Report Says that More than Half the AirBNB Units in NYC May be Illegal

A new report about Airbnb in New York City could be very damaging to the highly popular home sharing/renting website. It turns out that most of the listings in New York City might be illegal. Why? According to the report more than 58% of listings in New York City are for “entire” apartments or houses cited by Capital New York. The listings imply that no one else would be living in the unit during the visitor’s stay. Of these full-home listings, around 10,000 are in Manhattan.

For this project entitled “Inside Airbnb,” Activist Murray Cox gathered the data. However, it’s illegal to rent out most homes, one- and two-family residences excluded, for less than 30 days when the owner or tenant is not present under state law, according to the website. The website found only one full apartment listing for more than 30 days in New York. It’s unclear, however, how many of the the full-home listings in the city are exempt from the 30-day rule, Capital reported.

“We do not comment on public scrapes of our information, because, like here, these scrapes use inaccurate information to make misleading assumptions about our community,” an Airbnb spokesperson emailed to the website. “Thousands of regular New Yorkers are using Airbnb everyday to help make ends meet. That’s why it is so important that we fix local laws to allow people to share the home in which they live.”

Last year, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman released a report that showed that nearly 75 percent of the city’s Airbnb rentals violated zoning or other laws. That report showed also that commercial operators managed more than a third of the units and accounted for more than a third of the revenue.

What will this mean for Airbnb and business in New York? Mostly likely a much more strict understanding of the housing laws of New York City as well as stricter guidelines on rentals. We will keep you posted as this event unfolds.

Picture via Airbnb on Flickr