Airbnb comes to the fore in the midst of an offensive by the Government, autonomous communities and city councils against the proliferation of tourist apartments. This Wednesday, the reservation platform published a report commissioned by the consulting firm PwC with which it tries to deny that short-term rentals (ACD) are responsible for the crisis in traditional rental supply and the high prices of housing both in lease as in purchase. According to this analysis, properties that have continuous activity in the vacation rental market represent only 0.5% of the total Spanish housing stock.
The document defends that although this year some 351,389 ACDs have been active (both complete floors and rooms) as reflected in the data from the INE -which represents 1.3% of the Spanish housing stock-, only 37% of them have been allocated “intensively” to the tourist rental market, while there is another 63% that has not had tourism as a main activity. According to Airbnb, 52% of properties are rented sporadically (less than a third of the year), especially in the towns on the Spanish coast, where owners take advantage of the summer to make a profit. While the remaining 11% are main homes, which belong to owners and tenants who rent during periods when they are absent. “Properties used occasionally as short-term rentals are unlikely to enter the traditional market, even in the face of strict regulation,” the report’s authors believe.
Furthermore, according to PwC and Airbnb, most of these rentals are not even found in the large Spanish capitalswhich is where the housing market is tightest. 76% of these leases would be concentrated mainly in small and medium-sized municipalities. “In addition, municipalities with a higher concentration of ACD tend to have smaller populations, with an average population of less than 7,000 inhabitants in cases where they represent more than 2% of the local housing stock,” says the report.
The document also refers to the fact that the majority of ACDs are secondary homes of the owners (89% of the cases), which would represent 16% of the total number of houses in Spain, but the majority of which would be concentrated in small towns. , and only 9% in large cities.
They focus on empty homes
The multinational dedicated to booking tourist apartments thus defends that short-term rentals are not the reason for the supply deficit that our country is experiencing, and points out that efforts should be focused on putting the almost four million empty houses on the market. there are in Spain (according to the Bank of Spain, only 400,000 of them would be in areas with demand) and which represent 14.4% of the residential stock. Likewise, the low rate of housing production in Spain is also noted as a determining factor, with barely 83,000 units delivered on average per year; the stagnation of the rehabilitation of houses and the drastic decrease in the construction of social housing, all factors that the Bank of Spain has pointed out in recent reports.
They cushion the lack of hotel capacity
Airbnb also defends that the growth of short-term rentals is supporting the tourist ‘boom’ that Spain is experiencing after the pandemic, ensuring that in many regions hotel capacity is unable to cover the existing level of demand. This would happen in regions like Cantabria (174%), Valencia (169%), Asturias (164%), Navarre (155%) and Catalonia (143%), where demand has exceeded hotel capacity between 40% and 70%. “This highlights the crucial role of tourism in the Spanish economy and the need for alternatives to hotels to effectively adapt to growing demand and the evolution of consumer preferences,” reflects the document.
«The majority of short-term rentals are secondary residences that are not primarily dedicated to tourism, but their flexibility allows them to meet both residential and tourist needs. “This versatility strengthens the crucial tourism sector while supplementing the income of owners, all without the need to create or dedicate a permanent residential space exclusively for tourism purposes,” the PwC and Airbnb report concludes.
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