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Brigid Bergin: You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin in for Alison Stewart. Tourism in New York City is rebounding in a big way after taking a major hit during the global pandemic. Estimates from the city's main tourism board, New York City & Company, forecasted some 63.3 million visitors will hit the five boroughs this year and that the city will surpass the levels seen back in the before times of 2019 just next year. That means a whole lot of people looking for places to stay and not always in hotels, enter the rapid growth of short-term rental sites like Airbnb.

In some cases, those rentals have become a nuisance for tenants and a source of frustration for local residents struggling to find housing that they can actually afford. Local lawmakers recently enacted legislation that will allow landlords to add their building to a list of sites that do not allow Airbnb rentals. It's all part of a growing movement to better regulate this evolving industry. Two of my colleagues from the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom tracked down the latest data of all those properties where Airbnb rentals are prohibited, and they made a really cool map that you can go and check out.

I am joined by Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky, a data reporter on our health and science team, who has also become our go-to Airbnb expert in the newsroom. She joins me here in the studio at 160 Varick. Hey, Jaclyn.

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: Hey, thanks for having me.

Brigid Bergin: We also have David Brand, our housing reporter, who is out in the field reporting. Reporting never stops. David, thanks for joining us by phone.

David Brand: Thanks for having me, Brigid.

Brigid Bergin: We're going to talk about their most recent story on Gothamist. The headline is, Is Airbnb allowed in your building? Our map shows which NYC addresses ban the rentals. We want to take your calls and questions about Airbnb, where it's allowed, where it's not. How do you feel about the increasing regulations? Are you one of those tenants who's filed one of the many 311 complaints because of the late-night parties at your building, maybe you're seeing some trash out front from people who are not living there long-term, or maybe you're someone who has been actually making a little extra money off Airbnb and now you have some questions if you're actually following the law?

Well, give us a call. The number is 212-433-9692. That's 212-433-WNYC. You can also text or tweet @allofitnyc. Jaclyn and David, again, welcome to All Of It. I'm excited to have you here to have this conversation. Jaclyn, I called you our resident Airbnb expert because this is not your first Airbnb story. Let's talk about this data that you tracked down. Where did you get it? What is it? What does it tell us?

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: This latest data set was actually obtained via a Freedom of Information Law request by my colleague David. We've just been trying to follow the story of Local Law 18, this new law that will crack down on illegal Airbnbs. This was just another way of getting at it. We're also tracking just the number of Airbnb listings available in the city as the law goes into effect.

Brigid Bergin: Let's remind people, what are some of the laws governing Airbnb usage in the city right now? There are no short-term rentals, owner has to be in the unit. What is the general landscape people should keep in mind?

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: The general landscape is that a lot of what we think of as the classic Airbnb, the reason you want an Airbnb for a lot of people is to have your own place, to have a kitchen, to have all these nice amenities, and to stay in a neighborhood that maybe isn't a hotel in Times Square. Those are the Airbnbs that are actually not legal in New York City under both city and state law. There are lots of special rules about when you're allowed to actually do a short-term rental. The owner has to be in the unit. Both the guest and the host have to have access to all the common spaces. A lot of what we think of as classic Airbnbs are actually not legal.

Brigid Bergin: That's so interesting. David, Jaclyn mentioned that you were the one who actually obtained the data through your FOIL request. Can you talk also a little bit about what the process is to register your apartment with the city to get on this list, to say that your building doesn't allow Airbnbs?

David Brand: Fair thing. There is a pretty lengthy application that property owners, co-op boards, condo associations, property managers can fill out on the Office of Special Enforcement website, enter details about their building and just say, "Our leases or our residency agreements already prohibit 30-day rentals or rentals of 30 days or less, so we want to appear on this prohibited building list. We want you to share this with Airbnb so that if someone who lives in this building tries to rent a whole apartment on Airbnb that you're going to block payment, and that will discourage people from doing that."

I talked to some property managers, some condo association members who said, "We don't want short-term rentals in our building. It is disruptive. There's a lot of great guests, but there's also people who come for bachelor parties or who just come for the weekend and trash the place, so it's disruptive for neighbors."

Brigid Bergin: Listeners, we want you to be part of this conversation with us about Airbnb. What's your experience been like here in the city? Are you someone who's had Airbnb guests stature at your home? Are you in one of those apartment buildings where maybe some Airbnb guests have been perhaps slightly less polite and you're happy to see the city trying to crack down and regulate this industry a little bit more? Give us a call. The number is 212-433-9692. Again, it's 212-433-WNYC. You can also text us or reach us on social media. That's @allofitnyc.

Of course, I'm speaking with my Gothamist and WNYC colleagues, Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky and David Brand. I'm Brigid Bergin in for Alison Stewart. Let's go to Sunny in Bed–Stuy. Sunny, welcome to WNYC. Thanks so much for calling.

Sunny: Thank you for taking my call. We own a two-family townhouse in Bed-Stuy and we have a tenant on our first floor. We live in the duplex and we rent out our basement. We are listed on Airbnb and we've been doing it for five years, and everyone is so respectful and so wonderful and we've had zero issues ever. I'm very clear about ground rules, about no noise, and respecting neighbors. Now that the city is cracked out on it, it's very upsetting because it's been such a important source of income for us.

It's not a unit we would ever rent out because our boilers are down there. They're locked behind the door, but the basement needs a lot of maintenance that we can only get to if it's short-term. For us, it's been a huge bummer. In this area, there's no hotels, so people visit their grandkids and they need a place to stay because they can't necessarily fit in their family's apartments. I have a completely opposite experience of the people being upset because I can see how it affects Times Square or very busy areas with lots of foot traffic and bachelor party crowds, but this area is just not it and it feels like the legislation isn't specific enough.

Brigid Bergin: Sunny, thank you so much because I think your voice is really important to this conversation. I see Jaclyn nodding. Jaclyn, what are some of your reactions to Sunny's call?

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: Just that it really lines up with a lot of what I've heard from so many, one in two family homeowners specifically. They feel like the law paints too broad of a brush and that it's meant to target these large-scale Airbnb operations where hosts have dozens of listings and ends up also affecting hosts to maybe rent out a basement unit or a place where their in-laws come to stay.

Their argument seems to be like yours that these units wouldn't actually be on the long-term rental housing market if they weren't on Airbnb to the point where actually one in two family hosts like Sunny are organizing. They formed a group called ROAR NYC, and they are petitioning to get the law changed to include a carve-out for them.

Brigid Bergin: David, so much of your reporting is related to the housing crunch in the city and how hard it is for people who live here to find a place where they can pay their rent on a monthly basis, let alone a short-term rental. How do you see a regulation like this either helping to address that issue or potentially contributing to it?

David Brand: That's the context that's really underpinning all this legislation about short-term rentals. We say Airbnb, they're the biggest company in this market, so it's like shorthand for short-term rentals, I guess talking about making copies as doing a Xerox or something. If people are holding a unit just for short-term rentals, so that could be a building owner who drives out a bunch of tenants and then turns all of the apartments in that building or most of the apartments in that building into just short-term rentals and just making a lot of money, more money from short-term rentals than they would from a permanent resident, that might be great for them.

That's great for tourists who want to spend some time in New York City and have a full apartment to use rather than a hotel room or a shared space, but that's really not good for New York City's housing picture overall. We are in a severe housing shortage and just like a dire, affordable housing shortage to the point where fewer than 1% of apartments priced below $1,500 are vacant and available to rent. When you look across the market, it's less than 5%.

We have such a limited housing supply that taking tens of thousands of units off the market as short-term rentals, that's tens of thousands of potential permanent homes that are off the market. That's what has driven a lot of this anti-short-term rental legislation.

Brigid Bergin: I want to bring some of our other callers into this conversation. Let's go to Michelle in Brooklyn. Michelle, make sure your radio's off. Welcome to All Of It on WNYC.

Michelle: Okay. Can you hear me?

Brigid Bergin: I can hear you, but make sure your radio's off.

Michelle: Okay. Yes, the radio is off. I think you may already have addressed this issue, but as a private homeowner, not as an owner of a multi-family unit, we are somewhat confused about what is legal and illegal to now rent for short-term. These are spaces and private homes which never would be rented out on a long-term or as affordable housing. It's very confusing as to whether or not the space in the home can be used as an Airbnb rental after September.

Brigid Bergin: Well, Michelle, I have just the right person to address that question sitting across from me. Jaclyn, you want to jump in there?

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: Sure. That's another thing that I'm hearing from Airbnb hosts is a ton of confusion. Do they have to register? Will they be allowed to go through with registration? Do they need to make changes to their property? What kind of work do they have to do on their property to bring it into compliance? The one piece of advice I can give is from my conversations with the Office of Special Enforcement. They are the office tasked with protecting the city's housing stock and of course, enforcing this new local law is to reach out to them and to connect with them.

Progress has been slow in terms of approving applications, but they do work with hosts to help them, if possible, bring their properties into compliance, whether they need to clear a violation or maybe remove a lock so that the guests have access to the common space. They seem to be fairly willing to work with hosts.

Brigid Bergin: We are talking all things Airbnb this morning on All Of It here on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin in for Alison Stewart with my colleagues, Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky and David Brand from the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom. We want to hear from you about your questions, your experiences. Do you want to know if the Airbnb in your building is legal or illegal? We've got a great article up on the Gothamist site where you can see that. We're going to talk about that and more with your calls after the short break.

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Brigid Bergin: You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin. I'm speaking with my colleagues from the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom, Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky and David Brand about Airbnb and their most recent article, Is Airbnb allowed in your building? Our map shows which NYC addresses ban the rentals. We have another caller that I want to bring in, Corey from Rockaway. Corey, welcome to WNYC.

Corey: Hello. Hi, how are you?

Brigid Bergin: Good. How are you? Tell us about your Airbnb situation.

Corey: Well, I had Airbnb and I've been doing it in New York. Fortunately, I was able to build my portfolio while I have multiple, and it's just been a thing like one of the recent callers said the struggle of understanding what's legal and what's not. I totally understand a lot of the arguments of people in the neighborhood not wanting the riff-raff. Most Airbnb hosts don't want that same riff-raff. The regulations that now have been implemented, it's across the board just wiping Airbnb out, making it completely illegal. That's where the confusion is that we're confused because everything about Airbnb seems to be illegal.

I think that they need to roll back some of the things that they've implemented to be regulation where the number of people that you can, and whether like the most recent caller said if you have a two-family home and you never had the intentions of renting long-term, the extra space that you have in that home. I tell you, one of the things that scared me the most and made me want to do short-term rental is when you have a tenant who's not paying the rent, you can't get these people out.

There's so many nightmares of homeowners who want to open up to a family or whatever, but there are situations where you can't get these people out, and they're just living near rent-free and now you're having to support them.

Brigid Bergin: Corey, thank you. Thank you so much for calling and sharing that perspective because that is one of the tensions here. There are some small landlords and small building owners who have their own struggle in terms of tenants who are struggling to pay their rent. What do you do when you're not getting that income? You still need to maintain your building. You still need to pay the fees on the building. That is certainly a legitimate tension as well. Let's get a little scale on this story, Jaclyn. Can we talk about how many Airbnbs are in this city at this point and are legal?

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: Yes. It's a little tricky because there are like 40,000 Airbnbs in New York City on the website, but not all of them have been booked recently. Some of them are inactive, some of them maybe they're just up on the site but haven't been booked in years. We are able to estimate that there are about 12,000 that are actively rented, and of those, more than half would be illegal. Then, of course, if you include other short-term rental sites, not just Airbnb, city lawmakers estimate there are about 10,000 illegal short-term rentals that could be taken off the market.

Brigid Bergin: David, I'm wondering, if I'm curious to see if my building is one that Airbnb is not allowed to be in, how do I use your map? How would I navigate it to find the answer to that question?

David Brand: Well, Jaclyn made the map and it's really awesome. It's really detailed and you can really hone in on a block level and see if your building and specific address is there. You can also contact your landlord, contact your property manager, or contact the co-op board or condo association to check the rules there. You can also just do it by looking at our map with the specific addresses for all 8,700 properties now listed on the prohibited buildings list.

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: I would also add to that I'd also recommend looking at your lease because one important clarification is this list, it's not for building owners and co-op boards who suddenly decide that they don't want Airbnb. It's for buildings that have already banned Airbnb. I would definitely check your lease. I would definitely consult our map, but keep in mind that it's a snapshot in time and that new buildings are getting added pretty often.

David Brand: That's a good point that Jaclyn made too. One of the property managers I spoke to bandages 140 or 150 buildings across the city. He told me his company's default position was just to add these buildings to that list and then allow the individual, if it's a condo building or a co-op, then the residents there can maybe come up with their own rules to allow for rentals of 30 days or 60 days. He said he listed 140 buildings or so, and he's taken down five or so where they have negotiated and created these terms where they will allow relatively short-term rentals. Nothing less than 30 days though.

Brigid Bergin: Wow. Let's go to Laura in Brooklyn. Laura, welcome to All Of It on WNYC.

Laura: Hello. Thanks for taking my call.

Brigid Bergin: What is your experience with Airbnb?

Laura: I started using Airbnb over the pandemic. I've been in the same apartment, a multiple-room apartment, basically three bedrooms, for over 15 years where I had roommates starting out, and then I had short-term roommates who I found through Craigslist, oftentimes people that were visiting New York for a few months, maybe on an internship or for a semester away. When the pandemic hit, all the roommates left. I was there by myself, which is fine.

I started exploring with Airbnb and found that Airbnb, not just for short-term stays, but for finding people for a month or more or for finding potential longer-term roommates, was much more ideal than going through Craigslist. There were so many more safeguards in place, and it was a lot easier to find a good match for my living style. Now with these new regulations, it's a little daunting. I currently have a roommate who I found through Airbnb many months ago, but once she leaves, I don't want to go back to Craigslist. I don't know what's going to happen.

Brigid Bergin: Laura, thank you so much for that call. I see you nodding, Jaclyn.

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: Yes. Without knowing the details about the layout of your apartment, my sense is that if you're just using Airbnb to rent out a room in the unit in which you yourself live, your unit is, in fact, a legal short-term, legal. It is legal as a short-term rental. You do still have to register through the Office of Special Enforcement portal, but that's precisely the use case that Airbnb was designed for.

One interesting thing that we're seeing from Airbnb is that they're pivoting to get back to the roots of Airbnb which is exactly that, renting a room in somebody's house where they live or in their apartment where they live. They're calling it Airbnb Rooms, and they're also retooling to focus on these longer-term stays like how you're using them to make it easier to book and pay for long-term stays more like a conventional rental.

Brigid Bergin: David, you laid out for us some of the challenges associated with just finding housing in the city and the real housing crunch, particularly around affordable housing. Do you get the sense that enforcement of Airbnb rules will help ease the housing market here or do the problems, not enough housing stock, not enough affordable housing, go beyond Airbnb?

David Brand: They definitely go beyond Airbnb and these short-term rentals. I guess in the best-case scenario that this law would reopen a few thousand apartments back to people who live in New York City and are looking for permanent housing. That's putting a dent in the crisis, but this is a really deep crisis and we are hundreds of thousands of units of affordable housing short of what we need as a city. Every little bit helps, of course, and putting more apartments back online for renters could make a significant difference but not going to solve the problem.

Brigid Bergin: Jaclyn, Airbnb is suing the city over its rules requesting hosts to register its properties. I know you've written about some of that. Can you tell us what the latest is in that particular case?

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: Sure. Not only is Airbnb suing the city. A trio of hosts is also suing the city. There are two lawsuits both saying more or less the same thing, that the registration process is overly cumbersome, that it's confusing, that it amounts to a de facto ban on Airbnb in New York City. Also, for the host, they even argue that it's an invasion of privacy because they have to know very specific details about the layout of your home and where the locks are and violations and all kinds of things. It's a pretty intense process. Those are just working their way through the process.

One thing I will say is that this rule was supposed to go into effect in July. In July, it was supposed to be the case that if your listing wasn't registered, you couldn't get paid through Airbnb, but just a few days after the lawsuits were filed, the Office of Special Enforcement delayed the deadline to September 5th.

Brigid Bergin: What was the rationale for the delay? Just that owners were still adjusting to it?

Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky: They haven't said much about why. Again, I will say it came just a couple of days after the lawsuits were filed. The other thing I'll say though is that the process has been very, very slow. I have some numbers here on how many people have applied and registered and been granted. As of July 7th, city officials approved just 121 registrations. That's it. They got 1,400 applications. Again, it's like a slice of a slice of a slice of all the units that would have to register.

Brigid Bergin: Wow. Airbnb is an issue that I think is so complicated and will be with us for quite a while. David, any final thoughts on what you're going to be watching going forward?

David Brand: Yes, and I just want to shout out some more great reporting by Jaclyn and our editor Christopher Werth on this because they pointed out in a previous story that there's a real staffing crisis right now affecting the office that's supposed to be enforcing this. That could be contributing to delays or to the effectiveness of enforcement once this law actually takes effect. I want to highlight the great reporting that Jaclyn did.

Brigid Bergin: Well, I appreciate you highlighting it. There's lots of great reporting that our listeners can catch up on on the Gothamist website from Jaclyn about Airbnb and a whole lot more. She's also our data reporter who does all manner of things. David, thank you so much for joining us from your field reporting assignment. David Brand is a housing reporter for Gothamist and WNYC, and Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky is our data reporter who covers all manners of things, but she is part of the health and science desk. Their recent article is, Is Airbnb allowed in your building? Our map shows which NYC addresses ban the rentals. Check it out. Lots of great information there.

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