Affordable Housing Act: European hosts need legal certainty too

The European Affordable Housing Plan identified the cause of the housing crisis correctly: Europe does not have enough homes, and building them costs too much. As drafted, however, the Affordable Housing Act will not add homes, while creating increased regulatory uncertainty for hosts across European cities. 

No clear safeguards on proportionality 

The Act lays sensible principles in favor of proportionate, evidence-based regulation on STRs, and protects European citizens’ right to rent their primary residences. 

However, it does not draw a clear distinction between large scale commercial operators and everyday citizens who supplement their income by sharing their second home casually. 

 It also remains unclear how these principles will apply to existing or new STR restrictions in areas designated under housing stress. As it stands, the Act discourages disproportionate measures such as local bans, but without clear safeguards, it will leave hosts directly exposed to arbitrary restrictions. 

George Mavros, Head of Government Affairs for the European Union at Airbnb, said: “The Act sets out the right principles. It now needs to include real guardrails that turn them into certainty for the hosts, guests and small businesses who depend on this activity.”

Short-term rentals: an economic lifeline and a flexible housing option for locals and families in European cities

Short-term rentals generate more than €149 billion in economic impact, €40 billion in tax revenue and over 2 million jobs across the EU1. They also provide much-needed flexible housing. 

More than 8 in 10 Europeans have experienced a need for temporary housing, searching for a long-term home, studying, working, or accessing medical care, and most turn to short-term rentals as the most convenient and cost-effective solution. 

They are also often the only option to house locals when disasters occur. During last summer’s wildfires in France, Airbnb hosts provided 1300 free STR nights to displaced families. Cities that treat short-term rentals as mere tourist accommodation alone risk removing capacity their own residents rely on.

The same supply matters to European families when they travel : two thirds of European parents already cite the cost of stays as a barrier to visiting cities with their children, and almost one in two have given up on the idea altogether. Where larger STR accommodation disappears from a city, parents travelling with children have little choice but to pay for two or three hotel rooms per trip, in effect, a tax on larger families. 

A transparent notification and review process is needed

Airbnb urges co-legislators to pair the Act’s proportionality principles with a clear process for assessing short-term rental restrictions:

• Same standard for existing rules:  restrictions already in force should be reviewed against the standard the Act establishes,  including those justified by objectives other than housing protection.
• Notification before adoption: competent authorities should notify new restrictions to the European Commission, with the data-based evidence and impact assessment supporting them. Notifications of local measures affecting the provisions of services to the Commission are standard procedure, which should apply to the AHA as well.
• Review against the Act’s principles: each measure should be assessed for necessity, proportionality using data collected under the EU Short-Term Rental Regulation.

Housing supply is the real driver of affordability

While short-term rentals represent 1.2 percent of dwellings in the EU2, around 1 in 5 dwellings sits vacant3. Since 2010, house prices have risen by 60.5 percent4 and rents by 28.8 percent : experts agree that gap points to a shortage of homes and to the cost of building them. Let’s reinforce the act with real measures to support building more affordable homes in European cities, rather than merely managing scarcity. 

“Making housing more affordable is a goal we share, and we stand ready to work with Members of the European Parliament and the Council to get this Act right,” said Mavros. “That means focusing it where the shortage actually is: construction, renovation, and the homes standing empty across Europe today.“