If Airbnb is used to help pay for rent, that necessarily pushes rent upwards.
I definitely know people who are contemplating getting a bigger place with a spare room specifically to AirBnB it. Besides general effects on the housing market, this can increase people's financial risk (depending other aspects of their finances, such as savings cushion). It amounts to over-provisioning their housing in the hopes of reselling the spare capacity at a profit (you figure you can get more on AirBnB for the 3rd room than the incremental 2rd->3rd room costs you). That can turn out badly if somehow the reselling doesn't work, isn't as profitable as you thought it would be, you end up unable to manage it for a period of time so the extra capacity sites idle, etc. Sort of like buying extra servers in a colo because you figure you can make the money back by renting VPSs at a markup. It can definitely work, but to really make it work you are now in the VPS business, and you might lose money if you aren't good at that business.
In most rental markets, it's more difficult to find affordable housing for 3BR and 2BR units for families. If more people rent out 2BR and 3BR appartments to rent out the extra room, that's going to put more pressure on families looking for affordable housing.
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I definitely know people who are contemplating getting a bigger place with a spare room specifically to AirBnB it. Besides general effects on the housing market, this can increase people's financial risk (depending other aspects of their finances, such as savings cushion). It amounts to over-provisioning their housing in the hopes of reselling the spare capacity at a profit (you figure you can get more on AirBnB for the 3rd room than the incremental 2rd->3rd room costs you). That can turn out badly if somehow the reselling doesn't work, isn't as profitable as you thought it would be, you end up unable to manage it for a period of time so the extra capacity sites idle, etc. Sort of like buying extra servers in a colo because you figure you can make the money back by renting VPSs at a markup. It can definitely work, but to really make it work you are now in the VPS business, and you might lose money if you aren't good at that business.
In most rental markets, it's more difficult to find affordable housing for 3BR and 2BR units for families. If more people rent out 2BR and 3BR appartments to rent out the extra room, that's going to put more pressure on families looking for affordable housing.