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A report from the office of New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer claims that NYC residents paid an additional $616 million in 2016 due to Airbnb. The report said that “Tenants in Murray Hill, Gramercy, Stuyvesant Town, Williamsburg, and Greenpoint pay an average of more than $100 per month in additional rent due to Airbnb listings.”
“For years, New Yorkers have felt the burden of rents that go nowhere but up, and Air
The report claims:
- Airbnb listings were heavily concentrated in parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn and had a greater impact on these neighborhoods. Approximately 20% of the increase in rental rates was due to Airbnb listings in midtown and lower Manhattan, including neighborhoods such as Chelsea, Clinton, and Midtown Business District; Murray Hill, Gramercy, and Stuyvesant Town; Chinatown and Lower East Side; Battery Park City, Greenwich Village, and Soho.
- In aggregate, New York City renters had to pay an additional $616 million in 2016 due to price pressures created by Airbnb, with half of the increase concentrated in the neighborhoods highlighted above;
- For each one percent of all residential units in a neighborhood listed on Airbnb, rental rates in that neighborhood went up by 1.58 percent.
- Between 2009 and 2016, approximately 9.2 percent of the citywide increase in rental rates can be attributed to Airbnb
“For years, New Yorkers have felt the burden of rents that go nowhere but up, and Airbnb is one reason why. From Bushwick to Chinatown and in so many neighborhoods in-between, affordable apartments that should be available to rent never hit the market, because they are making a profit for Airbnb,” said New York City Comptroller Scott M. Stringer. “Airbnb has grown exponentially at the expense of New Yorkers who face rising rents and the risk of being pushed out of communities they helped build. If we’re going to preserve the character of our neighborhoods and expand our middle class, we have to put people before profits. It’s that simple.”
Airbnb denies claims
Airbnb posted its own statement denying the charge, claiming:
- The majority of our hosts are sharing the home in which they live, not removing permanent housing from the market. In fact, as NYU researchers recently found, in order for someone to make as much money from an Airbnb guest as from a long-term tenant, they would have to share a home for 216 nights a year in New York City — more than triple the number of nights that a typical listing is shared.
- Blaming rent increases on everyday New Yorkers who are sharing their home on Airbnb defies logic. After all, anyone who lives in New York knows that the City has had a declared housing emergency since the end of World War II and that prices have been rising for decades. In fact, home prices in New York City were soaring long before Airbnb was even founded, increasing by 124% from 1996 to 2006 alone.
- Rents in many neighborhoods are also now falling, in part due to a long-awaited increase in the housing supply after years of post-recession stagnation. Manhattan rents fell 3.8% in March — the most since 2011 — and Brooklyn rents are down for four straight months, with concessions offered in 48 percent of new leases — a record high.
Airbnb said that “It is home sharing that has empowered these tens of thousands of New Yorkers with more than $6,700 in extra income each year — all without spending a single taxpayer dollar.”
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