AirBnB rentals typically make more money for apartment and condo owners than long-term rentals, at least in big cities (that attract tourists) where there's often already scarce housing and not a lot of new affordable construction.
So as housing units get taken off the long-term market rental (i.e. actually being used for housing) to be turned into short-term rental for AirBnB, it reduces the available stock for renters.
And in many large cities small condos and purpose-built rentals are mostly what get built, because that's what investors are asking for - and builders build what they expect to sell and what they can profit on.
But then the investors who buy these "homes" don't actually put them up for rent, they turn them into short-term rentals for tourists and visitors, and those dwellings are not available for the people who actually need to live in the city.
This dual pressure on scarcity then drives up the rent on available properties because the demand goes up since there's less and less long-term rentals available for residents.
So they don't necessarily "prevent housing construction" (what housing gets built is a topic a bit too complex to get into here) but they absolutely do reduce available housing in large cities and in-demand areas, in the ways outlined above.
This is why many large metropolitan areas have either banned AirBnB or heavily regulated them (with mixed success, and rarely the honest participation of AirBnB themselves).
This tells me that you think that treating housing supply as a relevant factor to the price of housing is a stupidly obvious error.
> So they don't necessarily "prevent housing construction" (what housing gets built is a topic a bit too complex to get into here) but they absolutely do reduce available housing in large cities and in-demand areas, in the ways outlined above.
That you for agreeing that they do not prevent housing supply from increasing to meet the increased demand.
> This tells me that you think that treating housing supply as a relevant factor to the price of housing is a stupidly obvious error.
Nah it's just that we've had trolls in here before who try to make bad faith arguments about AirBnB, by pretending they don't see the problems created by turning housing into short-term rentals.
> > So they don't necessarily "prevent housing construction" (what housing gets built is a topic a bit too complex to get into here) but they absolutely do reduce available housing in large cities and in-demand areas, in the ways outlined above.
> That you for agreeing that they do not prevent housing supply from increasing to meet the increased demand.
I definitely don't agree with that. I said "necessarily" for a reason, meaning it's not the _only_ factor, nor it is _always_ a factor (depending on location etc) but it certainly is one of the major impacts on housing supply.
As for meeting demand, here's one way AirBnB is "preventing" supply from meeting demand:
Builders build what sells, and what buyers want. For the last while in many/most large western cities (I only know Canada and the US mostly, making a few loose assumptions here about elsewhere), real estate investors have been pushing for lots of single-bedroom condo units because those are the kinds of units that are popular as short-term rentals.
So builders prioritize these kinds of units for sale to investors who have no intention of making them available as housing, even though they are zoned and built as housing.
So... I think you can draw a pretty solid line between this kind of economic incentive and a lack of housing to meet demand, since there is a finite capacity for building housing (based on available builders - i.e. capital and manpower).
Secondly, remember impacting supply is not just about adding new housing but also about how affordable the available housing is.
When people convert existing housing to short-term rental, it reduces the total supply. And when you squeeze the supply, prices go up, and people get priced out of the places they live.
AirBnB rentals typically make more money for apartment and condo owners than long-term rentals, at least in big cities (that attract tourists) where there's often already scarce housing and not a lot of new affordable construction.
So as housing units get taken off the long-term market rental (i.e. actually being used for housing) to be turned into short-term rental for AirBnB, it reduces the available stock for renters.
And in many large cities small condos and purpose-built rentals are mostly what get built, because that's what investors are asking for - and builders build what they expect to sell and what they can profit on.
But then the investors who buy these "homes" don't actually put them up for rent, they turn them into short-term rentals for tourists and visitors, and those dwellings are not available for the people who actually need to live in the city.
This dual pressure on scarcity then drives up the rent on available properties because the demand goes up since there's less and less long-term rentals available for residents.
So they don't necessarily "prevent housing construction" (what housing gets built is a topic a bit too complex to get into here) but they absolutely do reduce available housing in large cities and in-demand areas, in the ways outlined above.
This is why many large metropolitan areas have either banned AirBnB or heavily regulated them (with mixed success, and rarely the honest participation of AirBnB themselves).