With many units being repurposed for travelers, and neighborhoods losing local character, some residents and officials are pushing back.
January 23, 2020 at 7:00 AM EST
I had run into what is being called “the Airbnb effect,” in reference to the home-sharing platform founded in 2008, although it can be attributed to all such sites. Residents of major tourist destinations say apartments turned into Airbnb rentals are limiting available housing, raising rents to unaffordable levels and pushing locals out.says that “evidence suggests that the presence of Airbnb raises local housing costs” in American cities.
When I returned from the trip, I called Albert Artigas, a Girona local who belongs to the group behind the signs. He said he and other Girona residents formed the organization when they started to see their neighbors move out of historic and beautiful Old Town and landlords turn the homes into tourist rentals. “This is a problem for the Old Town because the neighborhood is losing its identity to become a theme park,” Artigas said.
“When your streets become the streets that you would expect in a theme park, you are living in a theme park.”Artigas insists he’s not against tourism in Girona or trying to stop it. “We all are tourists,” he said. He also understands how much cheaper it can be for a family to stay in an apartment rental than to pay for hotel rooms.
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