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NYC Fines Airbnb Hosts For 'Illegal' Home Rentals (cnet.com)
In October, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed into law one of the nation's toughest restrictions on Airbnb, which includes hefty fines of up to $7,500 for people who rent out space in their apartments. Several month have passed and the New York Post has learned of "the first casualties of [the] newly enforceable law." The city has reportedly charged two hosts with a combined total of 17 violations, and since each violation comes with a $1,000 fine, it adds up to $17,000. From their report: Property owner Hank Freid -- who was once crowned one of NYC's "Worst Landlords" by a watchdog group in 2005 -- and real estate broker Tatiana Cames were slapped with 17 violations, at $1,000 apiece, for their allegedly illegal listings on Manhattan's Upper West Side and in Bedford-Stuyvesant, in Brooklyn, according to documents obtained by the Post. Freid, who manages the Marrakech Hotel, was hit with 12 violations for listing SROs in the building on several booking platforms, including Booking.com, Expedia, Kayak, Hotwire, Travelocity, and Orbitz, the citations reveal. Meanwhile, Cames -- who was served with five violations -- allegedly posted five separate listings to Airbnb advertising 320 Macon St, which records show she purchased for $2.15M in 2015. The Macon St. property was discovered to have inadequate fire alarms, sprinklers, illegal subdivisions, and a confused bunch of French tourists in a rear unit, according the procured documents. Cames appears to be making money off the vacancies in the building as she attempts to fill the space, as the same units are advertised as "for rent" on her personal website. The listings also seem to suggest that drawing illegal Airbnb-ers into BedStuy will help "diversify" the locale. If Freid and Cames don't pull their listings, they could be hit with a second set of violations, at $5,000 a pop.
Ask most neighbors of air bnb rentals how they feel about having a different stranger live next to them every few days. Residential areas are created so that people can be part of a community that shares a common interest in the quality of living in that place. Even complaining to the police won't deter an air bnb resident because they know they will be gone soon.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Right.... AirBNB has some illegal unlicensed activity and NYC uses law to impose heavy fines.
At the left side of the argument, illegal unlicensed people in NYC get taxpayer subsidized healthcare and public services and, including cash benefits.
Can somebody explain to how to reconcile enforcement of one laws and ignoring the second laws, printed on the same paper with the same ink.
We're the government and we're here to help. You know, because babies and terrorists and shit. We sympathize, but we can't allow you to use you own home because [Redacted].
But now we have to get back to other important things, like polishing up regulation on restrooms and soda refills.
Also we need to kindly ask you to dispose of the lunch your brought to work today. New York special executive order 1428731, Section 4b, Paragraph 28, clearly states that your Michelinas frozen noodle lunch exceeds permissible caloric and sodium content. If you dispose of it now, we'll reduce your fine to $1500.
The failure to understand why people don't want a different stranger living next to them every week is a sure sign that our society is breaking down. You can only have a functional society if people have some sort of empathy for people.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
No, residential areas are created to provide places to live. Period. Full Stop.
You don't get a veto over your neighbors, only who stays at YOUR house. . . . .
Just what we need - more government telling us what to do with our own damn homes.
Reason 124,151,813,523 Trump won.
What part of "The Macon St. property was discovered to have inadequate fire alarms, sprinklers, illegal subdivisions" you didn't get? Or maybe you missed the "Hank Freid was once crowned one of NYC's "Worst Landlords" by a watchdog group in 2005" part?
Newsflash: it might be your own damn home, but it's likely close to someone else' and, surprise surprise, you can't do as you please with it.
RT.
Laws barring property rental are per se illegal, as the constitution does not give the government, at any level, the explicit right to dictate what one does (or does not do) with their own property. This goes for zoning as well.
Sure it does. It delegates or defers (depending on your view) to the states the authority to make laws that are not spelled out specifically in the constitution. States have done so, generally at the behest of their citizens. Granted money talks and not all citizens get an equal say, but the states do have the rights to make laws wherever not explicitly prohibited by the constitution (and federal law, which ultimately rolls up to the constitution.)
Zoning and property use laws are generally a good thing. I don't want a heavy industrial manufacturing process in the middle of my residential neighborhood. Because of this my neighbors and I (over history) have expressed this desire to government and zoning has occurred that prevents this.
The fines were $1000 per incident. Let's assume each unit rents for $1000/wk. And since there are multiple units in these buildings, a single ad could cover several units. I'll make a giant assumption of 10 units per building, and an occupancy rate of 50%.
(10x52x1000)/2 = $260,000. A $17,000 fine may cut into profits a bit, but it is hardly punitive. At $5,000 a pop, that starts to be enough to discourage the behavior. But even then the venture appears, if not wildly profitable, still better than having the units sit empty.
.....for free. Once you charge money for individuals to stay at your home you are in direct violation of zoning laws put in place by the local government voted in place by you and your neighbors. You want to turn your house into a short-term commercial rental, then get the zoning and/or laws changed to allow for that use in a residential zone. Those zoning laws are the same reason why I can't buy the house next to you and on a whim decide to bulldoze it and put up a small factory.
I call Bullshit on that "part of a community" bit. Tell me the name and hobby of your next door neighbor.
And now find 5 other people who can tell that. Nobody gives a shit who's living next door in large cities. You would probably only notice that someone in your apartment megacomplex died because after a few months in Summer it starts to smell funny.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"Ask most neighbors of air bnb rentals how they feel about having a different stranger live next to them every few days." ...Say people in an urban area where they don't know their neighbors anyway. NYC regulations make it impossible to build any new housing units other than condos for the super-rich, so subletting apps are a natural way for the proles to eke out more living space.
If a city doesn't want to deal with this, then start making it easier to put up new apartment stock.
If this was already against the zoning laws, why did NYC need this new law?
"Might" ?? You can't value hypotheticals. Now, if they **DO** have loud parties every night, you call the cops for their disturbing the peace, or perhaps talk to your landlord or Homeowners' Association. The latter two generally have enforceable rules about nuisances. . .
The line is drawn where the community draws it. If you don't like where they draw the line you either have to pick a different community, convince them to change their minds or accumulate so much power that you can overrule them. Whinging about natural law/rights has proven to be a very poor way of doing the latter. What works better is to be part of a tight nit minority and filling the media, judiciary and government with members of your minority.
Since you brought up zoning... Some zoning laws don't allow hotels, motels, or a bed and breakfast to be operated in a residential zone. I'm not arguing for or against what NY is doing, I'm just making a point that these operations MAY be in violation of their local zoning laws.
I'm all for what Air BnB does, as long as the original intent is followed. If my neighbor wants to rent out his house while he's out of town, more power to him. I would start to object when a slumlord is buying up the houses in my neighborhood, pimping them out on a daily basis to whomever is passing through town, and not maintaining them.
I mean that is kind of the point of zoning laws, isn't it? If I don't want to live next to a motel (or smelter plant) I am pretty secure in knowing that one isn't going to be built next to my house 2 years after I buy it. And having a stable place to live, knowing who my neighbors are, knowing who I need to keep an eye on is part of the value of living in a residential neighborhood. I certainly don't have the ability to control who my neighbors are, but by choosing to live in a residential area I have a certain expectation that I won't have a new set of neighbors in the house next door every week.
The fact that your home isn't built as a hotel and lacks the usual consumer protections is precisely why the city won't allow you to treat it as one.
However I agree that the NYC law seems overly strict. Over here, cities implement such laws to prevent disturbances caused by short term rental, but in most cases this amounts to a rule that properties cannot be rented out short-stay for over 30 or 60 days a year; anything below that is fine. The idea is that people should be free to rent out their own home for short periods (even when they are away themselves), while preventing landlords from turning entire tenement buildings into year-round AirBnB short term rentals. Because that does amount to running a hotel.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Preposterous! Next you'll be saying that Uber doesn't match you up with someone going to the same place as you were going anyway in order to split the gas money! Have you no shame, sir?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
A troll giving legal opinion. Will wonders never cease....
. . .in which case you target the property owner.
I'm not going to post my neighbor's names, but on the block I live, everyone had kids around the same age and we all hang out together with the kids running up and down the front lawns. We regularly congregate on a driveway and have some drinks. Yes I do know the name of everyone on my block and what their interests are. That's what a community is.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Yes I do know the name of everyone on my block and what their interests are. That's what a community is.
I haven't had that since I was a child. Nobody wants that now. Also, I don't want to know my neighbors. I've seen how they drive, and they are inconsiderate fuckbags.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Well if you're neighbors are like you, I don't blame you.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
We sympathize, but we can't allow you to use you own home as a bed and breakfast because it's a home and not a bed and breakfast.
FTFY
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
That is what zoning laws are for.
And if a place is zoned residential, it's designated for long-term occupancy.
Short-term occupancy such as hotels and hostels are almost always commercial zones.
Thus, the AirBnB rentals are almost always an attempt to use residential property for commercial purposes. Especially if the owner does it regularly or frequently.
I've lived in apartments, and noise problems are difficult enough without adding people who don't care because they won't be around next week.
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According to the latest ruleset, this post should be modded as Vorpal Flamebait +5.
Laws barring property rental are per se illegal, as the constitution does not give the government, at any level, the explicit right to dictate what one does (or does not do) with their own property. This goes for zoning as well.
Yes, it most certainly does. The Tenth Amendment states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Because there is nothing in the Constitution specifically prohibiting laws barring rental property, that power is reserved to the states or the people. So it is perfectly constitutional.
You know, I really wish you folks who are so obsessed with the constitutionality of things would actually read and understand the document. I don't blame you for posting AC; I would be embarrassed to put my name to that post too.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Perhaps with fines for renting out the apartment?
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
No, not with fines for renting out the apartment. Fines for disturbing the peace. The problem isn't the rental, which is no one's business but the property owner's. The problem is holding the property owner accountable for the use of the property, including use by guests. You want to rent out your apartment on AirBnB? No problem—but you are responsible to your neighbours for your guests' behavior during their stay. So you'd better make sure they're well-behaved and considerate before letting them stay at your apartment.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
The Constitution says nothing about depriving one of property rights; only property.
A distinction without a difference. Property rights are property, and vice-versa. Any time your property rights are infringed you have been deprived of your property to at least some degree. To argue otherwise admits the absurd legal fiction that the property technically still belongs to you, you just don't have any actual right to use it—the property rights belong to someone else. When people talk about being deprived of their property, it's not mere physical possession that they're referring to but rather their legal rights relating to the property.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
But it's really just a harsher enforcement of regular zoning laws. You can't run a commercial hotel in a residential neighborhood, and you shouldn't be able to get around those laws by saying "no it's different because it's on the internet." When there's such a pattern of behavior of disruption coming from apartments being rented out, isn't it okay to ban the underlying bad behavior? Drunks are so likely to cause accidents, injuries and deaths on the roads that we just ban drunk driving all together. We don't say "well, you can drive hammered and we'll only punish you if you run somebody over."
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
When there's such a pattern of behavior of disruption coming from apartments being rented out, isn't it okay to ban the underlying bad behavior?
No, that sort of prior restraint requires serious justification—"imminent threat of irreversible harm". The handful of minor disruptions which have actually occurred are nowhere near that level of threat; very few things are, short of direct physical attacks. While it would certainly be a simpler solution, prior restraint violates the property rights of those who rent out their apartments to considerate guests who do not cause such disruptions, while also causing harm to the guests themselves in the form of fewer choices of accommodation and correspondingly higher prices.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat