When we founded Airbnb, the idea was simple: help ordinary people open their homes, earn extra income and connect travelers with communities in a more authentic way.
New Yorkers have been part of this story from the beginning, welcoming guests into their homes, sharing the city’s spirit with the world, and earning some additional dollars to meet rising costs.
This month, we made a long-term bet on New York’s future: purchasing a permanent home in a historic Manhattan location. It’s more than an office, it’s a statement of confidence in this city.
That statement of confidence might surprise some who have been closely tracking our recent history with New York legislators.
Nearly three years ago the city effectively banned home sharing. The results speak for themselves: 92% of Airbnb listings have vanished, rents remain at record highs, vacancies haven’t moved, and the outer boroughs alone have lost $1.5 billion in visitor spending, 15,000 jobs and $573 million in earnings. Restricting homeowners’ rights to earn income didn’t make this city more affordable — it made it harder for working families to get by.
Before Airbnb was basically banned, 93% of hosts here told us that they relied on Airbnb to pay their mortgage or keep up with the cost of living.
Consider what the ban actually means. For a retiree sharing a spare room or a parent listing their college student’s bedroom, hosting can mean the difference between staying in their home and losing it.
A family of five visiting from out of town can’t fit in one hotel room. Instead of a home, that family now needs two or three hotel rooms just to stay together, pricing many visitors out of the city entirely. None of this makes New York more affordable. It just makes the city harder to visit and less affordable for everyone the law claims to help.
Hotels play an important role in helping tourists visit the city, something we also believe and is why Airbnb has also partnered with the city’s hotels making hotel bookings a meaningful and growing part of our business here. But hotels weren’t built for a family that needs multiple rooms or a guest who wants to stay a week or more and no hotel partnership lets a New Yorker earn a dollar by sharing what they already have.
We believe responsible home sharing and strong community protections can coexist, as they do in cities worldwide.
Homeowners in the outer boroughs’ one- and two-family houses should be able to responsibly share their home, earning supplemental income. We’ll keep working with policymakers to restore that opportunity through commonsense reforms grounded in facts, not fear.
In the face of New York’s affordability crisis, the partnership between Airbnb and the city of New York has never been more important. In recent years we’ve backed housing stability across the city, through the Airbnb Community Fund and partnerships like our $1 million commitment with Neighborhood Housing Services of NYC. Tax revenues from homesharing have the potential to generate tens of millions in additional revenue for the city.
You don’t put down a permanent home in a city you’re planning to leave. You do it because your employees and community partners are here, and because this remains one of the greatest cities in the world to build and create community. We’ll keep investing here, keep supporting homeowners and the small businesses that depend on neighborhood tourism, and keep pushing for policies that let New Yorkers benefit from their own city.
New York has been counted out before, and it has proven the doubters wrong every single time. We’re excited to be a part of that story.
Blecharczyk is the co-founder and chief strategy officer of Airbnb.