How much is left of original idea of Homesharing platform Airbnb after ten years? Has it really changed world as Californian Techfirmen like to say about your ideas? And what about tourism as well as cities that are groaning under it? Airbnb has something to do with all this. For many people who rent ir flats or only rooms on platform at times, this has become a beautiful side-merit. But where housing shortages prevail, company is considered complicit because some private residences are deprived of rental property and are rented to visitors only as a holiday home. What does Airbnb himself say? Jeroen Merchiers has been Europe's head of company for six years. Time Online has talked to him.
Online Time: Mr. Merchiers, what is actually Airbnbs relationship to big cities where your Firmaviele accommodation offers? In Berlin, for example, re are just once again trouble, because Airbnb hosts are supposed to register with city, but only hesitantly do.
Jeroen Merchiers: VerschiedeneStädte have different starting positions. We try to cooperate so well and much as possible with cities. This also applies to Berlin. We sehenaber that our AIRBNB hosts are struggling re.
Online Time: What are your point of view problems re?
Jeroen Merchiers lives in one of cities that are particularly popular on Airbnb: Barcelona. © AirbnbMerchiers: Actually Warenwir quite confident when local legislation was changed at beginning of Jahreszugunsten of Homesharing. Everyone was thrilled. Since Diekonkrete implementation of so-called zweckentfremdungs Prohibition Law has been aberklar, we are worried again. We have informed our hosts at all ErdenklichenWegen about how y betreffenwird reregulation, with weekly information events, via e-mail, letter. But esbleibt a challenge because requirements from district to district Inberlin are different. We have experience in cooperating with cities and authorities around world to set up such registration systems, Tatsächlichfunktionieren. Of course we did not respond to everything, but we hubs expertise. In Portugal or Spanish regions such as Andalusia, up to zu80 percent of our hosts are registered with local authorities – while Esin Berlin is only a single-digit percentage of hosts so far. Mankönnte questions: What is reason for this?
Online Time: Because DieZusammenarbeit doesn't really work?
Merchiers: The closer authorities and Airbnb cooperate, more progress we usually achieve. Dashängt also from cities. In many re are similar Diskussionenüber rental prices and tourist flows, se are main topics currently. In Paris, London and Amsterdam, for example, we work very closely with local authorities, also in Barcelona, where I live. I hope that we will also get re in Berlin.
Online Time: How interagierenStädte typically with your company?
Merchiers: Our experience is: if we do not go to local, regional or even national, Airbnb as a company becomes an easy target to make it fürProbleme responsible in cities. We are an American company, we have grown very rapidly in vergangenenJahren, it is often reported about us, our name becomes representative benutztfür a specific way of life... I understand what some people see in us. But we are very aware of problems of rental prices and overtourism. I doubt, however, that we play a major role at DiesenEntwicklungen. In fact, we are not part of problem, but rar a solution to this.
Date Of Update: 12 August 2018, 12:00
