Philip Guston, “Painter in Bed,” 1973.
If you’re an artist, it’s pretty likely you’ve stayed at Airbnb at some point. It’s also likely that you’ve already broken the law. Here’s why: In New York it’s against the law to rent an apartment for less than 30 days. Otherwise, you’re running an illegal hotel.
That law has gotten the apartment-sharing service Airbnb in trouble with the New York Attorney General’s office. In October 2013, New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman issued a subpoena demanding user data, including e-mail and home addresses, associated with New York City’s 15,000 host listings. Essentially, Schneiderman’s looking for violations of the “illegal hotel” law.
This is the situation we’re in, but this week, Airbnb’s future began to look a bit brighter. On Tuesday, Airbnb gained a minor victory when the Albany Supreme Court struck down the Attorney General’s demands for user data.
Justice Gerald W. Connolly agreed with Airbnb that the subpoena “demand is unreasonably broad” and would interfere with user privacy. He went on to write that the current subpoena “seeks materials that are irrelevant to the inquiry at hand and accordingly, must be quashed.” However, he mentioned that a “substantial” number of hosts appeared to be in violation of the law.
The Attorney General Schneiderman told the New York Times he plans to issue a revised subpoena for user data within the next few days.
Though Airbnb gets to claim victory this round, Schneiderman seems poised for a game of cat and mouse. So who knows how long this will go on, while this “illegal hotel” law sticks around.
We’ve yet to hear artists mentioned in Airbnb’s court battles, but looking at how artists use Airbnb might help rebuff the idea that this apartment-sharing service in some way rivals hotels.
“I would be less likely to come as frequently or to stay very long if I had to rely on hotels,” artist Lorna Mills told us. She’s one of the most avid Airbnb users we know, visiting New York to attend exhibitions, her own and others.
She doesn’t see Airbnb as a hotel substitute. Hotels are just more expensive and, she added “it’s also very hard to find an affordable hotel room on short notice.”
For artists and freelancers, that might be the most attractive reason for using Airbnb. Exhibition and writing opportunities can come up at a moment’s notice, and whether you can afford it or not, it’s hard to find a hotel at the last minute. Without Airbnb, Mills and other artists simply wouldn’t visit as often.
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I see you’ve conveniently deleted my first comment because it doesn’t agree with your artistic views so I’ll repost again with Disqus..
AirBnB does well at offsetting the phenomenally high rent in your New York City apartment by filling that unused bedroom which, for whatever reason, has suddenly become available. The numbers falling somewhere between actual rent and the price of a hotel room are attractive to people willing to live short periods with strangers. The obvious upside is that you can potentially turn a profit, if not live roommate free part of the year. But while this scenario might fare well in less expensive communities, there is an enormous downside for cities like New York.
The potential profit enables spaces to remain vacant while still commanding more than if a space were to be rented for a set price by the year. This drives prices up while inhibiting actual habitation! This can be easily evidenced by searching for space months at a time. You’ll find that the same spaces are available by the day, months in advance as are available for entire year spans. This means that the space is empty and available all year round and that the owner is not able to rent the space to local tenants because they have already leased parts of that upcoming year out. In short, the owner has no interest in renting to prospective tenants at a reasonable market price. This makes it unlivable for the average up and coming artist to survive by any means but to fall in line with corporate structure, which in turn squashes any thought of disseminating a message that doesn’t promote a product or might be subversive.
As an artist I am also miffed that your article uses our likeness to try to rally support for businesses that do just fine on their own. To justify the raking of large profit while employing an imbalanced amount of human contribution is to take part in the cause of our society’s current trajectory. If this were truly a tool to be fought for it’s services would be contributed as it’s good natured predecessor CraigsList does. This is shameless promotion to come of an Arts publication. If you are going to run ads label this an opinion piece so that others are not deceived.
and to confirm my belief, http://www.brownstoner.com/blog/2013/07/all-cash-investors-beating-buyers-of-townhouses-in-brooklyn/
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