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Comment by akshayB | Hacker News Reader

It sounds like government needs to adjust the laws so it encourages the homeowners to rent rather then Airbnb.

The infrastructure is there. Plenty of EU jurisdictions levy a fee that Airbnb collects. Except in my experience it was 1 EUR/ evening.

Funny how the locals pay for all of the upkeep or historical sites, and I get to see it for free or nearly free.

The problem is that those laws are politically unpopular. We have rent control that transfers to the next tenant, so any landlord (like mine) who gave a good deal in 2016 is kicking themselves now. Stories abound of nightmare tenants living rent free for over a year, and even after trashing the place. If I owned a place in Dublin I'd try really hard to avoid becoming a landlord. All of this means there's less supply instead of more.

We also have a lot of voters for whom rising house prices are a good thing. Homeownership rates in Ireland are high compared to the rest of Europe and plenty of people were underwater from the mid-2000's until recently.

Dublin needs to get rid of height maximums in the core of the city, build a transport network not suited to the 1950's (it's shockingly car-dependent and sprawling for Europe), and maybe not trap every project in planning hell. It suffers more generally from a labrynthine complex web of agencies and politicians - how can a city this small have sixty-freakin-three councilors? We're only 1.2 million people. And yet we wind up with things like the city council drawing up plans for a bus lane without realizing someone's already got permission to put an apartment building on the same land. https://www.dublininquirer.com/2015/06/30/for-favoured-liffe...

Of course, our agency tasked with bringing in foreign investment is just pretending none of this is a problem https://www.independent.ie/business/irish/ida-chief-denies-c...

Those reading this - keep in mind that yeah, it's cheaper than SF, but wages are substantially lower too.

I actually really like Dublin, and I am grateful to the Dubs for making me feel welcome (I'm from California) but I got INCREDIBLY lucky moving here in 2013 and walking in to a flat (the economy was on its knees then). I am aware that as a tech worker who lives in a prime spot in Dublin with rent control I am part of the problem. However, I'm also moving to the midlands in a few months, so that should free up at least one flat.

"stories abound" of homeless beggars who actually have "a lot of money" .. too .. it is a psychological fascination.. real-world needs measurements of factual conditions, not urban folktales

But until such measurements exist, landlords will make decisions based on such stories, so they matter.

Dublin is a tourist town. The only thing that can compete with 100 euros a night is a rent of 3000 euros a month.

Or fines for short-term renting which make normal rent the more feasible option.

I doubt your Airbnb will be used 100% of the time. 80% would be more realistic. Renting on Airbnb has a one major advantage over traditional renting. If someone loses a job and stops paying rent it's quite hard to evict him.

Can hotels start converting their rooms into apartments and start renting out to families? If Airbnb is taking business away from hotels shouldn't this work?

It's not New York with lot of population, skyscrapers, etc. Dublin as a city is not great, like... They are not even prepared for rain.

For many homeowners renting the house out is more trouble than it's worth: once your tenants are in, getting rid of them may be close to impossible.

Specially when you try to kick them with any cheap excuse to increase the rent by 300/€ month. Right?

That just side steps the problems, and Airbnb is just an excuse.

There needs to be regulation that makes it easier for the tenant to also be the owner.

Maybe I'm reading your comment wrong but that would make it even harder to find a place to rent. Owners will stop renting if they fear to lose their property if a tenant remains for more than say a year. You need to regulate the amount of time you can AirBnB a place before facing a fine. Ideally you would earn 300$ for putting your place on AirBnB for two months or 700$ for renting it a year. (Simple numbers just an example). And we would still have the stagnant salaries and sky high property values that no one can afford problems.

>but that would make it even harder to find a place to rent

Maybe i wasn't clear, but my point was that when renting is the most common way of living, it is not healthy for society.

Ownership promotes community and responsibility. Renting is parasitic and enables social stratification in to elites and tenants.

Prices are inflated and are used as investments rather than housing. This is where the government needs to add regulation to prevent exploitation of the market.

> when renting is the most common way of living, it is not healthy for society.

Germany (with it's sane housing cost growth) would disagree with that.

> Renting is parasitic and enables social stratification in to elites and tenants.

Not really. Renting provides accommodation mobility. Done correctly, it can be liberating & very valuable for state, renter & landlord.

Ownership also promotes capitalism. If the "owners" of these flats weren't so gung ho about making money and AirBnb'in out to tourists this problem wouldn't arise in the first place.

Housing is scarce, always has been. The prices are not "inflated", they are merely a symptom of the underlying reality which is that there's only so much housing to go around and given the option of making money (renting) and making a lot more money (airbnb), landlords will obviously choose the latter. My guess is a majority of these so called landlords are of modest means and would be harmed significantly by overbearing rent control programs. The only sensible solution to this problem is to enact policies that encourage developers to build (increased supply will lower rent costs) or enact policies that somehow limit the number of tourists coming to Dublin (doesn't seem reasonable or desirable). Any attempt to artifically manipulate the price of housing up or down via regulation will at worst, end in disaster or exacerbate the current crisis.

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