything remotely close to that level of engagement and activity. Even writing the occasional letter to a legislator is a paltry amount of effort, by comparison.

I'm not intending to be glib here, I'm quite familiar with the arguments that equate society with representative government. I'm just interested in how representative such systems really are of said socieity.

> If people knowingly help that child labour scene to flourish, by what metric do we decide that "society" doesn't, in fact, like it, despite its actions?

Completely false premise. They're not "knowingly" helping the child labor scene - they're just picking the cheap shirt. Walmart doesn't put up a sign "this stuff made with child slave labor!" - they might not even know themselves.

>Completely false premise. They're not "knowingly" helping the child labor scene - they're just picking the cheap shirt. Walmart doesn't put up a sign "this stuff made with child slave labor!" - they might not even know themselves.

If Walmart did put up such a sign, it might have a shaming effect. Obviously they don't and we shouldn't expect it. People who are aware of what's going on can go in and out while plugging their ears, doing the equivalent of singing, "naah-naah" to the origins of their products.

Meanwhile, government, which I'm to understand is to be equated with society, seems to take no issue with trade with countries where such conditions prevail. Every once in a while, a politician (like Trump) will decry how China (as an example) does business, but there seems to be little action on that front.

So your flat has been inspected by the hotel commission and your hotel permit is displayed in a prominent location in your flat and you've kept logs of all required maintenance and I can view your flat's inspection records?

Huh? Why does he have to do that? I can understand being suspicious of those who actually come and STAY in the Airbnb, but to use your line of argument against the person renting out the room makes no sense to me. What exactly does the hotel permit specify? That the toilet is clean? That the building is structurally sound?

It certainly depends on where you live but almost all jurisdictions have those sorts of requirements. For example, first thing I saw on Google

>Environmental health specialists inspect every hotel at least twice a year or more often as deemed necessary to ensure compliance with the Hotel, Food Service Establishment, and Public Swimming Pool Act of 1985* and the hotel rules and regulations. Current hotel permits must be displayed in a prominent location for the public to view and the inspection report must be available for public scrutiny.

https://www.tn.gov/health/article/eh-hotels#sthash.fTwnqZnV....

Maybe this is more true of countries like India, where I'm from, where I can imagine hygiene standards being more "flexible". But here in Western Europe for example, or the US, airbnbs are almost better maintained than I'd maintain my own house. And I think there's a good reason for this: the impact of reviews. Even in India, I can't imagine a place going far looking like a cheapo dorm room, because people will definitely look at reviews.

>>Huh? Why does he have to do that?

Because hotels are subject to those regulations. It's not optional for them. Why should it be optional for AirBnB hosts?

Because AirBnB hosts, in general, are not running a hotel.

The distinction is purely legal - in this case, the semantics matter quite a bit.

I don't know if they do. If it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck, it's probably a duck.

At the end of they day they are directly competing with hotels. In order to ensure the competition is fair, they should be subject to the same regulations.

And what if the competition isn't fair already?

What if I just want to rent out one room in my home on the side, not as a business? Why, then, should I be subject to the same requirements as a huge corporation with dedicated multistory buildings, many more customers, staff, and so forth?

To me, it sounds like the taxi industry pre-Uber. Lots of questionable-value regulation created by incumbents that doesn't really hurt anyone in the real world when it's mostly ignored.

>Because AirBnB hosts, in general, are not running a hotel.

Of course they are. Are you paying the host to stay in a room they own? Hotel.

Which isn't what most people think of when they hear "hotel".

Really? What do "most people" think when they hear "hotel"?

edit: for all you down voters, he is the dictionary definition of the word "hotel":

"an establishment providing accommodations, meals, and other services for travelers and tourists."

Which means every "Airbed and Breakfast" is a hotel.

Most Airbnbs I've stayed at do not offer meals. In my local jurisdiction, all hotels must provide meals like your definition lays out. By that fact an Airbnb would /not/ qualify as a hotel legally

If providing a meal is part of the definition that makes something a hotel, that's true; the way you state it is a requirement that hotels must comply with, though, which would mean AirBnB might qualify as a hotel, but also be in violation of the requirement.

Theres lots of places where AirBnB (or hosts on the platform) meets the definition of a hotel and simultaneously often fail to meet the legal obligations of a hotel.

> Because AirBnB hosts, in general, are not running a hotel.

I don't know whether it's the majority, but quite a lot of them are running hotels, though often illegal hotels under local law.

Among others, that it meets fire codes.

Just wait until an AirBNB customer dies in a fire because the property didn't meet fire safety requirements. AirBNB probably wouldn't survive the fallout.

One AirBnB customer DID die from an unsafe tree-swing on the property: https://medium.com/matter/living-and-dying-on-airbnb-6bff8d6...

Nobody looks at that when renting a hotel.

Maybe because by and large, hotels have a hard time getting around being inspected. So there is no need for the average consumer to spend the time to do the research so they can say "yep, government regulators are doing a good job!"

As with most regulations, it drives up the cost a bit for the end user, but it's worthwhile - and when done properly, invisible to the consumer.

Because they don't need to, because it's mandatory for hotels.

I can understand hotels having a legitimate objection to the differential regulation that gives Airbnb hosts a cost advantage, but there are good reasons for exempting (some) hosts: generally, once you run a business at scale, there's a disconnect that leads to cutting corners with safety, which is what prompts these regulations.

If a hotel room is just one of a thousand properties (the thinking goes) then the owner might be too casual about safety issues -- hence regs to force them to care. But if it's a room in the owner's very own house, there is no such "incentive incompatibility": a fire is much more than just a financial loss for them, so -- if anything -- they're overcautious! Thus, it's reasonable to exempt the renting out of one's primary residence from these additional safety regs.

With that said, your general point still stands: many of these hosts are "superhosts" who rent 3+ properties, which does (from the perspective of regulatory concerns) look like a hotel business and which therefore does merit similar regulation.

Who defines usual?

Who else has keys to the flat? Are you sure your electrical is up to code? How about plumbing, heating/cooling? Do you have a CO detector?

Is your flat in compliance with local regulations for disabled persons? Or is the service you're selling only for certain kinds of people?

Why wouldn't it be if the parent is currently living in it? Are the regulations for short-term and long-term rentals different?

Yes, there are in fact less (or no) disability access requirements for a private residence. The typical home, if used as a hotel, would not be in compliance with access requirements imposed on hotels. This is one way that the deck is stacked against hotels.

I don't understand this comment or why GP is being downvoted. No, my own home is very wheelchair unfriendly because I am not in a wheelchair.

Is the web service you build accessible by blind and deaf people? Or is the web service you're selling only for "certain kinds of people"

So the hotel lobby is taking away my choices.. to keep me safe? Now that's some seriously good hospitality. The hotel lobby is like the paternal figure I've always wanted.

We are talking about safety here.

Safety regulations don't typically form out if nowhere. You grew up in a world where the previous generations lobbied for safety regulations in response to an actual lack of safety. It's like the new anti vaccinations movement- there's a whole generation who grew up not watching children be maimed and killed by what's now vaccine preventable infectious diseases so now suddenly vaccinations are poison. Absolutely no frame of reference.

In terms of safety hotel lobby is pissed because they have to follow regulations and pay associated taxes whereas AirBnB isn't. The hotel lobby certainly would be in favor of loosening safety regulations in general as compliance will certainly cut into their bottom line at least a little.

Great observation. Fire inspectors perform an entirely different inspection on commercial property than that of a SFR or even multi family residence. There is a reason and it was paid in blood.

You can pretend the conversation is about safety but there's more to it than that. There are legitimate safety regulations, which could be monitored with a $100 random annual inspection. And then there are the actual regulations which are usually just encoding the business practices of the incumbent into law so that other companies with other advantages are impossible to make legal, regardless of safety.

If it were actually about safety, the "hotel commission" would try to make it as easy and as cheap as possible to get inspected. The fact that they don't suggests it's more about gatekeeping.

Sure, all regulations look like regulatory red tape strangulating the free market.

Until you look at actual, individual, regulations–which tend to be codified common sense.

Maybe on a per rule basis they tend to be common sense. But if even one rule out of 100 is an unnecessary encoding of business model, then requiring a permit is a de facto monopoly granted to the incumbents.

So even if most rules are common sense, that doesn't change the fact that most permit requirements are predatory business tactics.

I want to feed and house the homeless in my neighborhood but it's illegal due to "safety" concerns. Apparently them sleeping on the street and shitting in the bushes is safer than me building them a tiny house with a composting toilet and a wash basin.

> You grew up in a world where the previous generations lobbied for safety regulations in response to an actual lack of safety

Sure hope you're not talking about the tobacco lobby. Tell me which company paid for what safety regulation. I'd like to applaud these upstanding corporate citizens.

> The hotel lobby certainly would be in favor of loosening safety regulations in general as compliance will certainly cut into their bottom line at least a little.

I'm pretty sure they would be in favor of tightening regulations as much as possible, as long as those regulations are draconically enforced. The incumbents can comply with anything and pass the buck to the customer while any potential competitor cannot enter the market because the upfront regulatory cost is so immense.

If the legislation actually tests the safety, instead of a blanket ban, then I can see your point. Because many motels I've stayed at are unsafe. On multiple occasions I've gotten a key card to my room without showing ID (having forgotten it in the room).

> You can't sell an unsafe car.

I'd like to address this. Not everyone can afford a new car complete with mandatory TPMS, side airbags, and traction control. When we as a society decide to put requirements on new cars, we price some marginal consumers out of a new car and into a less-safe used car.

As the price of new cars increases, so to does the price of those used cars. So there again, we're pushing less well off consumers into cars that aren't as safe.

Personally, I think manufacturers should have the ability to sell any car they want. At the same time, they should be required to put a notice on the window sticker that says "We used the value of $X to drive the design of our safety features" (or something like that). If you want an ultra-safe car, you look for one that has $1,000,000. But people knowingly buy motorcycles and Corvettes, so obviously not everyone has the same tolerance for risk.

Car safety isn't just about the people driving them. Many car safety features like anti-lock breaks, traction control, and backup cameras are just as helpful for everyone outside of the car as they are for people inside the card.

Forcing unsafe cars out of the market through attrition has benefits for everyone else.

Unsafe cars are also raise the death raise inside and outside of the car and raises health costs that are borne by all members of society. People should not be allowed to drive unsafe cars.

They're not in New York state - your car must pass an annual safety inspection. IIRC when I lived in Ohio they had a similar inspection regime.

And you shouldn't apply car safety rules to motorcycles or bicycles.

Airbnb isn't a hotel. It should have to live by "the rules", but those rules should be tailored to it's industry not a tangentially related industry threatened by its existence.

In this case, Airbnb is a motorcycle with 4 wheels, a roof and windows. While technically still running a motorcycle engine, the perception it is actively courting among its users is that of a car.

So in once camp, people are saying it should be regulated for what it feels like: a car. In the other camp, people are saying that it should be regulated for what it's made of: a motorcycle. There are good (and bad) arguments for both sides.

If you like staying in hotels, wouldn't it be better if the hotel industry failed to lobby against AirBnB? That would mean cheaper rooms for you!

After staying in AirBnB, I realized why I have to pay more in hotels. In hotels, we take things like security,clean beds,heating,cooling, a 24 hour reception etc for granted. But in AirBnB I have to waste my time behind all those things rather than enjoy my vacation or fulfill my purpose of the visit.

> And No, I dont want to read hundreds of reviews before I make my decision. I am back to hotel stays. I hope their lobbying finds success.

The great thing about the free market is you get the choice. You don't have to pass a law to force everybody to also do as you choose.

There are definitely problems with some AirBNBs. Renting out an apartment as if it was a hotel room should not be allowed. However. that should be a contract issue between tenant/landlord or owner/HOA, and also a local zoning issue.

That said, there are also times that AirBNBs are very worthwhile. I've stayed in homes in the desert, far away from anything else. I've stayed in non-touristy neighborhoods in Venice, Stockholm, and Havana, that let me get away from the common areas and see local life.

Hotels definitely have its pros and cons, as do AirBNBs, but there should not be federal regulation outright banning it.

>The great thing about the free market is you get the choice. You don't have to pass a law to force everybody to also do as you choose.

Not necessarily: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons

That paper is about information asymmetry. If you know you're getting a room in someone's apartment, there is still no reason to prohibit informed customers from doing that.

And the externalities visited upon everyone else around the apartment renter?

They may or may not exist depending on the location, the layout of the building, the particular renter, the behavior of the homeowner, and probably about a thousand other variables that are impossible to even identify.

You know you're getting a room, but you don't know if the room or experience will be plagued with trouble. Much the same as the "lemon car" problem--not all cars or rooms at "market price" are equal.

You know that the average quality is lower than a hotel, with reviews on top of that. And if you don't want to risk a lemon then you can still stay in a hotel.

You have hotels either way and you clearly can't save the market for not-hotel rooms by prohibiting it entirely. Where is the harm in allowing someone to knowingly take a risk in exchange for a discount?

Having traveled enough to know that not all hotel rooms are created equally, I don't even know how that's a concern.

I've stayed in hotels that were frequented by prostitutes (not a value judgement, but it does change the experience of the stay considerably), hotels with drug dealers in the parking lot, etc. Even going with a big brand, I've had extremely disappointing experiences.

Most recently, I stayed at the Hyatt Regency in Louisville, which is a highrise hotel in which all the rooms are located around a central lobby. This is fine, assuming there aren't people screaming in the lobby, but surprise, there were literally people screaming in the lobby for long periods in each of the two nights we stayed there, and repeated calls to the front desk didn't resolve the situation.

We'd planned a longer stay, but ended up relocating after the second night of interrupted sleep, and somewhat ironically, ended up in a super quaint AirBNB that was a fraction of the price.

Yes, AirBNB can be a bit of a crapshoot, but that isn't a problem that's unique to AirBNB.

For a non-airbnb example of this, look at Ireland: they have minimal regulations/barriers to entry for starting a (real) B&B, and the result is that you can get great accommodations all over this heavily-touristed island for €35-55/night. Truly one of the great deals in European travel.

Similar in the UK, the regulations for B&Bs and guesthouses are pretty minimal compared to a hotel. The biggest issue people run into in getting licensed is that often some changes are needed to meet the fire code for overnight accommodations. Usually not hard to fix, but may involve things like installing fire doors at the top and bottom of stairwells, and installing lockable fire doors on any closets that are located beneath stairs.

I rented an entire 3br/2 ba apartment in Dublin for a week for $700, circa 2007. We had 15 people in there.

On the first night there a child cat burgled one of our wallets. He scaled the side of the building and came in through an open window. We caught him in the act, but he was too quick and scampered out the way he came. When we complained to the host (the pharmacy downstairs, really) they asked if we wanted a NEW apt in a different building or another apartment in that one (basically two apts for a week for the price of two nights in a hotel)

Now when people talk about Air B&B, I think of courier dentistry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX_GfxGIWQs&t=1s

> child cat Do you mean a kitten or did you mean "child that"? I can't stop laughing, despite your loss of wallet.

I had the same reaction. Then realized he meant a pint-sized cat burglar scaled the wall, snuck through a window, and lifted a wallet. To me this is extreme considering it would be far easier to be a pickpocket or scam artist.

I think they meant that a child (noun) cat-burgled (verb). https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cat_burglar

great accommodations all over this heavily-touristed island for €35-55/night.

Used to be about half that pre-Euro!

Dude, pretty much everything, everywhere "used to be about half that" 15 years ago, regardless of currency...

I don't know about Ireland, but in Spain it was terrible in many sectors. An euro is 166.386 pesetas. Guess what happened.

> also a local zoning issue

Isn't AirBnb a party to that issue?

If AirBnb stuck to it's early role as way for people to rent rooms in homes or vacation homes, it would be an amazing service. By seeking to "disrupt" the hotel industry, they kind of poisoned the well.

People are talking a lot about safety regulations, as in, "well, if you're willing to take the risk of sleeping in someone's house, you should be able to," but what gets me is that safety's just one of the things hotel regulations ensure.

Another is access for the disabled. I've stayed in a few AirBNBs that would absolutely have been off-limits to someone in a wheelchair, but the number of times I've stayed in a hotel that wasn't disability-accessible? Zero.

Yeah, choice is great when you're talking about saving some bucks and taking on the risk of sleeping in an essentially-unlicensed hotel, but what about the people for whom the regulations guarantee them access to commerce or travel at all?

Like others have said, regulations develop out of a reaction to a lousy status quo. I think it'd be a shitty world to live in where people with disabilities were being shut out again, to the extent they used to be.

(Am I saying that, if you're going to let your room commercially, you should make it ADA-compliant? Maybe so. It's at least worth thinking about, instead of saying, by default, screw those folks in wheelchairs.)

ADA compliance is a fair point, but at the same time, I've lived in completely legal to rent apartments in NYC that were absolutely not wheelchair accessible.

All new buildings in NYC must have elevators/general wheel chair accessibility, but the old buildings are still there, and still being used.

Further, there are numerous AirBnB rentals that existed as licensed rental properties long before AirBnB came around that are most certainly not wheelchair accessible.

I think it would at least be fair for AirBnB to require listings that are/are not wheelchair accessible to say so on their listings. Beyond that I don't think it's fair to require owners of those properties to invest a large sum of money to make it accessible.

Oh, absolutely, I don't think the answer is black and white; neither "any exchange of housing for money must be fully ADA-compliant"-- nor "raising the question of ADA compliance is a burdensome regulation that should be ignored".

For me, the question that's worth asking is, how do we ensure, as new ways of doing old things develop, that the people who've been shut out in the past (i.e. the people that the ADA protects) aren't just getting shut out again?

People in wheelchairs, that's a thing. The ADA is the way that, up til now, we've set up to enforce that businesses must accommodate them. Stuff like AirBNB and Uber is bringing an absolute ton of new individuals, essentially doing business, who've simply never had to think about making business accessible to people with disabilities.

Maybe there's a new regulatory framework that needs to develop? Maybe there should be a burden on the companies like AirBNB and Uber to ensure that, wherever they operate, some percentage of their service offering is wheelchair-accessible? (Even if they're buying property or hiring drivers directly to satisfy that requirement?) I don't know, just brainstorming at this point, I guess.

It would cost those businesses more, of course, but I ask myself which world I'd rather live in--one in which my two wheelchair-bound friends could actually use AirBNB wherever they went, or one in which I said "hey, sucks you're locked out of that experience, but free market, yolo"?

I'm really not sure how best to handle it. Uber has definitely gotten some grief for their total inability to be accessible to people in wheelchairs in NYC, when there are yellow cabs that are, but that criticism has largely fallen by the wayside.

That cabin I rented with some friends in bumblefuck an hour outside of Boulder, CO - should they be required to install an elevator when the car we drove could just barely even get us there (even in the summer time)?

100% accessibility seems impossible (barring significant improvements in wheelchairs, which are definitely coming), but where exactly is the line?

I don't really know the answer. I think in general if you're making something new - you should make it as accessible as is reasonably feasible, but how much should we require to be "backported"?

The issue in my mind is that AirBNB actively thwarts attempts by landlords, HOAs, and zoning officials to enforce their contracts. If it was all above-board, I'd have no issues. Truly. But frankly, if AirBNB was compliant with leases, HOAs, and zoning, they'd be out of business. And they know it.

People talk a lot about the free market, but I see a lot of externalities at play here. Am I as a landlord to be held responsible for the damage to my units caused by somebody running a gypsy hotel, in explicit violation of their lease, paying me not one extra penny? Are their neighbors obligated to deal with a bunch of spring breakers partying through the wall, also for free?

This whole thing smells like a bunch of valley billionaires arguing that they should be above the law so they can make their IPO valuation come out right.

Properties have been sublet and let on the black markets forever. airbnb is not changing much of that, only making it more visible.

Most airbnb landlords will quickly realize that it takes a huge amount of work to welcome guest for short stays, then they'll realize that they might loose a lot of money if not filled all the time.

> airbnb is not changing much of that, only making it more visible.

I think it is grossly inflating the scale at which it is now possible.

Airbnb is a drop in the ocean, I guarantee you.

Oh for sure. I've known plenty of people who've done relatively brief (~ 2mo) sublets completely against leases etc (of course NYC is still a bit of a Wild West as far as housing is concerned, particularly at the more affordable end of the rental market).

My point was that AirBnB has vastly inflated the potential scale of revolving door short black market sublets (the loud, drunken vacationers that seem to be the source of most disgruntlement/anti AirBnB mentality here in the HN comments) much more than, say, craigslist.

The media are vocals about a few big cities on a few topics. It brings a lot of readers. Nothing special, it's always been the wild west over there.

AirBnb is already self regulating quickly: You rent a property, the guests damage it, you're not renting it on airbnb again for the next decade.

Or you simply realize that it's not sustainable. Revolving door short sublets are, in fact, usually not sustainable.

Fair point - again dependent on the property/neighborhood. I stayed in an AirBnB in Denver that was one of three cookie cutter buildings next to each other each on about 1/4 acre, built sometime in the last 5-10 years, all clearly used exclusively as short term rentals (as best I could tell).

Great AirBnB experience, literally no complaints, and no neighbors close enough to give us the stink eye (admittedly we were staying in the one that was in the middle of the three on that street). Mind you we were generally respectful and there for a very short time, not enough to really piss anyone off.

That seems sustainable to me, whether or not it's legal.

People AirBnB'ing their apartment in my current building (which has a 24 hour doorman/woman/person who pretty much knows everyone who lives there? obviously that shit wouldn't fly for long, never mind that it's flagrantly against the lease we all signed, there's no way to fly under the radar).

I meant that it's not sustainable because it takes a lot of work to welcome the guests, clean the flat and sheets all the time. It gets to a full time job really quickly if you have a few flat, and they better be in the same building.

Also, the price is expensive for guests... but as host, AirBnb takes 20-30% commission and you don't get paid for empty times. There are lots of emptiness if you do short rents.

I find the notion of business "self regulating" to be no more or less absurd for AirBnb than I would an oil or coal company. Of course I understand why they'd make the argument, I just can't fathom who would believe them here in the 21st century.

> The great thing about the free market is you get the choice.

Have you ever looked at the AirBNB rating system? It's a disaster. Five stars or get abuse. Without a trustable rating system here you won't get a free market.

I've stayed in an AirBnB maybe a dozen times and always had some problem or other that I've been expected just to accept - because it's AirBnB and not an hotel?

I've stayed in lots more hotels and experienced fewer problems. The times I've had resulted in either a sincere apology or full refund (the last time for the 2 days stay rather than the one night I complained about).

I can see the advantage of AirBnB for a group of people who are willing to compromise in return for a cost saving but not much else.

You make it sound like cost saving is a throwaway matter, an afterthought. I'm a grad student. Before Airbnb, I could only stay in hostels, which are worse than both hotels and airbnbs. Airbnb is awesome if I don't want to spend my holidays staying woken up by idiotic frat boys.

Some friends here are complaining that Airbnb apartments in their block mean that they are getting woken up by frat boy parties.

Haha, and so the cycle continues. Down with frat boys!

A hotel is also less authentic. I stayed in AirBnB and hotels both when traveling through Europe and the AirBnB gives you a bit more local flavor vs hotels, which tend to be very standardized. I also was traveling with kids and AirBnB allows you to rent out an entire apartment for the price of a single hotel room. Much better. Hotels should lower their prices and increase their options and then maybe they would compete? Instead of anti-competitive legislation...

>> I dont want to deal with problems when I stay somewhere for pleasure or business

This is why I've stopped using AirBnB. I had used it for multiple business trips and personal stays, and in only 2 of the places I've stayed has the host had any sense of professionalism. One slept in and wasn't up at the time they said breakfast was served. I eventually left before they woke up. Another canceled at the last minute because they were traveling. Too late for me to alter my other travel plans, so my only option was to take an expensive hotel room I wouldn't have booked otherwise, or miss that part of my planned vacation. Another had family staying and they clearly weren't equipped for all the guests.

The problem with AirBnB is it's usually additional, passive income. It initially feels like this glorious free market, but there's not enough skin in the game for them. If they want to blow you off at the last minute you just have to with an expensive, last-minute back up plan. And they just forfeit some income they weren't really counting on anyway. I've been jerked around by hotels too, but not nearly as often.

I've never stayed at an AirBnB but this is the exact issue I have with using Uber - the quality is so incredibly inconsistent. They seem to encourage any random yahoo to sign up and start driving with minimal (no?) training.

Curious what area you've used it in? I've only used it in San Francisco / San Jose and once or twice in other cities, and have actually had reliable experiences. The last couple times the vehicle quality was way lower than before, though.

I travel a lot so pretty much everywhere along the east coast. I haven't been to the west coast since Uber has existed. Dont get me wrong, I've had great service with Uber as well but it's totally hit or miss.

I still use it though because it is much more reliable than a cab most places and usually cheaper and I don't have to worry about payment.

Most of the Uber/Lyft drivers I've been picked up by are recent immigrants. The language barrier isn't a big deal but they blindly follow the directions on whatever driving app they are using (Google, Apple, Waze) and have no local knowledge. There are a few roads near me that are closed for construction or oneway only. So I've gotten into the habit of looking over their shoulder and interjecting where they should actually turn rather than what the app tells them.

> This is why I've stopped using AirBnB.

> It initially feels like this glorious free market, but ...

Based on the number of posts of former AirBnB users, sounds like the free market is working.

Maybe the failure here is in Airbnb's marketing of their services to the wrong crowd.

Yeah the larger market is working, the specific market that is the AirBnB community kinda sucks in that sellers have disproportionate power.

I felt like I was the ideal AirBnB user. I have low standards for where I sleep and can usually be flexible schedule-wise, and I also value low prices over most other factors. But I just can't afford last minute cancellations and people not living up to the expectations they set themselves. I'm pretty sure you won't find many people who are more open to what AirBnB could be than that...

Although I do not read hundred of reviews per stay I'm very picky and only choose the best.. this way I have stayed in multiple countries and have had very few issues with Airbnb.

To be fair with Hotels you also have to do your work and read the reviews.

Staying in AirBnB I don't feel safe at all and 80% of the AirBnB's I stayed had one problem or the other.

This is almost the direct opposite of my own experience.

Experience 1:

Got an AirBnB in Montreal Canada in December 2016. The photos were great. The owner was quick to respond. So I booked it and reached the place.

Bummer 1: No cable. ( But in the listing it was there) Bummer 2: No safety. The owner had converted an apartment into two, separated by a thin wall. The wall had come off and he had the gypsum wall leaning and cautioned me not to touch it.

Since it was for 2 days and in the middle of a heavy snowfall, I let it pass. Fast forward some hours, a couple of people checked into the other half of the apartment, started playing loud music, shouting and smoking. The smoke started coming into my half of the place because the wall was not really sealed.

Experience 2:

Rented a place which had a profile photo of a family. I thought great ! When I checked in, I felt it was some sort of "setup" just for the purpose of renting it out for AirBnB, I asked the owner where she lived. She said "nearby". I felt something fishy as there was no family ! The reviews even said there was a family (fake reviews ? ).

So after the owner left, I googled the address and to my surprise, I found that the address is under a rental agency. Next I found that the door lock is not working and internet is less than the speeds of dial up. I left the next day and disputed it on AirBnB.

AirBnB said, "Its legal for rental agencies to list on AirBnB". ( what was the photo of that family then ? ) Since AirBnB was not willing to refund and gave me a 25$ coupon, I disputed with AMEX and got all my money back.

That was my last & final stay using AirBnB. Deleted my AirBnB account after this incident.

For two crazy seconds I thought this would involve figuring out how to better compete in the marketplace.

With innovation and more pricing options that would ultimately result in better overall experience and more viable choices for everyone? You're insane.

This article reads just like the combustion vehicle/car dealership articles... "It's not fair what Tesla is doing! We need the government to step in and secure our position in the market."

The younger generation is not buying it and it is a huge turnoff. I've been using AirBnB for some time and have never had a serious issue. It has allowed me to sacrifice some of the things you get with a hotel for typically a lower costs and the opportunity to stay in many places that are not considered a "tourist" area, which is my favorite part.

There are many places a typical hotel chain can innovate and actually offer very similar things to AirBnB. They can identify the target market of AirBnB, which is typically either the younger traveler or people who like to explore the cities in different areas than where hotels are. Hotel chains can build little annexes, maybe similar to a hostel, inside neighborhoods, where they can have 4-5 rooms and use the main hotel as the check in/out, other amenities. And at that level they can compete with AirBnB very well.

As far as the hotel tax, I can't say every city requires it, but almost all the AirBnBs' I've stayed at recently has a city hotel tax. So they are doing well working with local governments. So to the hotel chains...good luck fighting that, most cities have already worked it out.

At the end of the day, AirBnB is just a market place that connects private citizens with each other. One citizen is letting another use their place for a price. That's it. Same as Uber... how do you ban a person from giving somebody else a ride. It's not the governments jurisdiction. Stay Out.

Oh, don't start with that "it's just a guy helping out another guy" nonsense. Airbnb is a gigantic business, and the 'hosts' are also businesses, and have to accept regulation as such. Of course it is the governments' jurisdiction to regulate the safety, sanitation, and other relevant laws that relate to paid lodging no matter who the person is offering said paid lodging.

Airbnb rentals (in the overwhelming majority of cases) aren't me sharing my couch with my best friend while he's in town, this is me letting a stranger come into my house and stay here for money. Acting like those are equivalent situations diminishes your argument.

>Airbnb is a gigantic business,

Right.

>and the 'hosts' are also businesses

Wrong. The hosts may or may not be a business, depending on their circumstances and motivations. A host could be someone leasing out their rental, or could be someone just renting out an extra room for some side cash. Until you have data to suggest otherwise, please refrain from damning everyone in the second category as belonging to the first category.

If you're accepting money from someone in exchange for a good (in this case, housing), you are a business.

An interesting definition. One that I'm glad doesn't apply to the random junk I sell on eBay and Craigslist.

In fact it does! The IRS just doesn't bother to go after you for it, because it's not worth the effort.

No, the IRS doesn't bother to go after me for it because generally, those items are being sold at a loss.

This is where you and I will never come to an agreement:

You quickly jump to the government to regulate and essentially run every aspect of your life and the decisions you make.

I would argue that there is no place what-so-ever for government regulation in the market that AirBnB hosts' participate in. It is self regulating. If AirBnB is deceptive or unfair in their marketplace of listings, people will stop using it. If AirBnB is unfair to hosts, hosts will stop renting their place on AirBnB. If a place is not safe/sanitary/etc., and AirBnB still allows it to be listed, people will have a bad AirBnB experience and stop using AirBnB and/or that renter. AirBnB has the motivation to make all hosts follow a certain level of expectation to avoid the above. Otherwise AirBnB will go out of business. And with places that violate building regulations/etc., the city is already responsible for that, whether the host lives there themselves or rents it out.

And yes, it is as simple as a PRIVATE citizen renting out their location to another PRIVATE citizen. The fact that it is not my buddy sleeping on the couch but some stranger is up to the HOST. They have the freedom to choose if they want to rent their place out on the market place to a stranger or not. That is what is so great about a free market, it is NOT up to you or the GOVERNMENT. Same as any person has the choice to stay at an AirBnB or a hotel, or anything else they find...hell..go camping. The point here is that it is NOT the governments job to step in and not allow a choice that somebody is WILLING to make. Just because you may find AirBnB unfitting does not make it wrong and should not be illegal. Hotels have no business lobbying to ban this practice and it's indicative of them that they are not willing to even once sit down and think, how can we better serve and compete against the target market of AirBnB. It's pretty damn simple. I even listed above something they could look at. Other commentators have made the same point and other things the hotel industry could do. But no... what do they do... turn to the government. Government regulation is NOT the solution here. It is pretty sickening that so many people turn to government to regulate something at the first sign of something not being perfect.

I am legitimately curious, have you ever walked into a hotel room and it was disgusting? Did you immediately leave and complain to the hotel manager? Did you contact the city the hotel was in and tell them the hotel was not clean? Did you tell the city they should make more regulations on how a hotel should be?

OR, if you happen to go to a hotel that was not clean, or anything else that was not up to your standards of what a hotel should be. Did you stay there still? Did you ever come back to that hotel on another trip.

My point is YOU made a decision what to do based on what you were willing to pay. That is called a free market. Not a government regulates everything market. Other people may have been willing to stay in the hotel above at a given price.

> If a place is not safe/sanitary/etc., and AirBnB still allows it to be listed, people will have a bad AirBnB experience and stop using AirBnB and/or that renter.

Well that's one way to regulate a market. But those are soft regulations. You do those things because the market demands it.

There are not so soft regulations, these are done because the market wouldn't know enough about them to demand it. Like making sure the fire suppression system is actually installed, inspected, and functional. The fire exits aren't locked the wrong way. I assume you test each smoke detector in your rental before handing over money?

While you have a problem with regulations some of them don't bother me. I live near the beach. 50 years ago I wouldn't be allowed to set foot on it because of my skin. It seems silly now but the gov't came in with teeth and said, "hey what you are doing isn't right." The market was rewarding these hotels for being racist shitheels. Gov't regulation put a bullet in it.

>"Same as Uber... how do you ban a person from giving somebody else a ride"

I have never seen anyone "banned" from giving another person a ride. I do see restrictions on using your vehicles for commercial transport, and some have nothing to do with the government. Ask your insurance company how they feel about you running a taxi service on your personal liability policy.

Before I even opened the article I knew it was going to be a legislative rather than customer-focused approach.

God forbid hotels recognize their inherent strengths and AirBnB's weaknesses and cater their services/marketing to that end.

Hotels have lots of advantages. Often better location: downtown. A 24-hour desk. You can ask for info. Get deliveries. They can give you extra soap if you run out... without emailing some guy. Ask them to get you a taxi (yes I know about Uber), etc.

But those advantages don't seem to be of interest to some segment of customers. So, there's clearly some issue with competition.

But some portion of that is the cost of compliance with safety, which AirBNB skips.

There's no reason we shouldn't require things that are effectively hotel rooms to comply with hotel safety regulations.

If AirBNB can only operate by violating the law, why should we support their business model?

Actually, there is plenty of reason they shouldn't have to abide by the same regulations.

We have the rules we have for hotels because they're typically large buildings with many rooms (often smaller than even the minimum dwelling size for private apartments) and that density presents significant safety hazards to many people should anything happen, not just you. You being in a 100sf room on the 11th floor makes it very hard to not have you die if there's a fire, especially when there's hundreds of you to evacuate.

There's no reason that someone say...renting out a detached single story house should need anything more than a working smoke/CO detector.

Exactly. The concern about lack of safety is paranoia at best. If the door locks, the smoke alarm is on, and power outlets not hanging from the wall, appliances in working order etc, then there's not much else to worry about.

For my recent Airbnb stay I couldn't fault it. Was more than I expected and great value.

I'm tired of over-priced hotels with boring rooms and mandatory daily room service. I want the option of not having my bed made and towels replaced every day. Stay out of my room until I check out!

Most have "Do Not Disturb" / "Do Not Service" signs you can hang from the door to indicate that you're not interested in your room service being performed; often makes housekeeping's life that much easier.

A number of hotel chains will actually give you points if you decline cleaning these days--which I usually do.

And there are also "serviced apartments" that only clean once a week.

The savings aren't big but I do take advantage of tem.

I know it's going to be controversial but I learned this the hard way. I don't travel a lot but just did a Europe tour over 4 Airbnbs with a friend.

All four had some key distribution problem that required talking to the host, who was not always reachable. (Oh, you just enter this code ... nope, doesn't work.) They also usually only have one spare set of keys so if we wanted to return at different times, no luck. One host wanted the late check-in fee paid in cash and wouldn't issue a receipt for it, even a PM/text with "yeah, got your $X late fee". (reported)

"the hotel cartel is intent on short-sheeting the middle class so they can keep price-gouging consumers,"

Well... maybe. After staying in about 10 airbnbs total, I'd generally prefer a hotel room.

* Hotels are generally clean. I still always check them before I get into them, but I've yet to find a hotel with "gross" sheets. I don't worry much about the showers either

* Hotels have parking! This is nice for the driver in me

* Hotels are safe. The door locks and general consensus that cameras are not good help me sleep better

* Hotels are generally somewhat flexible with room changes if they have availability

That all said, you're going to have to pay >$100/night to get that level of service from a hotel but that works for me

It's really what you pay for.

1) Prosecute and inform local law enforcement. If you have a rental property exclusively used for Airbnb, it's likely illegal.

Adam ruins everything: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGLe0Wgfbyk

My question to the HN community is, when does AirBnB cross into the out of favor status that a disruptive service like Uber has? If not any similar.

While regulation is nice there are many cases where it serves no purpose other than to prevent competition.

With regards to AirBnb a friend who rents home says its not common for contracts to forbid AirBnb and similar services and he does check sites to see if tenants are violating the rule.

The SF ad campaign was Uber-levels of gratuitously insensitive and vindicative: http://www.inc.com/tess-townsend/airbnb-responds-to-backlash...

By the looks of the comments, I would say ABB is already on its way out of favor. As a Firefighter, I will not stay in an ABB... nope.

Can you elaborate?

Minimal maintenance, no inspections on safety equipment, and the owner isn't there to notice strange smells (Ozone (electrical problems), Gas, chemical leakage, mold, etc), no compliance with local code.

I think they (Airbnb) have a great concept and an important service, especially in areas underserved by hotels, or areas with little competition to drive prices down.

However, their execution from the beginning has been to profit from illegal activity.

Ever been in an Uber and experience an injury during a car wreck? Or how about if the driver or another passenger has a warrant for their arrest? These nightmare scenarios are the dark side of the companies and ruin good people's lives.

AirBNB seems to be combating itself just as much, frankly.

Take this idea that an AirBNB host can set pretty much any service/cleaning fee, which is not factored in to search-by-price and not even displayed until you click a property. This basically makes the entire concept of a “price” meaningless in search results, and I quickly grew tired of having to click into every single property just to figure out the “real” price before returning to the search results page.

And price is far from the only way that a property can be misleading.

I don’t think the hotel industry has much to worry about.

That one baffles me. It clearly incentivizes hosts to get you to click with a misleading low price, damaging the AirBnB experience, without giving AirBnB an edge over anyone else. (The results aren't appearing alongside normal hotels.)

EBAY had to take action against sellers who were increasing shipping costs to set a minimum value on their items. Originally I don't think any of the shipping cost was factored into the fees paid to EBAY.

So I would hope that AirBnb does something similar to include presenting the full cost of rental at all times. There should be no fees other than those AirBnb specifies.

That's what this situation reminded me of too. eBay sellers will say a $12 item is 1.99 plus a shipping cost inflated by $10, which makes the price look cheap in search, and also avoids fees on eBay and PayPal.

In my experience, I've found most AirBnB hosts' pricing on other fees has been reasonable.

Other services out there though, like HomeAway, are much more deceptive. I've had to actually email the hosts on HomeAway to get the full price, which turned out to be double what the stated cost was.

I recently booked on airbnb in SF for a few days. The actual nightly price I paid was 40% higher than the list price (service fee, airbnb fee, sf occupancy taxes) which was towards the top of my price range filter. I still booked, so I guess it worked in favor of airbnb his time. But left a stale taste for future endeavors.

That has not been my experience. Per-person and cleaning fees are incorporated into the grid listings. AirBNB and Local taxes are not, but they are a regular percentage of the price, they apply to all listings, and not including them in the displayed price when comparing properties is standard in the industry.

"is standard in the industry."

Airbnb doesn't seem to follow the industry so it sounds to me like there is a deeper reasoning

I've stayed at AirBNBs before but I guess they're previously always been booked by someone else, because when I tried to find a condo in Whistler a few months ago, I ran into the same problem.

AirBNB had some nice UI elements, made it easy to visualize property locations relative to each other, etc, but in the end VRBO just worked out a lot better and seemed less sketchy.

I don't get AirBnB at all. The concept is just downright creepy and has always been to me. It feels like you're flipping a coin when staying somewhere with respect to neighbours, cleanliness, and the area.

I much rather pay for a hotel where everything is 100% taken care of, and usually the prices are on par with AirBnB. There's no mental overhead with hotels. If it worked like Uber where the slightest hiccup gives you a full refund, then sure I'd put up with the hassle.

Agreed. I don't use airbnb anymore like i don't use United. While I haven't been beaten, Airbnb does very little to ensure a good experience. It's as safe and trust worthy as a Craigslist listing.

Their customer service is abysmal and will not refund bad experiences. I see Airbnb as having a high churn rate business.

Airbnb's and any other types of vacation rentals are not for everyone. There are many different types of properties that you can filter for and you may want to focus on listings that are listed by "Superhosts" who have shown a consistent record of high quality service and ratings.

In terms of being as trustworthy as Craigslist, the main advantage is that hosts have to go through verification just like guests and they have bank accounts linked and many hosts have reviews from previous guests which gives you more confident of how good of a host they are.

Refunds are available if the listing is not as described or there's any personal safety or cleanliness issues. What was your experience that you felt warranted a refund?

AirBnb is not great with refunds.

My experience: rented a room in South San Jose for a week. After coming back from dinner, the apartment building was surrounded by police and I wasnt able to get back in so I had to get a hotel instead. After going through support, I ended up getting $150 in credits on a $600+ stay.

I still use airbnb often as I'm fairly risk tolerant. I'd say it's about 1 out of 10 times I end up in an unlivable place that I have to leave (losing my booking money).

Agreed, not for everyone.

usually the prices are on par with AirBnB

This varies a lot from city to city. In Austin, AirBNB easily wins (last time I checked) on location and niceness for the price. Hotel prices are exorbitant. Recently I traveled to Houston, though, and was shocked to find that hotels were price-competitive with AirBNB. My girlfriend and I expected to rent an AirBNB but ended up staying in a pretty nice hotel for less than $150 a night. AirBNB prices in Houston were similar to Austin with much less selection and not the greatest locations, so the convenience and predictability of a hotel won out. (Friends staying in Austin have had almost all positive AirBNB experiences, but there have been a couple of unexpectedly poor experiences as well.)

I think that as with ride-sharing versus taxis, the greatest disruption happens in cities where the traditional services are very poor or very expensive. Houston has plenty of cheap hotels and seems like it would be fine without AirBNB. If I lived in New York City and was used to hailing cabs, I might never have tried Uber. In Austin with our unforgivably shitty taxi service, and now our exorbitant hotel prices, AirBNB and ride-sharing services are fundamentally new, different, and better than the traditional offerings.

I wouldn't say you're flipping a coin - if you only stay at 5-star rated places with many reviewers, your odds are definitely better than 50/50 on having a terrible/great experience. Even without reading reviews - just using the heuristic "only book five star average from over 15 people" has gotten me a 18 out of 20 or so fantastic experiences (the two being key problems, or cleanliness, and unless I'm paying $150+ a night in a hotel, my batting average on that has been about the same).

I will agree with all the other posters that the consistency and reliability of your average AirBnB is definitely less than that of a hotel, but I find the advantages to more than makeup for it.

The hotel industry has been adding "resort fees", parking fees, enhanced wi-fi fees and other charges that also don't appear in search results.

Hotel parking fees are the worst. Very sneaky. Hidden from view, sometimes it says in the list "secure parking - yes (fees apply)" but doesn't say the fee. That means it's a per day charge and a rip-off.

I would prefer the perfect hotel experience, but airbnb is a better product (at any price) than almost all hotels. If the hotel strategy to fight airbnb rests on pushing regulators to screw consumers, it's unlikely they'll improve their product.

(Maybe some new entrant can make something better than airbnb or legacy hotels, though.)

Could you expand on why? I normally use Airbnb for areas without many hotels or for longer stays. I generally find hotels more convenient for short stays because it's predictable.

From my personal experience, Airbnb's tend to be a minimum of 15-20% cheaper than 3 star hotel prices. Often times those Airbnb's will offer a 5 star experience.

I enjoy hotels, and the convenience, but I prefer nice Airbnb's for the following reasons:

1) full kitchen 2) more privacy 3) much cheaper 4) often times helped by host 5) get a taste of actually living in a neighborhood at your destination

I want a hotel with 100/100+ symmetric high-quality Internet, and ideally, set up with a desk, good chair, large monitor on the desk, and keyboard/mouse.

24h checkin, and ideally essentially automated checkin -- if I'm a frequent guest, I should be able to have a key sent to my phone (or have an NFC token I carry added to the door's ACL) for the duration of my stay, ideally without dealing with humans. SPG usually takes me about 2 minutes to check in within the US, or 3-5 internationally; I'd like that to be 0.

I'd like convenient-to-transport, including both transit and parking, and carts/flat floors/etc. so I can move stuff in/out of my room easily.

Some specific amenities would be really nice -- a standard coffee machine (I'd prefer nespresso, but really anything), fridge, microwave, etc. I'd also love it if all outlets are wonpro universal sockets, and if the layout of sockets in the room is standardized (at the very least, always one or two on each side of the bed, and 2-4 at a desk).

What I'd love, but which many people may hate, is an absurd level of standardization of the room itself -- the same mattress, layout, furnishings, etc. available at every property, and actual floorplans shown so I'm booking a specific room and not run of house.

(I'd be fine with this just being a subset, like the club floor, of a legacy hotel. Or, it handled as a standalone new build, conversion of legacy hotel, subset of a floor ("Towers" or club floor concept), or potentially, a decentralized hotel with a bunch of apartments in an area, centrally managed and serviced.

Wait, you want all that... but claim to prefer AirBnB over hotels?

I've been in an airbnb for a few weeks. Monthly rental.

Host is a software engineer, even less social than me, and specifically advertised 100/100 Internet. Less convenient check-in than a hotel, yes, but for a 30 day stay, knowing "great Internet" and decent workspace (there's an LCD monitor, etc.) more than made up for it.

I want something which has the tech benefits of airbnb and the institutional backing of something like a starwood hotel. My least favorite thing is a shitty unaffiliated hotel; no idea what I'll be getting. The ideal would be this hypothetical corp-managed property. Right now I split between specific airbnbs and SPG hotels.

So marriott finds many guests order pizza delivery. They create new uniforms, new name, hats and a separate number for pizza delivery. (Could not find article but ~15-20,it's old ) It goes directly into their kitchen where they make the pizza.

Why can't hotels do the same. Make it look like an ABB. ???

I'd be pretty surprised if Airbnb won't be looked at as a fad in a few years time, independent of the hotel's action plan.

Hotels deliver a consistent experience up to certain standards, Airbnb doesnt. The price difference is marginal at best and staying in someones spare bedroom doesn't magically make your trip 'authentic'.

There are use cases where it makes sense (e.g. cheap shared accommodation, large flats with kitchens for families) but for most use cases covered by hotels it just doesnt.

What will happen is that more bad experiences happen and travel through social media, regulation will increase and it will go back to its niche life where it will do a great job.

Aside from compliance costs, hotels are sitting on tons of real estate they must fill with sleepers every night. It's expensive.

I still think hotels could someday co-opt airbnb's success by franchising "at-home" versions that provide rental properties with branded products and regular inspections. Take a cut of the proceeds. List the properties on the website.

- Hilton at Home

- Marriott Anywhere

This is not a terrible idea, but the overhead of running an actual hotel business and the associated costs would likely make it less attractive than the current wild west approach.

I assume, naively, that a lot of ABB'ers skirt taxes and short-term rental codes/taxes. The advantage comes from not recognizing the state/city/town bed codes/taxes.

I am probably in the minority here but Airbnb is a non starter for me. The fact that they rate and review the guests and that it stays online for ever is something I cannot accept. I know there are a bunch of things like living with locals and mingling with them and all of that but I would rather keep that little bit of privacy.

Do they really need to combat airbnb? I travel a lot (relatively), but I can't get the idea of this service. It's a bit cheaper, but a) I can't cancel it b) I can't book it without interaction with a host c) I can't move in without interaction with a host d) it ends up even more expensive after cleaning/service/whatever fees.

I've just checked [1]: NYC, a shitty "private" room with shared bathroom for a weekday is $150, with crazy "strict" cancelation policy, that literally says "Cancel up to 7 days before your trip and get a 50% refund plus service fees back."

What's the point and why is airbnb still alive?

[1] https://www.airbnb.ca/rooms/14165373?checkin=2017-05-18&chec...

Because not everywhere is NYC. I've found the economics and potential extra hassle of booking of airbnb work our best for slightly longer stays. The premium of two weeks of hotel over two weeks of airbnb is often significant.

> Because not everywhere is NYC.

Do I really need to attach links to rooms in all major cities in the world?

But I got the idea: airbnb may be better for longer trips.

> What's the point and why is airbnb still alive?

Because sometimes people have an extended trip that they plan out ahead of time. So, communicating with a host and meeting the host is not a huge deal since they'll be staying there for a few days or more. On the other hand, getting input from the host about local favorites would be desirable.

If I'm going somewhere for one or two days, I would definitely book a hotel. If I'm going somewhere for a week or so, especially if its somewhere remote, I'd try for an AirBNB. Costs are cheaper, hotels are usually substandard, and host's insights are valued.

Have you never tried asking a hotel reception for local recommendations? It works the same as asking a host and they are usually around 24 / 7.

> Have you never tried asking a hotel reception for local recommendations?

Hotel receptions are generally trained to only present you the major tourist attractions. An AirBnB host, or a host from a hospitality-exchange community, that you have chosen due to common interests or lifestyles is more likely to be able to recommend niche-interest things like live music, art galleries, or second-hand bookshops. In one Middle Eastern country I got to attend a local wedding celebration over two days because my AirBnB host was one of the relatives and it would be fine for him to bring a couple of foreign guests, but the same opportunity probably wouldn’t have come if I had stayed in a hotel.

A subset of a set isn't necessarily representative of the set.

I just AirBnB-rented a house for a week, $75/night plus $150 cleaning, 2 bedrooms + living room + kitchen + private screened-in outdoor pool. Loved it. Will seriously consider not doing hotels any more.

A friend likewise did a week-long vacation via ABB, different house each night. Stayed in a yurt, farmhouse, log cabin, etc - nifty places, interesting or isolated locations, which hotels absolutely cannot replicate without unattainable pricing.

AirBnB exists to connect you to people renting what you want. That's it. Hotels exist to provide a dense collection of cozy rooms with rapid comprehensive service. That's it. They exist for different purposes. Like many industries, the rise of a non-sequitur competitor pushes the longstanding players to revisit their core purpose - and fighting to destroy that competition often serves only to undercut their own real talents.

The options are there. Choose what fits you. Don't try to close down options for others just because those options don't fit your needs. ABB doesn't work for you in NYC? then just get a hotel. Don't deal with it by slashing my options to get unique/exotic housing which can't be replicated by hotel chains.

you're ignoring the situations where ABB is problematic and discussing only the situations where it is working well. nobody has a problem with ABB working well. the problem is the impact it has on residential areas in already housing-crunched cities. a secondary problem is health and safety regulation disparities.

if we're going to be discussing ABB let's actually discuss the reasons why it is controversial. there are very good reasons why ABB ought to be more strictly regulated in certain areas. The yurt, farmhouse, and log cabin rentals that your friend enjoyed aren't really the issue here and I haven't seen any significant effort to shut down those types of ABB rentals.

So please, focus on what matters here. There is a narrow but important subset of ABB rentals that is problematic and that is what the regulatory debate is focused on.

Zoning laws and renting contracts apply. Prosecute accordingly.

Parent post was complaining about customer-hostile rental agreements, and high prices. I focused on that.

My read on the OP is that hotels are just trying to crush the competition period, using/abusing whatever laws to squeeze ABB out of the area, if not ban 'em entirely, solely for monopolistic intentions.

I have little sympathy for housing-crunched cities. Supply of square footage is limited, demand becomes extremely high, and the only "friction" available to limit occupancy is price. Let the price drive creation of new [sub]urban areas, relieving pressure on prior areas and attracting new viable productivity.

Most areas have suitable health & safety regulations; adjust accordingly to enhance health & safety, not as an excuse to drive out competition.

Depending on the city, there are a good number of hosts that offer instant booking, keyless entry, flexible cancellation, rates that are 1/4 the cost of a hotel, and most importantly a far better location than any hotel provides.

How else am I going to live 2 blocks from the Notre Dame for a month?

Did you read the article? NY state has cracked down on Airbnb hosts (as a result of hotel industry lobbying) to the point where most people don't even bother. So what's left is overpriced and poor quality.

Note that the hotel industry lobbied against collecting business taxes from AirBnB hosts, afraid that paying taxes indicates legitimacy.

Which is why airbnb is all too happy to help states fill revenue shortfalls with taxes that come out of their pockets:

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/2017/04/17/...

"By next month, Airbnb will have similar agreements with 250 jurisdictions in the United States, including 20 states."

I feel pretty naive. When I read the headline, I assumed the hotel industry was going to adapt and innovate as opposed to using legal maneuvers and regulations.

This whole economic setup becomes more fascinating by the minute.. a shared, near socialistic economy on personal goods- and a buy/sell full capitalistic economy on virtual goods. Finally some mass producion, where the tailoring of the product is left to private sub-contractors.

this isn't a plan, this is just rent-seeking.

https://www.google.com/search?q=rent+seeking&oq=rent+seeking...

Is airbnb the best place to find somewhere to stay for 2-3 months?

I tried to use AirBnb once, but apparently you can't book a reservation unless you upload your photo. The fuck? And then they wonder why their hosts discriminate by race! I sure don't need to show my photo to a hotel to book a room.

In the US you must provide a valid photo ID when checking in to validate your age.

It's not about checking in. Obviously I had to provide an ID to every hotel I've checked in (though reportedly Richard Stallman manages to avoid that too). It's about not having to upload a profile photo to be able to use the damn app. It's the only app I've seen (including Facebook itself) that insists on doing that, and it makes zero damn sense.

Do you have a source on racial discrimination by ABB hosts?

there have been a few instances however as far as I know airbnb have handled this instances by banning the Host for life

http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2017/04/10/airbnb-bans-host-f...

Thank you I had never heard this before (granted I don't follow AirBnB very closely at all). Seems like an appropriate response from AirBnB at least.

to be fair, you are not renting a hotel room, you are renting someones home or room (in most cases). I see it as a way to build trust. Is a complicated situation... if a host chooses to discriminate me from staying at their home because of my race/age/sexual orientation I wouldn't really want to stay there anyways. Is it right? absolutely not. Is it against Airbnbs rules? YES. Will they be banned if they are caught? you bet.

Airbnb.com : Are we talking about that microscopic company that's barely a percent of hotels.com and booking.com ?

P.S. That's just to give a perspective on the industry ;)

First they ignore you,

Then they laugh at you,

Then they fight you,

Then you win.

Awesome. Move to Somalia where there's no state to prevent you from doing whatever the fuck you want.

Break the monopoly on the use of force by needing to supply your own to get anything done!

That's not an accurate characterization of Somalia. There are plenty of simple activities that would draw the attention of the government.

Your comments have been breaking the HN guidelines. Please post civilly and substantively, or not at all.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14130829 and marked it off-topic.

Topic aside. Pretty crappy article, it's just a wall of text.

I wonder how many people participating in this thread are being paid to post by (1) The hotel industry, or (2) AirBnb

Yes everyone is a shill /s

Just an observation...

These comments seem to be taken over by a pro-Hotel Lobby.

Does the average developer really care that much?

So many comments? 318 comments and climbing?

Why are there so-many down-voted comments?

Why are the ones down-voted almost entirely the ones saying they like AirBnB or questioning the Hotel industry?

Because lobbying is almost always 1) more effective and 2) less expensive than developing and implementing business processes which result in actual change.

It is easier to pay off a handful of politicians to legislate maintenance of status quo, for the next several decades, than it is to reengineer an entire industry in response to market forces and Capitalism. We are pseudo-Capitalists. We let market forces decide until those market forces decide that status quo isn't working. Then, rather than allowing the market to self-correct and increase efficiency and value, we artificially prop up and, further, mandate, the status quo via legislation.

Transportation, Internet Service Providers, Cable Providers, Automotive Dealers, ..., and now Accomodations.

This list of industries is growing at an alarming rate.

Even if we ignore the hotel industry it's not entirely clear that allowing residential housing to be used in lieu of hotels is a win for everybody.

And yes, I'd freely admit that I don't actually want to allow the free market to just do whatever it decides without any external political control.

The free market is just you and me deciding what we want to buy or not. What you want is the politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money because we are not smart enough to make free choices, which is the argument behind every single dictatorship.

Zoning laws are increasingly local however. At some point, its no longer "Politicians over in Washington" and your own darn neighbors who are attending HOA meetings, deciding to ban Airbnb locally.

A huge part of neighborhood local politics is the ability to push out "poor" people to certain corners. Single-family home dwellers don't like apartments or townhomes closeby. Not only are they "unsightly", they are filled with "lower class people" and "bring down home values". (often: codewords for browner and otherwise "less white" people)

But its important to realize that this phenomenon is NOT top-down, but instead bubbles up from the bottom up. The people who think this are your neighbors down the street.

I won't say those motivations are nonexistent, but having a bunch of unknown short-term people coming for a stay in a neighborhood makes it less like an actual neighborhood (who cares if I make a mess and do a half-assed job cleaning up?) and a temptation to turn housing into lucrative rentals squeezes housing stock in places where it's already constrained.

Fair point. That's also a local concern (and more legitimate). Although I need to remind people that in a democracy, its about the number of people who think a certain thought... not the legitimacy of those thoughts that count.

Then regulate what you dislike: making a mess, being loud, etc.

Or do you want to ban motorcycles because some riders have too-loud mufflers?

Which one of these things do you think is easier to enforce? Would you prefer to have to call the police with a noise complaint regularly or not have noise in the first place?

I think that the AirBnB host will be careful about what guests are permitted after the first noise complaint, risking being evicted. Perhaps just knowing the rules might avoid the issue. After all, that's how you expect any AirBnB regulation to take effect.

> I think that the AirBnB host will be careful about what guests are permitted after the first noise complaint, risking being evicted.

How about a simple law: don't violate zoning regulations.

Its no different than in the "good ol days" when you weren't allowed to run a Bed-and-Breakfast Inn out of your own home (unless you lived in a commercial district, or otherwise lived in a district with more lax Zoning laws)

I prefer living in a district with lax zoning laws. They're always much more enjoyable.

Not everyone has the mobility to move around towns. People gotta plant themselves somewhere and start working with the local politics of the towns that they live in.

Which might be even encouraged by proper zoning laws. Long-term tenants may become more interested in local politics (the efficacy of local schools, security, and local decisions). Even those who are more economically mobile should be "good citizens" and participate in local decisions.

Carrying on with that: for those who have little-to-no economic mobility (and there's plenty of them), Zoning Regulations and how their local neighborhoods act and work are incredibly important.

Yes, but in practice zoning laws, however well-intentioned, have had the effect of suppressing affordable housing, public transit, and local businesses. Some of my favorite neighborhoods are the result of an area being re-zoned to allow mixed-use development. Over and over it's been a successful way to transform a blighted, abandoned area into a vibrant neighborhood. And no, that's not just gentrification.

I guess that demonstrates your point that the poor would benefit from being informed, active participants in local legislation. They aren't. Encouraging more local legislation isn't going to change who participates in the conversation.

Well it's not the "favorite" configuration of everyone, and many such people own homes in their communities and can't easily move. Why shouldn't they have a say?

Evicted? Someone running an airbnb is almost certainly violating their lease in the first place unless they own the place.

If you can't evict, then fine the owners enough to make them care.

Theoretically maybe it's possible but look at what happened to Boston neighborhoods where a lot of homes started being rented to college kids. Especially the way the landlords don't really give a damn because they make enough profit that any fines they incur are just the cost of doing business. Much easier to have a simple, no exceptions rule than a complex schedule of fines and enforcement for violations.

That's a good comparison. My take is that writing "simple, no exceptions" laws is very difficult. It's incredibly hard to draw what lawyers call a "bright line" between good neighborly behavior and bad behavior.

Further, I suspect the hotel lobby will try to sneak in some far overreaching wording as part of stopping some bad AirBnB hosts. I don't trust them to write something truly clear. For example, will their laws make renting your spare bedroom on Craigslist illegal? Quite likely they'll try to.

In contrast, a schedule of fines for things like noise violations already exists! It's just time to update the fines and start enforcing them. One major problem with misdemeanor laws is they tend to hardcode the dollar amounts and forget to update them with inflation.

I don't think it's really that hard to ban short-term rentals. If you want to still allow long-term rentals you can set a minimum length of any such agreement. Certainly it's less complicated than addressing every single undesirable thing that could result from having them.

What benefits you or me individually can easily be detrimental if we all start doing it, even if we take as a given your (in my opinion incorrect) assumption that in an unfettered free market there aren't some actors far more powerful than others.

Political regulation is just you and me delegating representation of interests. What you want is for corporations to decide what we can and cannot do with our money because we are not smart enough to make free choices, which is the argument behind every single corporation.

Companies do not exist for altruistic purposes. They exist to make a handy profit for the fee at the expensive of many sometimes. Regulation extends a more fair playing field in some cases. Sometimes it protects the public interest. It's why there's no Walmart in Seattle.

The problem is, people still inexplicably think that they are delegating this representation to people who actually care or who are bound by some type of moral code which mandates acting in the person's best interests.

How has this basic falsehood persisted for so long and in the face of such damning evidence to the contrary?

> How has this basic falsehood persisted for so long and in the face of such damning evidence to the contrary?

Probably the fact that there's strong evidence to support it? Compare today versus the 1970s in air quality, car safety, waterway pollution, etc.

> Political regulation is just you and me delegating representation of interests.

Is there a way to opt out? Otherwise it sounds more like coercion than delegating.

Corporations are not made of martians, they are made of people making free choices. Should they get a special status with limited liability protected by the government? I don't think so but that's something to blame on the government, not corporations.

If your neighbor's airbnb ruins your nights you should be able to sue and the owner of the building should be free to ban airbnb. But the government deciding that airbnb should be illegal or regulated centrally is where I draw the line.

Corporations are very nearly made of martians. The interests of the corporation (shareholder value, quarterly profit, market share, etc.) are not human values and frequently run totally contrary to the interests of their customers and the community they do business in.

What would be the point of environmental regulation polluters can opt out of?

Suing someone is very inconvenient. Not only that, what are you going to sue for? Losing a couple nights sleep a week doesn't exactly have a monetary value.

> ... we are not smart enough to make free choices...

You say that like it's not true, but history has borne that out pretty well. Humans are great at ignoring externalities, impacts on minority groups, etc.

Nobody wants politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money. What we want is a free market with a check on human greed. For example, do I think all people deserve cheap energy, personal transportation, and inexpensive plastic products? Yes. Do I think they deserve them at the expense of millions of peoples lives/livelihoods? No. Therefore, I believe there should be regulation in the "free market".

> Nobody wants politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money.

This seems like an essentially true statement, but a substantial majority of evidence points to the contrary.

>For example, do I think all people deserve cheap energy, personal transportation, and inexpensive plastic products? Yes. Do I think they deserve them at the expense of millions of people's lives/livelihoods? No.

Sorry for being nitpicky, but wouldn't that second group of people also "profit" from cheap energy, ect. because they are also part of "all people"? Then what is so inherently wrong about that situation? If ALL of us can be living a little bit better by SOME of us sacrificing, then isn't that what we should be doing, at least in a somewhat "equal" measure? Guess I'm just channeling my inner Spock a tad bit too much ;)

Your Inner Spock might determine that it's Highly Illogical to only look at cheap transportation and not consider externalities like pollution.

External political oversight* is one thing. Control is another.

There is a trend of legislature propping up broken industries to the detriment of the people. Take the dealer network argument for example.

Dealers argue that the existence of dealers creates inter- and intra-brand competition that drives prices lower and benefits the consumer. In the same breath, however, they say that it is impossible to compete with direct sales from Tesla. It is too competitive.

These are two contradictory statements. Dealers act as a middlemen that necessarily increase prices in order to generate profit that is allocated to said dealers. Dealers have historically enjoyed this now-oft-unnecessary place in the chain of automobile conveyance. But dealers view this profit source as a basic right which must be legislatively protected. And, thus far, they have been quite successful at lobbying for mandates which require these market inefficiencies.

Without legislating any particular example I agree that regulation can be used as a cudgel to stifle competitors too, but I don't agree that the answer is to throw out the concept.

This is actually existing capitalism though. Capitalism on paper is much different from capitalism in reality.

Well, no. There's actually a term for it: Crony Capitalism aka "Cronyism" (protectionism). Don't conflate this with actual Capitalism.

Where has "actual capitalism" ever existed? It's always cronyism.

Cronyism is actual capitalism; “capitalism” was a name first applied by critics to the real world dominant system of the 19th Century industrialized West, and cronyism is a central feature of that system.

Heck, the name “capitalism” is a reference to the fact that that system is characterized by active measures (starting with the design ofnthenstructure of property rights) taken to organize society for the benefit of a particular narrow class, the capitalist class.

(“Protectionism” is a different, but related, thing, though.)

But some of us like the status quo where drunken vacationing Europeans aren't allowed to rent out units in our residential apartment buildings.

Trying to just "disrupt" business without actually addressing and solving the complex issues that define the market is just lazy, and often illegal.

I'm pretty glad we have regulated capitalism. If you like the unregulated kind perhaps you should visit unregulated hotspots like northern Iraq or Somalia and see what Capitalism looks like in all its raw glory.

There is a difference between oversight and control. Maintaining market inefficiencies to the detriment of consumers, simply for the sake of maintaining status quo and profit allocation to the establishment, goes beyond mere regulation.

Market regulation is by definition controlling what a market can and cannot do. The intent does not change the definition of the word.

Capitalism != Anarchy. Free markets still require laws addressing theft, property ownership, contract law, etc. Protectionism, however, simply rewards first comers. Disruption is the crux of a free market and should be embraced not lobbied against. Services that people dislike the most due to cost or service rendered (airlines, health insurance, telecom providers) are often the most regulated.

>Free markets still require laws addressing theft, property ownership, contract law, etc

It's funny you say that, because one of the features of AirBnB is that it has "disrupted" property ownership and contract law. A huge number of AirBnB properties are being sublet in direct violation of the terms of the tenancy that the tenant agreed with the landlord.

If you want a state that strictly enforces contracts between parties and property ownership rights then that's a state where AirBnB wouldn't exist.

A tenant subletting their apartment against the terms of their contract is obviously an issue and should be addressed between the actual property owner and the current lessee. However, lobbying for a blanket law against subletting if the actual property owner is OK with it is where protectionism comes into play.

To the extent that AirBnB hosts are violating their contract with the landlord, the state should be involved to enforce that. However if the host owns the property (or has contract permission to sublet) the state should not be involved. The state may also get involved is someone (guest or legitimate owner) is affecting their neighbors (excessive noise for example).

I can recognize that some AirBnB's are not legal even while arguing that as a whole the idea should be legal.

I think the legality of operating an AirBNB out of a residence that you own depends on the zoning ordinances that the property is in. (Renting out your farmhouse is probably ok; renting out your suburban or urban house or condo as a business proposition probably violates zoning ordinances and would require requesting a variance from your local governing council with appropriate public hearings and notifications to your neighbors.)

You are correct, but I disagree with those zoning rules in general. Specific zoning rules that prevent behavior that is significantly negative to the neighbors I'll allow, but most zoning is about keeping some other class (generally blacks or poor) out.

I was with you up until the intellectually dishonest and unnecessarily provocative remarks about Iraq and Somalia.

Provocative perhaps, but certainly not dishonest. The unregulated behavior of free market actors leads to oligarchy and violent organized crime syndicates. Every time.

The idea that capitalism as you recognize it can exist without serious regulation is obvious nonsense.

Somalia and Iraq are not examples of capitalism. That is the dishonesty in your previous statement.

Additionally, I never made a statement about capitalism without regulation. I believe strongly in useful regulations for capitalism.

> Somalia and Iraq are not examples of capitalism.

The Mises Institute, a major thinktank for free-market capitalism, has presented several articles in praise of how things are done in Somalia.

the delusions (or cultivated lies) of an ideologically extreme organization with a tenuous grasp of reality is not evidence that Somalia or Iraq are actually Capitalist economies.

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