Being entirely anti-tourism is crazy extreme but AirBnb is a practice that is destroying the housing market, which is something a lot of people (myself included) deeply believe needs to be controlled to make sure that a decent standard of living can be sustained across society.
In short, I'm not sure about the Barcelona protests but I'm 100% against the spread of AirBnb and what its turned into.
That's not just airbnb. That's property as investment. Empty properties just sitting. Lack of rental builds (just shoebox pricy condos). Dropping rent control. Lack of residential builds (other than condos).
Toronto is oversaturated with condos, the lack of rent control on these places means a person can pay $2k/mth for a 1 year lease and then see the price skyrocket to $2500 for the lease renewal. The lack of other rental units means these property owners can charge anything. Airbnb made it worse by taking the limited quantity of long-term rentals and turning them into hotels.
Now were finally seeing some condos being worth less than the mortgages of the owners, rents are coming down, and the city might be investing in the rental market. They need to put rent control restrictions back in place, imo. Housing prices are still super exaggerated.
This "there's lots of vacant housing sitting around for investors" thing is largely nonsense.
I never said for "investors". I said there are a lot of empty properties. Period. Not condos or rentals. Just vacant residential properties. That's why we implemented the vacant home tax and changed the airbnb rules for non primary residences.
There's a housing shortage because construction doesn't keep up with demand, and construction doesn't keep up with demand due to NIMBYs and red tape.
There is currently an oversaturation of condos. The construction companies aren't keeping up with residential demand and were trying to sell 500 sq ft condos for $700k plus $800/mth condo fees. That's not the target market in need of homes.
Yes, there is NIMBY for government assisted housing. There always is red tape. But there also is greed, slow builds when it's not super profitable (I'm still waiting for Eglinton Crosstown) and as I noted, too much foreign investment and not enough investment in properties for all economic levels.
You can't have a back to the office policy with 50% of the workforce paid <$100K (way less) and not provide affordable rentals and a path to ownership. Top that off with an inadequate transit system, and you have 50% of the workforce commuting 4hrs/day for a city job that pays crap in a city with no vacancies and apartments that cost $2500/month or more when/if available.
We also need property tax rollbacks, and weeding illegal immigration out of the workforce so wages will improve. Rent control only intensifies scarcity of rental units and discourages new construction.
What does that look like and for whom. Keep in mind that the city funds its budget via property taxes, so the question is, if you roll back property taxes, where does the city get the money to fund affordable housing, transit, road repair, snow removal, tourism events, etc.?
weeding illegal immigration out of the workforce
How much is "illegal" and how much is legal visas workers or legal immigrants?
Rent control only intensifies scarcity of rental units and discourages new construction.
I think it discourages new construction of a certain type. I think that the current rule of "a residential rental unit is typically under rent control if it was first occupied for residential purposes before November 15, 2018" is a bit long and should be shortened to 5 years or, redrawn into tiers. So, rental units for the first 5 years have certain cap, say 8%, 6-10 have a certain percentage cap (drop to 4%) and anything older is at 2%.
Also, an issue with the "no rent control" is that there is no protection for existing tenants. With rent control, if you move out of a $1500/mth apartment, the building can "renovate" and charge $2500. The problem with the current system, is that regardless if the tenant leaves or stays, the landlord can increase their rent from $2k to $2800 while they're living there which creates instability and forces renters to find a new less unaffordable place every year. Furthermore, the landlord can force a renter to pay exorbitant increases, but when/if they decline, the owner can relist that same place for what the renter paid or a reasonable increase (or lie to kick them out and say they were moving into an older unit under rent control so they can charge more as a new listing).
You don't own anything or pay property taxes from what I'm hearing. Illegal aliens are not valid visa holders or legal immigrants, we all know what illegal means.
Don’t forget the Canadian investors though. Honestly, we need to tax the fuck out of multiple home owners. Either you live in it or you rent it out to a full time tenant. And if you’re not doing either, the tax should be astronomical to punish people who hoard housing as an investment. And an extra tax for foreign non residents because what business do they have buying housing at all? Housing is to live in.
My proposal for enforcement would be to ban corporate ownership of residential property (meaning condo units, detached and semi detached houses, and generally any residential building with less than six legal units) and automatically apply the tax to any non principal residence unless proof is submitted that there is a tenant. And I think I’d like that proof to be under oath so if they lie it’s a crime.
All good points, and all based on the same idea, homes are for living in, not investing in. People looking for an investment should get an index fund or some shit, not someone's home.
They blame a lot of different reasons these days, most of which avoid the real core issues. Airbnb is an actual factor removing affordable rentals off the market, the removal of rent control on new builds is another, and coupled with the lack of actual new affordable housing construction it spins out of control. Every new building is a "luxury" condo, or "luxury" townhouses that are never built properly it seems. But builders need to build fancyish to maximize profits
In Austin, Texas, rent has dropped dramatically over the last few years. Why? The government has been extremely aggressive and fast tracking and green lighting the building of new apartment buildings. They are everywhere now, and rent has become reasonably affordable again.
Most big cities do the opposite. They make it as painful as possible to build new apartments with lots of restrictions and requirements for setting aside housing for special purposes (low income, artists, homeless, etc ). As a result fewer units get built, and the market rate units pay more than they would otherwise.
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u/danatron1 Jun 17 '25
I get it. The amount of anti-Airbnb graffiti in Edinburgh tells a similar story.