The city of New York will begin this Tuesday to apply a series of restrictions on short-term rentals that the tourist accommodation platform Airbnb considers to be a “de facto” ban on its activity.
The new regulation requires all hosts to register with local authorities, as New York prohibits the rental of entire apartments for less than 30 days when the owners are not present, but these types of businesses often do not respect it.
“The city is sending a clear message to the millions of potential visitors who will now have fewer options for staying in New York: you are not welcome,” Airbnb’s director of global policy, Theo Yedinsky, said in a statement.
A spokeswoman for the platform further explained that New York’s regulations are an anomaly even among cities that have decided to regulate tourist apartments, such as Los Angeles or San Francisco, which do allow hosts to offer their apartment without them being present.
She also argued that Airbnb has been trying for years to work with authorities to address the problem of illegal apartments, but that the city has decided to pass “new rules that create a ‘de facto’ ban on short-term rentals.”
The spokeswoman questioned whether the measures could help reduce the price of rentals in the Big Apple, which is suffering from a housing crisis. She also recalled that no city accounts for more than 1.5% of Airbnb’s revenue, not even New York, where more than 40,000 tourist apartments are offered.
In June, Airbnb sued the city and managed to delay the entry into force of the restrictions for a few months, as the regulation was scheduled to begin on July 1.
However, a judge dismissed the lawsuit last month, deeming it “rational” for authorities to want to monitor the legality of apartments being offered.
In a message on its website, the platform regrets that its lawsuit was dismissed, and reminds its hosts that as of today they have two options: register with the authorities or increase the time they offer their accommodations to more than 30 days.
However, Airbnb will not cancel bookings already made that start before December 1. Those that start on or after December 2 and do not comply with the regulations will be canceled and guests will be refunded.
According to The New York Times, the city estimates that some 10,000 Airbnb apartments in 2022 were fraudulent.
As in other cities around the world under tourist pressure, New York authorities believe that this proliferation of tourist apartments contributes to rising rental prices for permanent residents and exacerbates the housing crisis facing the city.
Despite the news, Airbnb shares on the New York Stock Exchange were up 7% half an hour after the start of trading.
New York limits Airbnb to the maximum as of September 5th