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Short-term accommodation with AirBnB in Strata apartment buildings is in the top 2 talking points for 2017 and will continue strongly into 2018. During 2017 it has become evident that the powers of strata and body corporate Committee’s to stop and prevent short-term letting with companies like AirBnB and Bookings.com, is weak. These weak powers are leaving Committees with the two options.
- Make life difficult and uncomfortable for AirBnB landlords and tenants.
- Report it to the government bodies (eg council) and see what they do.
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Option 1 making life difficult:
This will always be an uphill fight, landlords will get smarter and with the overnight rental returns potentially very high some people will be more than comfortable to pay to work around the roadblocks installed by committees. It is also reasonable to expect that someone will fight the road blocks bringing costs to the Strata Committee. This means that Strata Committee’s need to be sensible and fair with the restrictions they apply to their building with access devices and security patrols.
Option 2 government bodies policing usage breaches:
Some international cities have been very successful with banning AirBnB and other providers with government laws. But is this something we can expect within Australia? I believe this will be area specific and even still, I don’t foresee any restriction on short-term letting.
- Brisbane/Gold Coast – this is the only part of the country I could image a restriction on AirBnB in Strata because of the huge short-term rental market that already exists with Building Managers owning letting rights for each building. But instead, Building Managers embrace these platforms so they are unlikely to lobby to blockage.
- Sydney/NSW – this is another major market with apartment owners lobbying against short-term letting in apartment buildings. I struggle to see Council or State Government stepping in and banning short-term letting for two reasons:
- Housing Affordability this continues to be a major talking point and with the ability to rent out your spare room, or even your room, to help cover the mortgage many Gen Y’s and Gen X’s will remain pro-AirBnB.
- Hotel Occupancy Rates & Tourism Demand tourism is a major part of the Australia economy and Airbnb in Strata as short-term letting is now part of that. While hotel operators are being disrupted by market share moving into the private sector, their revenue and occupancy rates in 2017 are some of the highest on record. We are also seeing more hotels being developed now than since the 2000 Sydney Olympics. With this being taken into account NSW and Sydney are now becoming a tourism industry that needs private short-term letting to be part of the system in the same way that Brisbane and the Gold Coast did 30 years ago.
Hotel Numbers – NSW Tourism
- September 2017 Quarter (NSW) occupancy rate was the highest on records at 80.5%.
- September 2017 Quarter (NSW) takings – $1.2 billion increase of 7.9% – highest on record
- 4.5% of this was from a higher daily rate
- Greater Sydney saw a growth of 8.0% on the daily rate
