First it was Uber.
Now Airbnb is increasingly finding itself in the crosshairs of cities where it operates.
The City of Toronto has just released proposals for regulating the popular home sharing platform.
Some say Ottawa should do the same.
The problem, say critics, isn’t the individual homeowners who occasionally rent out their homes when they are away. It’s the rise of “commercial” hosts who buy or rent multiple properties just to list them on Airbnb full-time.
“The big concern is the private operator, the commercial operator who’s running a business as a ghost hotel or a private hotel,” says Steve Ball, President of the Ottawa Gatineau Hotel Association.
It’s obviously a concern for the heavily-regulated, heavily-taxed hotel industry. In Toronto, they’re also worried about those houses, condos and apartment units that are taken off the market for traditional buyers and renters, in turn putting more pressure on affordable housing.
Toronto’s Mayor also sees a problem with a full-time “hotel” operating in a residential neighbourhood. In announcing his city’s proposed regulations, John Tory said "In many cases where people have chosen to buy up some of these units that are not their principal residence and rent them out on a short-term basis a few days at a time, what you find is that this is extremely disruptive to neighbourhoods."
Toronto is essentially proposing rules that would restrict Airbnb hosts to only listing their principal residence. Further, they would have to be registered and licenced.
Steve Ball thinks Toronto’s proposals are balanced and fair. He says Ottawa should do the same.
"I think it's a discussion we need to have at some point and see how it's impacting the local industry,” says Ottawa Councillor Michael Qaqish. “ I don't think it's going to happen anytime in the immediate future but certainly in the next term of council there'll be an opportunity to review that."
In light of Toronto’s announcement, Airbnb issues a statement saying it “welcomes the move toward regulating home sharing.”
If that’s true, the company also stands to lose a fair bit of revenue. Steve Ball says recent studies show commercial renters make up 18% of Airbnb’s hosts, 32% of its available inventory, and 52% of its annual revenues.
