Housing advocate warns Airbnb is eating away at rental market
Posted February 20, 2016 1:38 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – While the vacancy rate in Vancouver sits at less than one per cent, more and more rental units are heading towards the Airbnb route.
Housing advocate Sharon Isaak says landowners are using the site more and more to maximize profits. “Initially it wasn’t done that much but as we have seen in other cities, it is exploding. Airbnb is becoming a huge part of the rental market and keeping units empty away from residents who live in the cities where Airbnb is taking over.”
She says there are clear examples of long term housing units being transformed into short term space for people who don’t live in the city. “There is a building in the West End that was purchased by an owner that tried to evict everybody to run an Airbnb and when you have that sort of thing going on, renters don’t stand a chance.”
Isaak believes this is the unintended consequence of the online service, and more research into how we can solve the problem is needed.
