Greece wants to curb short-term rentals

As with protecting taxis by imposing restrictions on Uber, Greece is now trying to give hotels an edge over short-term rental platforms like Airbnb, which are becoming competitive and changing neighborhoods.

Tourism Minister Vassilis Kikilias said that in order to regulate short-term rentals, tourist accommodation rental platforms will be required to adjust their advertising policy. national herald.

Many Greek property owners have switched from long-term monthly rentals to short-term rentals to tourists after discovering that they can make more money. But this has created a lot of problems for ordinary people in their own cities and has led to rents being out of reach for many, and even areas such as the anarchist stronghold of Exarchia in Athens have also become the focus of investors.

Speaking at the “National Tourism Strategy 2030” event hosted by the Hellenic Tourism Confederation (SETE), Kikilias said the ministry will collaborate with Booking.com and Expedia, according to GTP Headlines. “In short, there will be no hotels without stars. Where hotels are advertised, short-term rentals, for example, cannot be advertised. This will be clarified,” Kikilias said, without specifying how he could order this.

Groups representing tourism and related industries in Europe were pleased that the European Commission said it would regulate short-term rentals, and hotels complained about competition and wanted to take advantage.

SETE president Yannis Retsos said that while Airbnb rentals are a recognized part of the country’s tourism product, they create an unfair market environment, especially for tax-paying hotels, the report says Do they pay taxes?They pay like hotel owners, and they keep a strict record of this. “We consider the involvement of municipalities very important. It is necessary to transfer jurisdiction to the respective mayors so that they can set restrictions on such activities,” he said, without specifying how this could happen.

SETE previously proposed introducing a value-added tax (VAT), property limit, and rental time limits as part of a set of rules to regulate Airbnb-style activities, without explaining why it wouldn’t be unfair to property owners. Athens Mayor Kostas Bakoyannis said the municipal authorities should be responsible for setting limits on short-term rentals depending on the needs and capacity of each area.

Demand for Airbnbs in Greece is on the rise

Demand for Airbnbs in Greece continues to grow, with a 13.5% increase in overnight stays in September compared to the same month in 2019, according to AirDNA data. Greece was also among the eight countries in Europe where listings posted on Airbnb increased, ranking eighth and up 61.8% in the summer of 2022 from a year earlier.

The COVID-19 pandemic has left many property owners desperate to return to long-term rentals as international air travel has all but ground to a halt and there has been little or no demand for long-term short-term rentals.

How to solve the problem without playing on the side of hotel owners

In many countries around the world, measures have long been devised to regulate the operation of Airbnb without harming both local residents and hotel owners, whose lobby traditionally tries to eliminate competitors through administrative methods. The method is to limit the rental period of properties for Airbnb and create conditions for property owners that will encourage long-term rentals.

This decision reviewed in 2019 and were as follows:

• Limitation of the number of short-term rental objects per room AFM, i.e. one manager receiving income (presumably no more than 2 objects).
• The maximum lease duration for each object. For example, it should not exceed ninety (90) days per calendar year, and for islands with less than ten thousand (10,000) inhabitants, sixty (60) days per calendar year.
• The previous paragraph may be exceeded, provided that the total income of the lessor or sublessee from the total amount of the leased or subleased property does not exceed twelve thousand (12,000) euros in the relevant tax year.

However, these measures were not taken. In 2019, Airbnb was able to find arguments that convinced SYRIZA legislators. But this time, the ND is in power, including many businessmen and hotel owners, and persons affiliated with the hotel business. And there are suspicions that Airbnb will not have enough finance arguments to convince parliamentarians.

Source link