Landlords Want a Share of Renters' Airbnb Revenue (thestack.com) 197
An anonymous reader writes: A group of leading U.S. property owners, including AvalonBay Communities and Camden Property Trust, have met with lodging rental site Airbnb to discuss ways that they can get a cut of their renters' income. The tech company has faced obstacles to its growth, with residents putting their leases in jeopardy by renting out their places to Airbnb users as temporary accommodation – a form of illegal subletting. A future agreement between owners and tenants could mean renters no longer need to take a risk when letting their apartments on the site.
Seems reasonable (Score:5, Insightful)
If you are renting it is not your property.
Re:Seems reasonable (Score:5, Informative)
It is not that simple you have rights as a renter. You may not have the right to sublet however.
Re:Seems reasonable (Score:5, Informative)
It is not that simple you have rights as a renter. You may not have the right to sublet however.
This.
That means you may not use the property as a commercial enterprise. To me, owners asking for a cut is a very, very fair compromise on that rule.
Before some smart arse pipes up and says "but it's no different to having a home office", first let me say, you're an idiot because it's completely different. As a home office you're running a business out of your abode, as an AirBNB you're running your abode AS A BUSINESS.
Re:Seems reasonable (Score:4, Insightful)
The right to sublet is often standard in rental agreements.
The owners are already getting a cut. It's called rent.
Re:Seems reasonable (Score:5, Insightful)
Standard? I don't think I've ever signed a lease that didn't explicitly forbid it- its a pain in the ass for the landlord and can lead to difficult 3 way legal issues. I can especially see a landlord not wanting it done for short term leases- a normal sublease is annoying, who to sue when you have a contract with one person who subleased it for 3 days each to a half dozen people via a 3rd party website? No thank you.
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It's standard in many places where month-to-month leases basically don't happen. Who wants to move and still have to pay for eight months of a lease?
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Generally you have a termination clause- termination of the lease in exchange for 1 or 2 months rent at any time. Or you work with the landlord, most will be flexible and transfer a lease. But almost all leases include no sublet clauses, most of the sublets you know are probably doing so illegally. In a place where landlords have so much market power they won't do a month to month there's no way in hell they'd allow you to sublease which is even worse for them.
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As a small time landlord, I have the same thing in my agreement- although if my tenant needed to leave and found a replacement, I'd either terminate his lease early or agree to transfer the remainder of his lease to the new guy. I just want to be in on that loop.
For a big time landlord- someone who owns hundreds of units- I can see why they'd want this. Some percentage of their users will break their lease and do this anyway, either through ignorance or not caring. Stopping them requires suing and/or
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I'm not so sure about this. From the Rental Tenants Authority Queensland site one of the things they list in their FAQ is:
* The property manager/owner’s permission must be sought for all people living at the property, even if they are sub-letting.
https://www.rta.qld.gov.au/Ren... [qld.gov.au]
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So if you sign a lease and then you have a child you must seek the property owner's permission for your child to live there with you? I'm assuming children are legally people. And "even if they are sub-letting" isn't requiring that they be subletting. (Before someone says "but the child isn't subletting.")
I'd say the law as written says you have to ask permission. If that's not the intention then the law is badly written. Wouldn't that mean di
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I'm not sure about Queensland, but a lot of places have laws about renting out overcrowded properties. So yes, I think the intention of the law is that you do have to seek permission from the owner for your newborn child to live there, but probably there are other laws that apply which effectively narrow the scope of when the owner can say no in this case to where the propert
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That came from the FAQ and will probably be a simplification of the actual legislative instrument. I do know that when you apply for a rental you include all the members of your family at that time and these are then given to the owner. It would then leave open the opportunity to discriminate based on family even if it was illegal to do so.
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A right to do what? Let complete strangers live in someone else's propery without their permission?
"Who the hell are you?"
"Dude, I'm living here for two weeks, I'm a friend of Joe's."
"Joe? Who the hell is Joe?"
"You know, he's one of the 10 people leasing the place from Bob."
"Bob? Who's Bob? I rented the place to John!"
Such rights where they exist are for the purpose of keeping the tenant in the apartment despite a leave of absence for some reason or other. Especially in cases where there is rent contro
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Peace
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Or even worse, the lessee has an Israeli/atheist/etc girlfriend. Still no problem?
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That's the point. Some locales have a "reasonable consent" for the landlord, which means that if the person is reasonable then consent to sub-lease should not be denied. However this "reasonable" does mean that the landlord is asked for consent in the first place, the sub-lessor is a known person (not to-be-named-later), there is reasonable expectation of financial ability to pay, possibly credit checks are done, criminal checks are done, etc. If these checks were done on the original tenant then they mu
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Well, it is a good thing that nobody is stealing or misusing other people's property then I guess! I don't know where you got that ridiculous idea, but it is a ridiculous notion. If the people are subletting then that landlord has the same scenario exactly. The place is occupied by a party other than the owner, and a deposit plus standard liability on the part of the original lessee
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Actually as a landlord I would not authorize any subletting of my property and would take you to court and remove you judiciously from my property should you violate the contract where I state that very thing unequivocally and the contract is agreed upon by both sides before possession takes place. Most definitely a landlord can remove a tenant if the tenant violates terms of the contract agreement, it may go to court but it will be enforced.
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Well, I have always said 8 or 9 out of 10 landlords are assholes. You don't do anything to contradict my observation having seen your idiotic posts over the years. The fact that you think I would ever get involved with a self-important douchebag like yourself, who thinks he can dictate Draconian terms 'cause he da' landlord!', is hilarious.
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Though if you live in a civilized country, the government wouldn't help you to enforce a contract if it is unreasonable. When you rent an apartment to someone, you cannot tell them how to use that property. They do have to compensate you if they damage it, but it is none of your business if they sublet it or give it their friend and allow her to live there for free.
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Indiana court defined Pi as 3 at some point in time [wikipedia.org], sure, you can say it set Pi to 3 legally but it did not change the nature of Pi.
There is no such thing as a 'right' to other people's property. A right is protection against government abuse and oppression, nothing else. A right is only a meaningful term in the context of a relationship between an individual and the collective, since the collective cannot be actually punished for oppressing an individual, the laws are set in place to prevent the oppress
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If there is no natural right to property then you do not own your body and organs and freedom because your natural right to property starts with yourself and extends to the fruits of your labour, as they are expression of your time on this planet.
And again, your rights to your own body and organs are those which the law bestows and nothing more. Thus for example NSW law (as I believe does the law of the several states) prohibits the sale of human tissue including one's own (e.g. blood, semen organs), whi
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A right is protection against government abuse and oppression, nothing else.
"Nonsense walking on stilts!" How are the various rights appurtenant to copyright ownership, for example, "a protection against government abuse and oppression?"
A right is that which you can successfully enforce against another party in a court of law. Of course that is the legal positivist view of what a right is, the natural law folks, among others, entertain different illusions. ;)
Thus (lawful) occupancy of land, for example,
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Every single rental agreement I every used always forbid subletting. The was the number one thing they would point out to make sure no one made any mistakes. Some other places I did not rent did allow subleases but you had to get a sublease form filled out and approved. Landlords do not want strangers staying in their properties without having a legal agreement.
This is not about money, the "cut" does not matter. What matters is that it is NOT the renter's property.
Look at it like a rental auto. You can
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Look at it like a rental auto. You can not let any of your friends drive your rental, even if the rental agency is getting a "cut".
That's for insurance purposes. They allow you to add whoever you want as an authorized driver, you just might have to pay more.
Landlords do not get to prevent "strangers" from staying in their property. I can invite over whoever I want to stay in a place I am renting, nor do I have to even be there at the same time. It is only when it is for money that it counts as subleasing, and lease contracts will either specifically allow or disallow them. I have never seen a lease that stipulated that guests are p
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You can invite over, but that is not sub-leasing though. Sub-leasing means you are leaving the apartment temporarily but you don't want to lose your tenancy, so you sub-lease to someone else who will pay the rent. That person should meet the same standards you did when you applied for the rental. This does not seem to be what a weekend vacation rental is, you may be gone for 2 days but your rent is monthly and not daily.
I have seen landlords raise rent when the figure out that there are now two people ef
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The right to sublet is often standard in rental agreements
It's right there in the summary that the leases in question cannot be sublet: "a form of illegal subletting"
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The right to sublet is often standard in rental agreements.
The owners are already getting a cut. It's called rent.
Standard??? since when? The standard is generally NO RIGHT to sublet.
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I tend to disagree. The landlord made a "convenient" long term lease contract with the renter who, in turn, has the work with finding short term renters and bears the risk that he won't find any, thus having to pay rent while gaining no income.
It is, essentially, like the situation between wholesale and retail. And I guess you don't want to tell us that the wholesale has any right to any additional compensation above the wholesale price whenever the retailer sells part of the commodity he bought in bulk?
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The difference between your examples is that you are talking renting vs sale. The ownership of the property remains with the original owner. There are differences in wear and tear between long term renters and short stays and yet in this instance the cost of those repairs and maintenance increases is staying with the original owner and not being put onto the middle man.
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Actually, it is. When you're renting, any wear that goes above and beyond normal use is something you have to compensate the landlord for.
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My experience with renters has been that this only goes as far as their bond. After that the owner has to go through the legal process to recoup and is often not worth the recovery cost.
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In Queensland if the rent is less than $700 pw then the maximum bond allowed is 4 weeks rent. If the weekly rent exceeds $700 pw then there is no limit.
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Localities that allow sub-leasing usually require some agreement between the owner and the renter. The purpose of the sub-lease is that the tenant will vacate temporarily but will return and does not want to lose the right to rent (especially in the case of rent control). This does not cover the AirBnB case of leaving for the weekend and hoping to make some fast cash in secret. The renter must inform the owner or landlord or manager and they must give consent first. Sometimes there is a reasonable conse
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If the renter wants to make money with property, they should buy a house. Or they rent from people who explicitly permit subleasing. The contracts I've seen are quite clear: either tenants can sublease or they cannot. Most, if not all of them I've seen do not allow it. People who have thought it through tend not to allow it.
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but it is, effectively.
while you are renting, it is in your command.
or put in other ways, if the damage from the sub-renter is your responsibility then the owner should have no cut or no say in anything.
aaaaanyways, in some countries/legislations this is exactly the case. you rent your property and you have NO right to make spot checks or creep around and make up petty rules.
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It's not just rent control. Short-term rentals, such as weekends and week-long rentals that Airbnb deals in, necessarily command a higher price than yearlong or longer commitments. That's because with weeklong rentals, the lessor has to go through the trouble of finding a new tenant every week instead of being guaranteed the rent for the year.
Of course, you can make the argument that the yearlong lessee who then rents his unit to a different occupant every week is putting in the extra effort every week to
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That's because with weeklong rentals, the lessor has to go through the trouble of finding a new tenant every week instead of being guaranteed the rent for the year.
And probably more importantly, with shorter-term commitments, the lessor takes on the risk that no one will rent the place the next week and there will be no rental income. So the shorter-term commitments price this risk in via higher rent per day for a shorter commitment.
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Short term rentals tend to suffer greater levels of wear and tear than long term rentals as well. So this is a consideration when choosing between the two options.
Re: Seems reasonable (Score:3)
A lot of rent in cities are paid by governments. So a "low income" tenant may not even have to pay rent, get income assistance, food stamps they live "temporarily" with a partner, husband/wife or family that has the same arrangement (gets assistance etc) while subletting the entire house and netting the entire rent in cash to students or other transient residents.
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That's not necessarily true. The market value for a place to stay can fluctuate for all sorts of reasons. Look at how hotel rates fluctuate between weekdays and weekends, by season, and if there is some kind of special event happening nearby.
Furthermore there is a lot of cost associated in renting out a place for the short term. This is why staying in a hotel for a couple nights is more expensive over time than renting an apartment. The hotel needs to clean the room before every new guest arrives, etc.
I
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> I would say if the tenant is renting it out and able to make a profit it is only possible if the landlord is renting below market value.
Not at all. A short-term stay at a furnished apartment is always going to cost a lot more than a long-term lease of an unfurnished one. What the tenants are doing is renting out their place while they are away (vacation, trip, etc.). Of course that still violates the no-subleasing rule found in most contracts. But I think the only thing landlord can do in this case is
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So, you think that the per diem for a one year lease should be the same as that for an overnight rental? Do you know what Airbnb is?
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I would say if the tenant is renting it out and able to make a profit it is only possible if the landlord is renting below market value. The tenant is merely exploiting the difference between his listed rental price and the market rental to make a profit.
You're assuming the (actual) renter is using AirBnB to make a profit. They could be simply renting out an extra room or the whole place while they are out of town to recoup some of their paid rent for that month. It's not possible to put your lease payments on hold while you're on vacation after all. The value of the residence isn't necessarily being judged wrong. The original renter agreed to pay the rate for all the space and amenities in the location, and now are getting money in return for letting someo
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I realize the issue is complex (I was once a landlord myself), but while landlords have legitimate interests, a lot of them are just plain greedy and a certain percentage are downright dishonest.
I always tried to be fair with tenants and work with them. I had a few bad tenants, of course, like anyone does, but by and large with almost everyone we could mutually work things out when necessary.
But then, I was only looking for a reasonable return on investment, not trying to squeeze every cent out of people wh
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Yeah, it's like they're rent seeking or something.
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'Randos' - I like that....
Landlords should put this in their leases (Score:2)
They should put clauses in their leases banning subletting/AirBnB. Do that and then anyone who violates it can be evicted for breaching the lease.
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So if they are doing it, why aren't they kicking out tenants for breach-of-lease?
As well as eviction from their current properly, breaking the terms of the lease could very well (in Australia at least) get their name on a database of bad tenants that landlords/agents can consult and use to refuse them other properties in the future.
Analogy, please (Score:5, Funny)
This is Slashdot, so we need analogies.
Say I have a KVM Linode, and then "WebBnB" wants an LXC container on my Linode, and they're running Apache in their container, and serving up several VirtualHost websites for their customers. WebBnB needs to charge their customers for the websites, so I can charge them, and Linode can charge me extra. And we all take a cut, thereby making WebBnB the stupidest and most expensive webhosting company ever, so the customers leave 'em and start doing business directly with Linode. Problem solved.
I am a Landlord (Score:5, Informative)
I am a landlord, of four one-bedroom apartments, and all of my leases explicitly disallow subletting. Numerous posters, with zero stated understanding of any kind of real estate practice, seem to think that subletting is "illegal" if it's disallowed in their lease. Someone is not going to go to jail, or have to deal with the cops, for breaking a provision in a lease I wrote. They may get evicted, which could involve the cops, but that's an eviction. Breaking the agreement isn't going to have legal consequences, past the *potential* eviction, unless I chose to try and have a judge pass a judgement (and then good luck on enforcing this judgement.)
Plus, this 100% depends on the lease. I can write a lease which gives full authority to sublet, one that disallows subletting, or one that gives me a percentage of the sublet. Unless we read the lease, there is no reason to try and pass any kind of informed judgement on the situation.
The entire process I described to you, having a judge pass judgement against someone, and then sending that person to collections (or garnishing their wages) is a big, big, pain. Plus, it's going to destroy the relationship with the renter. The judge is going to award you probably all the income they made, since they were not authorized to resell your place, and maybe 3x as much for damages. That's still not worth your time, unless you like spending time in court or need to be there anyways. Even then, the tenant isn't going to be able to pay, and collections won't be able to get it out of them...
It's like 1000x easier if you have an agreement in place with airbnb.com, as a property owner, to automatically get a cut of the short term rental on your place. Especially if you own a gigantic tower in New York City, as opposed to four rinky dinky apartments in Albuquerque, New Mexico (like I do.) You can negotiate with airbnb.com ONCE for your entire property (if you have a standard subletting clause, which everyone is under) as opposed to getting a judge to offer a judgement against every single person, who is going to end their lease at that point.
The only reason this is even news is because most people have no idea about how rental property actually works. This isn't news - it's called good business.
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Numerous posters, with zero stated understanding of any kind of real estate practice, seem to think that subletting is "illegal" if it's disallowed in their lease. Someone is not going to go to jail, or have to deal with the cops,
Yeah but maybe they like to imagine numerous police in battle gear busting down doors with tear gas and flashbang grenades, all makes action footage for the evening news. In the real world, lease disagreements and mitigations are PITA and to outside observer it's really boring (unless it's elevated to The Judge Judy Show). I have no idea what this airbnd site is about, I guess I need to research it so I can make sensible arguments on the forums.
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"...imagine numerous police in battle gear busting down doors with tear gas and flashbang grenades, all makes action footage for the evening news."
That make me laugh.
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Basically they're demanding a cut of the revenue for doing _nothing_.
Dude, that's capitalism! You get a cut of the revenue for doing nothing because you own the damn thing. It's the ground principle of the whole idea: I own things, you work with them, I earn the money and pay you the minimum amount required for you to willingly continue working.
Some opinions. (Score:2)
On the other hand, violating your lease, is definitely a problem, even if you feel it's unfair.
Now as to the landlords/property owners wanting a cut, that's pretty bogus and greedy.
Though I would find having the renter pay obtain an appropriate insurance before hand to cover things if the AirBnB 'visitor' messed somethin
Sharing Business Model Assumes You Own Resource (Score:2)
The sharing/gig economic model assumes that someone owns something of economic value that is not already 100% utilized, be it an automobile, a domicile, labor, or what-have-you. If you want to sell use of something you don't own, you either need to stay under the radar of the owner, or have an agreement giving you the right to make the sale.
A comment snarks about whether adding a baby counts as sharing. In the US, usually no, unless you live in a community whose covenant limits permanent residents to 55-and
Boiled down (Score:2)
This whole article can be boiled down to "We want a piece of the action".
CompStak wants a share of PlayStation revenues (Score:2, Funny)
In related news...
CompStak wants a share of PlayStation revenues.
CompStak is the CRE (Commercial Real Estate) company that leases the 2207 Bridgepointe Pkwy, San Mateo, CA building to Sony Entertainment for the production of software for the Sony PlayStation, including their FreeBSD based operating systems development.
They are upset that their renters are making money through their least of their property, and have decided they want a cut of the revenues that result from the business done by their lessees.
J
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That's an interesting thought, and it wouldn't surprise me if a landlord eventually tries to pull that act on commercial property via an inventive reading of the lease.
However, I'm reasonably sure Sony's lease allows them to pursue normal s/w business activities... unless they sublet to Sony Pictures for a pr0n shoot.
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That's an interesting thought, and it wouldn't surprise me if a landlord eventually tries to pull that act on commercial property via an inventive reading of the lease.
This is pretty much how McDonalds franchising works: they pick the location for you, they buy the real estate, and then they lease it to you on the condition that you pay them franchise fees, rent, and so on on top of that.
It's also how most "incubators" and "accelerators" operate: they give you a location to work in exchange for an equity cut. The only real difference to the Sony scenario is that Sony wouldn't give them that cut, because Sony isn't a cash-strapped startup.
Most people renting housing are a
Re:Double dipping (Score:5, Funny)
You made your bed, fucking sleep in it.
Can't, it's being sub-let for the next four nights.
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God dammit, that's why you calculate your daily rent, and optionally tack on profit. You don't pay your rent that day, some random stranger does. To you, so you can turn it over to the property owner.
If subletting is not in the contract, you lose those days. If it is allowable, and you can't AirBnb it, you have to pay the rent.
Finally, let me restate your post. All rentees shall renegotiate their contracts for a per diem scale instead of monthly. When you don't live there, you don't pay. What will a landlor
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Why all the hostility? They rent at market rates for single family use as is (which is likely unfurnished). Its very possible that they're only legally allowed to rent in that way:
1. Government subsided housing
2. Limited Accessibility (Hosuing Coops)
3. Occupant Security / Strata restrictions (Appartments/Condos)
Ultimately, its a boring old contract law problem, you either have the right to sublet, or you don't. If there are restrictions on sublets, the landlord can evict / negotiate whatever share they see
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Maybe he does but you're missing the good logic that the post does contain.
If the landlord doesn't want the place rented out then that should be in the lease. (similar issue... if the short term sublet is illegal it's illegal)
If it is in the lease / illegal and the tenant does it anyway? They are in violation of the lease / law and should be dealt with accordingly. There is no reason to be exploring different methods here. The legal and practical means are there to deal with this situation. All the major
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Suppose rent controls force landlords to rent property out at below-market rates? Is it "fair" that a tenant can then sublet at market rates - even if the lease specifically prevents subletting?
Second things first: If subletting is prohibited, there is no AirBnB income.
If rent control forces landlords to limit their rates, then how can tenants rent (through AirBnB) at higher rates? Rent control is rent control. So why can AirBnB break the rules?
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Hotels and apartments are two completely separate classes of business under most zoning laws. So if it's an apartment, you can't run a one room hotel out of it.
Re: Ummm (Score:2)
These things are already legalized in areas and in contracts. The problem is that most people ignore those or don't know the restrictions exist/apply.
The same applies to people selling stuff on eBay and never reporting the income.
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In it doesn't stop with airbnb. There are annoyances just from having neighbors that invite over people I don't like, or in many cases I just don't like the neighbors themselves. I think a simple solution would be to stop people I don;t like from living near me.
I like this idea of a law prohibiting guests for more than 2 days, but I'd like to see it reduced to 1 or even 0, and also have it apply to the owners of properties as well.
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no, just as a home owner the bank/mortgage owner doesn't not get a cut of your ABnB
Re:Interesting precedent (Score:4, Insightful)
A car owner with a car loan is the wrong comparison. The proper comparison would be with a leased car.
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If you've bought a car and haven't paid it off, you own the car but if you break the agreement by not paying your loan the lender can repossess your car. If you've bought a house, and haven't paid it off, you own the house but if you break the agreement by not paying your mortgage the lender can repossess your house. In both cases, you are the legal owner. (There is the possibility of paying for the house and having ownership transferred after it's paid for, called "contract for deed", but it can cause
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I like AirBnB, but it has to be legal.
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