Amsterdam introduced in new guidelines for Airbnb hosts in 2022 and the outcomes are revealing.
Quick-term rental reserving platform Airbnb has hit again at Spanish restrictions on rental properties, stressing that they are going to have extreme repercussions for each revenue and jobs.
Citing analysis undertaken by Oxford Economics in late 2024, Airbnb warns of 400,000 jobs being put in danger by the laws, alongside virtually €30 billion of revenue.
The Spanish authorities carried out new laws on short-term leases on 2 January. Any property proprietor wishing to hire out their home is now required to be registered in a nationwide database and acquire a allow earlier than they’ll record their property on reserving platforms.
Lodging suppliers are additionally required to gather delicate private data from their friends, together with financial institution particulars and private identifiers. Spain has additionally proposed to lift VAT on short-term leases to match the ten per cent paid by inns.
Though it went reside in January, the regulation gained’t be totally enforced till 1 July. After that date, property homeowners danger fines of as much as €600,000 for non-compliance.
Why is Spain inserting these restrictions on rental properties?
For the Spanish authorities, corporations like Airbnb are fueling a housing disaster that may solely be stopped by way of regulation.
“Our obligation is to prioritise use of properties over vacationer use,” Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez mentioned at a press convention final week. “There are too many Airbnbs. What’s missing is housing.”
Sanchez claims that non-residents from exterior the EU purchased roughly 27,000 homes and flats in Spain in 2023, to not reside in however to earn a living from. “With the housing shortage that now we have, we clearly can not permit this,” he concluded.
Alongside restrictions on who can hire out homes and new pink tape for potential landlords, Spain is hoping to use a tax of as much as 100 per cent on property purchases for non-EU patrons. This would come with patrons from the UK.
Another excuse for the modifications is residents talking in opposition to the results of overtourism. All through 2024, components of Spain had been rocked by dramatic anti-tourism protests at customer hotspots, with extra anticipated in 2025.
Regardless of native protests, Spain noticed a ten per cent improve in guests in 2024, with 94 million overseas vacationers visiting in keeping with Tourism Minister Jordi Hereu.
For property homeowners, the implementation of those new guidelines is an unwelcome and infrequently complicated addition.
“There’s loads of uncertainty about it,” says Samuel Toribio, head of Europe at rental platform Homelike. “We’re seeing totally different layers of laws being utilized on the identical time that in some instances are contradictory.”
Toribio notes that these totally different functions at municipal, regional and nationwide ranges are inflicting confusion available in the market. Whereas the nationwide coverage requires a registration quantity, some areas are implementing the foundations in another way.
In Andalucia, for instance, the foundations change relying on the size of the rental time period, and in Madrid, a rule is being handed stopping any new short-term leases within the metropolis centre. “There’s a lack of standardisation within the scene that results in worrying uncertainty,” he added.
Airbnb warns of impacts on rural communities and small companies
The Oxford Economics report discovered that 141 million visitor nights had been spent in short-term leases in Spain in 2023. Hosts earned €5.4 billion, however having these friends in Spain earned the financial system €29.6 billion by way of spending in retailers, eating places and native companies.
“Extreme restrictions imposed on short-term leases won’t solely be detrimental to hosts but additionally to rural improvement and industrial exercise in small native companies,” says Airbnb. “They will even hurt household tourism that merely seeks to search out inexpensive lodging in non-crowded areas, damaging Spain’s competitiveness as a household vacation spot.”
Information from Eurostat exhibits a development in the direction of rural and less-visited areas for short-term leases. In 2023, 33.6 per cent of nights had been spent in rural areas, up from 31 per cent in 2018, a rise of 17.6 million visitor nights.
Final 12 months, round 150 small Spanish cities and municipalities welcomed their first vacationers, and Airbnb has leases accessible in additional than 5,000 rural and non-urban localities throughout the nation.
“Airbnb’s position in selling these rural experiences enhances the attraction of those locations, empowers native communities, and encourages sustainable tourism practices,” concludes Oxford Economics.
Airbnb says 70 per cent of its bookings are for properties in rural or low-density city areas.
“By staying in a vacation residence, these travellers have found new neighbourhoods and landscapes,” mentioned Juliette Langlais, EMEA Public Affairs Director at Airbnb. “By directing vacationers away from crowded city locations the place lodge provide, concentrated vacationer flows and native challenges accumulate, short-term leases have dispersed the advantages of tourism to native households and enterprise in numerous rural locations.”
Rental platform HomeToGo advised Euronews Journey that, in 2024, 87 per cent of its searches for stays in Spain had been for rural locations.
Do restrictions on vacation leases clear up overtourism?
Case research from different cities the place restrictions on short-term leases have been imposed recommend this won’t be the golden bullet Spain is in search of.
In Amsterdam, which has carried out quite a few laws on short-term leases, the vacationers haven’t stopped coming. Because the present laws had been launched in 2022, the general visitor nights within the metropolis have elevated by 12 per cent.
Whereas inns have seen visitor nights soar, the affect of the laws has hit short-term rental homeowners disproportionately. In the identical interval, there was a 52 per cent lower in short-term rental visitor nights, which Oxford Economics says may imply €269 million in potential host earnings have been misplaced.
The report additionally flags a rising ‘casual’ rental market, the place hosts merely ignore the system and hire to friends unofficially, promoting in classifieds or on social media as an alternative of regulated platforms.
“Airbnb understands that in sure areas in style with vacationers, the place devoted short-term leases make up a big share of the housing inventory, the affect on housing prices and availability could possibly be comparatively excessive,” says Jaime Rodríguez de Santiago, Basic Supervisor of Airbnb Spain. “That is the place Airbnb is open to working with governments to implement focused and tiered regulation.”
Quick-term leases make up a tiny proportion of the full housing inventory in main European cities. Amsterdam has the very best proportion, however it’s nonetheless only one.5 per cent. In Spain, 1.2 per cent of Barcelona and Madrid’s housing is classed as short-term leases.
However even this isn’t the complete image, as a lot of these leases are lived in for at the least a number of the 12 months by the property homeowners. On the subject of devoted leases, which can be found for at the least 180 nights a 12 months, Madrid’s share is 0.1 per cent and Barcelona’s 1.3 per cent.
Airbnb claims that the lodge foyer has been pushing the message that short-term leases are guilty for housing shortages. But when it’s not Airbnb and comparable platforms inflicting the housing disaster, what’s?
“The principle subject is the dearth of provide,” Samuel Toribio advised Euronews Journey. “The rhythm of latest homes constructed hasn’t but reached the requirements of 2007 resulting from an elevated value of manufacturing, lack of pros within the trade and incapacity to draw funding.”
Toribio additionally cites the brand new residential legislation in Spain, which got here into impact in 2023, as being ‘scary’ for the trade. He says that there’s a lack of fiscal incentives for personal landlords to place extra housing available on the market.
Airbnb Spain says the elemental downside shouldn’t be sufficient homes being constructed. “Within the final decade, Spain has constructed fewer properties than at any level since 1970,” a spokesperson advised Euronews Journey. “In 2023, information from the Ministry of Housing exhibits that the creation of latest households in Spain outpaced the variety of new properties constructed by three to 1.”
The rental platform additionally factors out that Spain has over 4 million vacant properties, accounting for greater than 14 per cent of its housing inventory.
On the subject of overtourism, Toribio notes that discussions are wanted that transcend the present laws. “There’s a big want for a dialogue round potential quotas and the kind of tourism that cities can soak up,” he says.
Airbnb and the Oxford Economics report each flag that, by implementing these restrictions, Spain may really be driving extra tourism to the already overcrowded cities and concrete areas.
“These regulatory limitations are contributing to Spain’s tourism financial system being closely reliant on worldwide lodge chains, super-concentrated in sure city and coastal areas,” says Airbnb. “That is fueling mass tourism and driving up lodging costs for travellers, with little or no profit to native households.”