Hacker News Reader

This isn’t recent. Around 2017, the building where I lived had issues with theft. Tenants knew that the (historic) front door was finicky, but AirBnB people didn’t, so they’d effectively leave it open and packages got stolen. There were other issues with AirBnBs, but long story short, everyone agreed they were against HOA rules and had to go. I reached out to support to see if the building could get delisted. They responded…

“The platform does not have the capability to delist a whole community currently but our Friendly Buildings Program does allow you to have complete transparency and control over home-sharing activity in your community. You would be able to set minimums number of guests, blackout dates, amenity restrictions, or even create a waiting list if you want only a small number of homes to have the home-sharing amenity.

We understand in order to be able to control home-sharing, you would have to allow it in some capacity and change your CC&Rs, which is a process. Since our program establishes a partnership between Airbnb and your community, we would love to support in any way possible or even send someone to propose the idea to your board and fellow homeowners in person.”

So in other words, you either work with them or they let things happen anyway.

AirBnB's entire business is predicated on skirting regulation. The problem isn't that they don't care, it's that caring would cost them money and invalidate their business model.

I wanted a term to define companies/apps that solely exist to skirt laws and regulations and then I realized it's the entire whole of "gig economy" companies.

> AirBnB's entire business is predicated on skirting regulation.

From time to time you spot underappreciated comments here. This is one of them

AirBnB, Lyft, Uber, etc - their entire business model is predicated on skirting regulations.

Then people are surprised they don't keep honest negative reviews? Why would a company which is knowingly violating rules care about your negative review?

They make money from hosts putting their places up for rent, not from those renting and if a negative review causes a listing to be removed... Clearly it is far more economical to remove the review instead.

It's not inherently bad. Some regulations are dumb and should be challenged by the market, like Uber and Lyft did to taxi companies and the protectionist regulations that kept them from evolving and improving.

It's less about removing the review or listing and more about looking at the belief system in the business. If a local government says "this space is for permanent residents only" AirBnB would say, "why?" and would rather ignore or fight the regulation than comply (or more likely "take it up with the host, not us").

There are legitimate questions to what terms a government/HOA can force on property owners renting out their residences. From taxation to civil rights and racial equity there's a lot on the table to challenge. That said, companies can be reckless when choosing not deal with the question because it doesn't have an easy answer and grow/scale at ethics' expense.

AirBnB has actually had to deal with this, like removing the ability of hosts to see guest photos before booking because of racial discrimination, and charging the appropriate hospitality taxes on listings to comply with the vast number of of municipalities they operate in.

keep in mind why some of those taxi regulations were created in the first place.

In the not so distance past there was a FLOOD of drivers, few rules and regulations and eventually a "race to the bottom" (too many drivers chasing too few fares).

Then the pendulum of regulation swings TOO FAR in the other direction, creating the "medallion" system where these are worth a small fortune.

A happy medium is where the market self-clears with reasonble regulations to protect both drivers and consumers.

AirBnB is in the same boat. It was a good idea when it was individuals renting out unused rooms for some extra cash. now AirBnB is an unlicensed hotel, where people buy up houses specifically for AirBnB.

There are countless stores of people renting property, and then turning around and putting that on AirBnB.

And strongly agree, some rules are dumb, but the correct approach should be to push for change, not run illegal businesses like AirBnB, Uber, etc.

If i called someone to come get me from "A" and drop me off at "B" how is this "ride sharing" and not a taxi service?

Seems like thesis, antithesis, synthesis.

Thesis: too many taxis result in badservice Antithesis: too many restrictions also result in bad service Synthesis: breaking some of the laws results in better service

Now we talk about regulating the gig economy, a horrible thing mostly brought by Uber and airbnb: let's see where it leads us.

The pendulum of regulation will swing too far in the other direction, it ALWAYS does.

Mostly because the government sits around and does nothing until things get really bad, then they institute very strict rules to prevent a repeat.

Had they gotten involved earlier they would have had more flexibility with the regulations.

> reasonable regulations to protect both drivers and consumers.

I would rather regulations exist to protect consumers and communities without respect for the business owners/operators' needs. Businesses don't have an inherent right to exist or be profitable and the choice to protect them is one of pragmatism (eg: national defense, airlines, rail).

I think something got lost in my last reply, I don't think companies should flagrantly break laws and feel that governments should take the gloves off more often to slap them with massive penalties for ignoring them. But it's not black and white.

The entire "gig economy" would be much better named the "scofflaw economy". Far more than technology, a willingness to deliberately ignore laws/rules/regulations/decency is the core competency of AirBNB, Uber, GrubHub and pretty much every other major player in the space.

I reported a neighbour's AirBNB listing (showing 10+ reviews and plenty of pictures) and they had their lease terminated. I couldn't believe it :-)

I'd been finding bags of rubbish in the corridor, or in a recycling bin, and was woken several times by wheely suitcases bump-bump-bumping down the stairs early on a Monday.

Denmark changing the tax laws to require AirBNB to report short-term rental income for tax also helped.

Check if the listings also violate local planning laws and if so contact your local planning office. In the past our local planning office was reticent to become involved beyond sending a notification of potential violation. These were mostly ignored. My locality a few years ago passed new rules requiring registration of short term rentals and certain requirements to do so including being in compliance with HOA rules. Since then the planning office has become more willing to take actual action.

Those willing to ignore HOA rules are often willing to ignore local tax collection rules so contacting your local tax authority to let them know you suspect someone violating the local tax laws is an option. Even when the planning officials were hesitant to get involved the tax folks were willing.

I have reported realtors which own or have close connections to those owning short term units violating HOA rules to the state licensing board. My experience is that realtors willing to knowingly violate HOA rules have often previously been censured by the licensing board for other issues. This in particular has been amazingly effective at getting units quickly removed and listed for sale. Once the listing is removed I withdraw my complaint and I have never had to follow through to completion.

Luckily once the registration laws went into effect there have only been a couple of people attempting to do short term rentals in my HOA and reporting them locally has ended those attempts.

Why doesn’t the hoa identify the condo owner amd fine then to oblivion?

This is a good point and what I am working on right now

The city ought to be dealing with unlicensed hotels, but of course it won't, since decisions are made by the politically connected landowner class. Airbnb just gives better returns than longterm rentals, and because of that it also increases property values. Landowners won't reduce their income stream, that's for sure.

I would think aggressive enforcement and fines by your HOA would lessen that activity.

Call your HOA, not airbnb.

Frankly I'll back AirBnB over an HOA any day. HOAs are a societal cancer.

Sure let’s delegate decisions that are entirely neighborhood and building specific to a company that doesn’t even understand the local issues. Yeah HOAs can suck and aren’t needed in some cases but in my case the HOA is doing the correct thing and legal action has been taken against these places. It’s a shame airbnb won’t enforce local government policies because it will eventually blow up in their face only after people like me and my neighbors are harmed.

I think there's a point to be made about single family dwellings, but it's hard to imagine how a 50 condo building would operate without one. Who takes care of the pool? Or fixes the elevator?

The governance is definitely poorly structured, though. In my (limited) experience I've seen a board that gets elected and then proceeds to abuse their power to advance their own financial positions.

I think there should be a 3rd party company that competes for the management contract and annual contracts are awarded based off democratic vote from all the owners.

My takeaway from dealing with a condo HOA is that condos shouldn't legally exist, because people owning fractional buildings is doomed to result in structural collapse. Elected residents aren't qualified to make decisions about long-term maintenance which becomes more severe and expensive over time, and they have perverse incentives to avoid spending money. Faced with a substantial enough cost, board members can opt to hide problems while they try to sell their own stake in the building.

That's being said, $&@# AirBnB.

"People owning fractional buildings" has existed for almost 150 years, at what point should we start to see NYC buildings collapsing due to structural collapse?

This is false. The first condominium in the continental US was built in 1960, the entire scheme is only 63 years old. There's some older buildings that have been converted, sure, but the legal concept isn't that old.

And buildings start needing more significant structural work after forty or fifty years. Which is to say, yes, I expect many more condos to collapse over the next couple decades.

> The first condominium in the continental US was built in 1960, the entire scheme is only 63 years old.

This is correct in the sense that it is technically correct (for residential dwellings; commercial condominiums have existed for almost a hundred years prior).

However, residential cooperatives (co-ops) have existed in the United States since the mid-1800s. These are functionally the same as a condominium with a slightly different legal structure. But the end result is identical: multiple owners jointly managing a building in which they all own a stake.

I mean, FWIW, the issue primarily relates solely with residential dwellings: Businesses generally have a better grasp on risk factors. Also, many residential cooperatives, to my knowledge, refer largely to house-sized structures, especially... in the mid-1800s. It's much more affordable to manage repairs for less floors and traditional wood frame construction.

It's also plausible the legal structure of a condominium itself is the problem that leads to, well, largely incompetent management.

Obviously I'm not sure landlords are a winning solution for anyone either. But particularly for large structures, I would prefer actual public/government management over a quasi-government entity comprised of self-centered residents.

Given the extremely similar structure in operation (residents are elected to the board, control maintenance fees, etc) and that insurance companies consider them the same for insuring purposes, what makes condos significantly worse than co-ops (which have been around for ~150 years)?

Technically a condo owner has fee simple (i.e. absolute) ownership of the airspace in their unit and tenancy in common (i.e. shared) with the other owners for the walls, floors and common areas.

I guess what you're arguing here is that groups of people shouldn't be able to own real property collectively, which would undermine a lot of the legal infrastructure that underpins business and society today; not just condos.

For example, what if one's parents die and probate leaves the family house to the adult children (who are obviously not married to each other), how would they take title?

The idea I can own my airspace, but be entirely dependent on some other idiots with no qualifications to make key decisions that determine if the floor, walls, and ceiling continue to remain stable and surrounding my property is problematic. Surfside will not be the last large condo to collapse this decade.

The legal structure makes some sense but the accountability is a joke. Structural safety should be handled at a more reputable level.

Also the definitions between your property and the common elements is... unclear in many cases, at best, and somewhat predatory in design at worst.

My HOA is primarily a collective bargaining tool for trash pickup. Over 80% of the annual fee goes to trash service. The cost of the HOA is significantly less than even the most budget-minded trash service.

Do you know how such a minimal scope had been maintained? I'm envisioning either a pretty new HOA or maybe a structure that somehow forbids scope creep.

In my experience, I've seen lots of _old_ HOAs that are similar — only there for utilities that the larger municipality is lacking (like trash, recycling, snow removal, etc). It's the new ones — those that are set up by the developer from the get go that get lambasted and become the stereotype.

Definitely not new- when I purchased the home, my attic had a box with HOA board member documents from the 1980s.

Also, I can’t say I know, other than everyone on the board seems to agree with how it’s ran.

Given the circumstances mentioned in GP's comment, it appears they are living in a condo, and the HOA is constructed to cover the rules for the use and maintenance of jointly-owned portions of the building. This isn't a case of "HOA is mad that next door neighbor used a wrong species of grass for their lawn."

HOAs are the most local form of democratic government that most Americans interact with. They have an elected board, which you can run for if you're a member (owner), and an amendable constitution. In every state that I'm aware of, you have full access to the budget and all meeting minutes. I've even seen recall elections and funded campaigns. Democracy is never perfect, but for any place where I'm living in close quarters to my neighbors (e.g. not in a rural area with 20-acre lots) I'd 1000x rather an HOA than either anarchy or some builder-run "committee."

AirBnB is itself an HOA over a distributed network of properties.

Violate its rules and you're a goner. Don't pay their "taxes", whether literal taxes or AirBnB taxing you by having you pay via your labor in changing your home, curating your listing(s) on AirBnB, writing reviews on AirBnB, being responsive above a percentile set by AirBnB, etc.

All as AirBnB demands. No input from you.