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David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member
Hospitality firm sues tenant over $1,300 Airbnb listing in Chelsea
Netherlands-based PPHE cries fraud within its stalled hotel project

At the site of a stalled hotel project in West Chelsea, a former real estate agent has been accused of illegally occupying a pair of apartments and renting them on Airbnb.
Netherlands-based PPHE Hotel Group, owner of 540 West 29th Street, sued tenant Ethan Noorani this week for allegedly breaking into and squatting at the building, then furnishing a 2,000-square-foot apartment and listing it on the short-stay platform for a hefty nightly sum.

“This is another Airbnb opportunist,” said an attorney for PPHE, “who got himself into the apartment and is now using the court system to keep from being evicted.” Reached by telephone, Noorani denied the allegations but declined to comment further.
The lawsuit follows the delay of a New York City law requiring apartment owners to register short-stay listings, and is the latest salvo in a struggle between tenants, landlords and government authorities to regulate the rental platform amid a travel industry disrupted by Covid and a housing shortage that has made urban centers more costly for residents.

PPHE told a Manhattan court this week that, as part of a weekly walkthrough to ensure the building remained vacant, it detected Noorani illegally entering and furnishing one of its apartments to list to short-stay renters.
Developer Robert Davis’ Jaeger Realty was charged with safeguarding the building, according to court documents. Davis did not respond to a request for comment.
The hospitality firm denies leasing the three-story building to Noorani or anyone else since acquiring it in 2020 from Largo Development to build 98 hotel rooms and 55 condo units on an assemblage on West 29th Street. Demolition permits were filed at the site in 2018. But five years later, it remains standing.
PPHE’s attorney declined to comment on the stalled project, which would likely need approval from the City Council following a city-wide permitting rule passed for new hotels in 2021. No new hotels have been approved since the rule went into effect, according to records The Real Deal reviewed.
Noorani’s Airbnb listing for the property, which has since been taken down, contains reviews dating back to at least December 2022, at odds with PPHE’s timeline of Noorani entering the building in May for the first time. When confronted by the police at PPHE’s behest, Noorani proffered a two-year lease ending in June 2024, according to the lawsuit.

PPHE claims the lease is fraudulent and, incorrectly, that the address of the building owner on lease traces to a Brooklyn bodega. In fact, the owner’s address on the lease is 185 South 4th Street, the site of a rental building that Largo owns in Brooklyn.
The lease is signed by Noorani as the tenant; the owner’s line is initialed simply as “DB”. On June 13, PPHE told Noorani to vacate the apartments within 10 days. He has not vacated.
PPHE’s attorney characterized Noorani’s behavior as “a shakedown” because, he said, an offer to settle the dispute was made quickly following the filing of the lawsuit.
“This is an unintended consequence of protecting tenants,” PPHE’s attorney said. “Some deserve protection and others take advantage.”

Airbnb has proposed giving landlords a portion of revenue earned by short-stay rentals, although the program covers only a small minority of rental inventory on the platform. Landlords, in an attempt to stay on the right side of bans on short-stay rentals, have sued tenants.
The company recently pushed back on data suggesting that its revenue was cratering, although its pace of growth has declined.

 

David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member

Is Airbnb allowed in your building? Our map shows which NYC addresses ban the rentals​

New York City landlords are adding thousands of addresses to a list that will keep tourists from crashing in their apartment buildings under a new anti-Airbnb law.
The measure allows property owners and managers to register on a “Prohibited Building List” confirming short-term rental bans as a condition of their tenants’ lease or residency agreements, forcing Airbnb and other platforms to block listings at the address. So far, the database features more than 8,700 buildings, according to records obtained by Gothamist via a freedom of information request.
The properties range from Midtown skyscrapers to two-story homes in Rockaway Beach. More than half are located in Manhattan, which is home to the city's highest concentration of Airbnb listings, according to data from Inside Airbnb, an independent group that advocates tighter regulations on short-term rentals.
This map shows all the addresses added to the Prohibited Building List as of late June. These buildings' owners don't allow tenants to post their apartments on Airbnb or other short-term rental listing sites.
Point locations may be slightly off due to the geocoding tool used. More addresses have been added to the Prohibited Building List since this map was created.
New York City is home to over 40,000 Airbnb listings, but only about a quarter are booked on a regular basis. Local lawmakers estimate that up to 10,000 short-term listings are illegal under city laws that ban the rental of full apartments for fewer than 30 days.
The city enacted a measure known as Local Law 18 in 2022 that requires hosts to register their short-term rental properties with the Mayor’s Office of Special Enforcement. The measure is intended to stop Airbnb and other short-term rental companies from listing whole apartments on their platforms, a practice that housing advocates say removes thousands of apartments from the city’s already limited housing stock. Some owners have turned buildings into illegal hotels, earning large sums on the temporary lodgings while squeezing the supply of permanent homes.

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Other landlords and property managers say they want to stop residents from renting out their units to tourists or partiers who can cause problems and headaches for neighbors.
“Neighbors generally don’t want transient occupants in their buildings,” said MD Squared CEO Michael Mintz, whose company registered around 140 Manhattan and Brooklyn buildings with the city’s banned listings database.
“We figured, given the issues that so many buildings have had with Airbnb and short-term rentals and managing that over time, that we’d register all our buildings,” he added.
The city already has laws on the books that prohibit full apartment rentals under 30 days, but enforcement has been tricky because Airbnb, VRBO, Booking.com and other platforms continue to list those properties.
The new measure will bar the bookings behemoths from processing payments for properties that appear on the Prohibited Buildings List. It will also block payments for units that do not meet the city’s requirements that hosts share the same living space they’re renting to guests, among other provisions.
 

David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member

Bulk of NYC Airbnbs to fall away after Labor Day​

Sonder, Mint House, Kindred among those trying to fill void amid short-term rental rules

The days are numbered for New York City’s population of Airbnb rentals.
The short-term rental landscape will change drastically after Labor Day, when the city begins enforcing a law that requires short-term rental hosts to register their properties. Airbnb sued to have the law gutted, claiming it was effectively a ban on short-term rentals; a judge dismissed the lawsuit and the registration of units has moved at a snail-like pace, suggesting many units will become illegal soon.

The state, meanwhile, already has a ban on renting out units in most apartment buildings for fewer than 30 days without the full-time owner being present.
Alternatives are slowly emerging to fill the gap Airbnb is destined to leave following the implementation of Local Law 18, Crain’s reported. Some of these alternatives, however, may face similar predicaments to the short-term rental giant.

San Francisco-based Sonder could provide one alternative. The company has units in the Financial District and elsewhere that aren’t covered by the short-term rental law. The company’s business model, however, is reliant on receiving business from other platforms, including Airbnb.
Additionally, Sonder has had some issues of its own. In the spring, the startup was warned that it had until mid-October to improve its share price or face delisting from Nasdaq. The company, which manages and leases rentals itself (unlike Airbnb), has experienced multiple rounds of layoffs in recent months.

Another place for tourists to turn is Mint House, which has apartment-style units at 70 Pine Street that are considered legal in New York City. Unfortunately for visitors, that’s the company’s only location in the city.

Kindred is a startup that charges residents to join a cohort of travelers and homesharers to host or swap homes without money changing hands directly. There are more than 1,000 residents registered in the New York metro area, co-founder Justine Palefsky told Crain’s.
Traditional hotels, of course, also stand to benefit from Airbnb’s tumult in the city. But even some luxury brands are willing to at least partially embrace a short-term rental model. The Ritz-Carlton in NoMad has 16 short-term rental units up for grabs for $9,000 a night.
 

David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member

The End of Airbnb in New York​

Thousands of Airbnbs and other short-term rentals are expected to disappear from rental platforms as New York City begins enforcing tight restrictions.

THOUSANDS OF AIRBNBS and short-term rentals are about to be wiped off the map in New York City.
Local Law 18, which came into force Tuesday, is so strict it doesn’t just limit how Airbnb operates in the city—it almost bans it entirely for many guests and hosts. From now on, all short-term rental hosts in New York must register with the city, and only those who live in the place they’re renting—and are present when someone is staying—can qualify. And people can only have two guests.

Gone are the days of sleek downtown apartments outfitted for bachelorette parties, cozy two- and three-bedroom apartments near museums for families, and even the option for people to rent out their apartment on weekends when they’re away. While Airbnb, Vrbo, and others can continue to operate in New York, the new rules are so tight that Airbnb sees it as a “de facto ban” on its business.

Short-term rentals can bring noise, trash, and danger, and they can price local residents out of their own neighborhoods. Some landlords in New York are prolific and have hundreds of Airbnb listings. But other New Yorkers who have listings on Airbnb are trying to make ends meet, either leasing their place while they’re out of town or renting half of a duplex to help cover their mortgage costs.
Airbnb is also popular with some of the 66 million visitors a year looking for accommodations that are cheaper and sometimes larger than hotels. In 2022 alone, short-term rental listings made $85 million in New York. The city might be a relatively small slice of Airbnb’s global market, but the new rules show how local governments can effectively stamp out short-term rentals overnight and lessen their impact on dense residential areas. And New York is just one of many cities around the world trying to calm the short-term rental gold-rush.

And everyone is taking a different approach. Dallas has limited short-term rentals to specific neighborhoods to avoid disruptive and dangerous parties. Elsewhere, the Canadian province of Quebec and Memphis, Tennessee, among others, now require licenses for short-term rentals. In San Francisco, the amount of time someone can list their entire residence for rent on Airbnb is limited to 90 days each year; Amsterdam puts that limit at 30 nights per year, Paris at 120 days. Berlin previously banned nearly all Airbnbs but walked the decision back in 2018.

Airbnb’s attempts to fight back against the new law have, to date, been unsuccessful. The company sued New York City in June, but a judge dismissed the case in August, ruling that the restrictions were “entirely rational.” Airbnb did not comment on whether it would appeal the decision. Hosts are also fighting for the right to list their apartments as short-term stays by meeting with city officials to try to change the law.

The rules “are a blow to its tourism economy and the thousands of New Yorkers and small businesses in the outer boroughs who rely on home sharing and tourism dollars to help make ends meet,” says Theo Yedinsky, global policy director for Airbnb. “The city is sending a clear message to millions of potential visitors who will now have fewer accommodation options when they visit New York City: You are not welcome.” Yedinsky says Airbnb has a goal of working with the city on “sensible” home-sharing rules, but he did not elaborate on the company’s next steps.

The change will make short-term rentals “a lot less attractive” for many people coming to New York, says Sean Hennessey, a professor at the New York University Jonathan M. Tisch Center of Hospitality. And in a city where hotel rooms are small and expensive, it could “make the city a little less accessible.”

There are currently more than 40,000 Airbnbs in New York, according to Inside Airbnb, which tracks listings on the platform. As of June, 22,434 of those were short-term rentals, defined as places that can be booked for fewer than 30 days. Many Airbnbs are concentrated around downtown Manhattan, along the Upper East Side, and in Williamsburg and Park Slope in Brooklyn. While the number of rentals may be small compared to New York City’s population of 8 million people, Murray Cox, founder of Inside Airbnb, says some desirable neighborhoods are overly burdened by short-term rentals, which can result in housing shortages and higher rents. The new law, in theory, could open these homes to local residents. New York City is facing a housing shortage that has increased rents and rates of homelessness.
The implementation of the law shows “very clearly you can cut down on short-term rentals,” says Cox, who was part of the Coalition Against Illegal Hotels, a group that advocated for the registration law. “You can make these platforms accountable.”

There’s an older law on the books that prevents short-term rentals of entire apartments for less than 30 days in New York, but it’s been difficult to enforce without the registration mandate that takes effect Tuesday in place. Compounding the sudden shortage of Airbnbs in New York is another piece of the new law that allows landlords to ban entire buildings from short-term rental platforms. As of July, nearly 9,000 buildings across New York City were on the list. New York’s laws on short-term rentals exempt certain entire apartments on rental platforms that are zoned as hotels and boarding houses, meaning there will still be some entire units advertised on rental platforms.
Some small-time hosts feel the law unfairly loops them in with professional landlords. Margenett Moore-Roberts rents out a two-bedroom apartment in her Brooklyn brownstone; she lives in the home’s other unit with her husband and teen daughter. She says she doesn’t want to rent the apartment to a full-time tenant and lose the flexibility to host family and friends there, or, as she did during the pandemic, use it as a home office. But because her family doesn’t occupy the second two-bedroom unit, it can no longer be listed on Airbnb for stays of less than 30 days.

Restore Homeowner Autonomy and Rights, a group of homeowners in New York, is advocating for amendments to the regulations that would allow owner-occupied one- and two-family homes to register their units with the city and do away with capacity limits. They believe people like Moore-Roberts should be able to rent out units, and that they don’t fall into the same category as bigger landlords.
Moore-Roberts says she isn’t against the rule change entirely, but she wants to see the law reworked with more nuance to protect renters with just one property, like herself. “They’ve used a very blunt object when they should have used a scalpel,” Moore-Roberts says. She is currently out of work, and she says a drop in income from the short-term rental compounds that financial stress. “Putting us all in that same bucket of players is really unfair and not helpful.”
Airbnb says it is canceling and refunding reservations in unregistered accommodations from December 2 onwards, but those up until December 1 can remain in effect to lessen the impact on hosts and guests. Guests won’t be penalized if they book and stay in an unregistered rental, but hosts and the platforms they advertise on could be as of September 5.

Airbnb also says unregistered stays were blocked from future bookings past September 5 as of August 14, but a search showed dozens of entire apartments for more than two people still available to book beyond September 5. These listings should not pass New York’s registration requirements for short-term rentals. Airbnb did not comment on why these are still on the platform. Vrbo declined to comment for this story. Booking.com did not return a request for comment.

There are 3,250 short-term rental hosts who had submitted applications for registration by August 28, according to Christian Klossner, executive director of Office of Special Enforcement in New York City. More than 800 applications had been reviewed, and the office had granted 257 registrations, returned 479 to seek additional information or corrections, and denied 72. As of Tuesday, the office will focus on working with booking platforms to make sure they are using the verification system for registrations and that they are not processing unverified transactions, Klossner says.
A growing number of cities might be trying to clamp down on Airbnb rentals, but the company continues to grow. It made $2.5 billion in the second quarter of 2023, up 18 percent year-on-year, with the number of nights and experiences booked on the platform growing by 11 percent in the same period.



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David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member

NYC OK’d 10% of short-term rental apps under new laws​

Only 405 approved in six months of registration portal

As anticipated, legal short-term rentals on platforms like Airbnb and Vrbo are dwindling in New York City.
Since launching its registration portal in March, the city’s Office of Special Enforcement only approved 405 applications from prospective short-term rental hosts, Gothamist reported. The agency’s data drop on Wednesday also showed 214 rejections and 758 applications returned for revisions.

The vast majority of the 4,624 applications sent to OSE over the duration of the six months are still pending, as staffing shortages add to the challenges for those within city limits who rely on short-term rental income. Seventy percent of applicants are waiting in the wings for an answer from the city agency.
Last month, there were more than 10,000 short-term rentals operating in the city.

State and city law already prevented stays for under 30 days without the presence of the permanent tenant. The registration law added another layer of difficulty for hosts and short-term rental companies.
Airbnb took on the fight against the recently enacted law, suing to have it overturned because of its potential to effectively eliminate short-term rentals, according to the lawsuit. A judge dismissed that lawsuit.

Applicants have been complaining for months about the glacial decision-making pace of OSE. In its fiscal year report, the agency said it took an average of 50 days to rule on applications, but the wait period took more than an additional month when the agency asked for revisions from applicants.

Airbnb blamed the city for the registration laws, saying it tried to get ahead of the drastic shift in city policy by informing hosts of the process as early as March.

As the impact of Local Law 18 comes into focus, other platforms are working overtime to fill the growing void, including Sonder, Mint House and Kindred. Visitors to the city could also flock to hotels and even consider staying on the other side of the George Washington Bridge in New Jersey.
 

David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member
Landlords file first suits against Airbnb based on NYC’s new short-term rental law
Judge issues restraining order, which could pave way for landlords to collect

Empowered by a new city law against short-term rentals, landlords are suing Airbnb and tenants who use it.
Two Upper West Side building owners have filed lawsuits against Airbnb and their tenants, claiming they are violating Local Law 18, which took effect last month.

The legislation — the latest effort to crack down on illegal short-term rentals — requires hosts to register their listings with the city so that platforms like Airbnb and Vrbo can verify their legitimacy before posting them.
Local Law 18 also allows landlords to put their buildings on a do-not-register list, which is supposed to block tenants from listing apartments on the sites. But the landlords who sued claim Airbnb continues to allow listings in their buildings, despite their inclusion on the list.

“There’s no real incentive [to comply with the law] other than these litigations,” said Robert Morgenstern, whose Canvas Property Group manages one of the buildings, 207 Columbus Avenue.
The judge in the case issued a temporary restraining order late last month directing Airbnb and the tenant to stop advertising the listing. Morgenstern’s attorney called it a landmark ruling that will allow other landlords to use the new law.
“The way these laws are written, it puts the burden on the landlords to enforce the law,” said Michael Pensabene of Rosenberg & Estis. “Airbnb continues to flout Local Law 18 . . . and in my experience, these hosts look to get away with as much as they can.”

A spokesperson for Airbnb wrote in an email that the company relies on the city’s verification system to determine whether a listing is in compliance with the law. A representative for the city’s Office of Special Enforcement did not respond to a question on how it handled the two buildings in the lawsuits.

The second lawsuit was brought by Milstein Properties at 30 West 63rd Street.
Landlords typically include clauses in their leases that ban tenants from renting out their apartments without the owner’s permission. Illegal rentals by tenants often annoy law-abiding tenants and leave building owners vulnerable to fines. But landlords inclined to stop such rentals have had no easy way to do so.
Local Law 18 was supposed to change that. The law not only provides a technological way to prevent illegal listings, but it also subjects violators to fines of up to $5,000.
The city’s regulation went into effect after Airbnb delayed it through litigation. The company sued in June, claiming the law was a de-facto ban on short-term rentals and violated previous agreements Airbnb had with the city.
The judge in the case disagreed and tossed the lawsuit in August, paving the way for the new rules to go into effect.

 

David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member

Milstein wins court order under city’s new Airbnb crackdown​

Ruling could allow other landlords to stop illegal listings in their buildings

Milstein Properties won an injunction against Airbnb in a case that may set a precedent for other landlords looking to enforce the city’s new short-term rental restrictions.
A state judge last Thursday issued the injunction against one of Milstein’s tenants at 30 West 63rd Street and Airbnb, barring the tech platform from posting the host’s advertisement.

It’s the first such order the state court has issued under the city’s Local Law 18, which in early September outlawed advertising of illegal short-term rentals on sites like Airbnb, VRBO and Booking.com.
“This very clearly now requires Airbnb to take seriously their obligations under Local Law 18 and to comply with the law,” said attorney Deborah Riegel of Rosenberg & Estis, which represents Milstein in the case.

A representative for Airbnb did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The law requires hosts to register their units with the mayor’s Office of Special Enforcement to ensure that platforms only advertise listings that comply with short-term rental regulations.

Milstein filed its lawsuit in early October, arguing that its tenant and Airbnb violated the law by advertising the listing despite the landlord’s having put its Upper West Side rental building on a list of properties not to be registered.
Airbnb had previously said it was complying with the law, suggesting that the special enforcement office had provided the tenant a registration code that allowed the listing.

A spokesperson for the city’s enforcement unit, however, said that no units in the West 63rd Street building have been registered. It is unclear how the tenant managed to post the listing.
The Milstein lawsuit is one of two early cases to test the new law.
Owners of a small Upper West Side walkup at 207 Columbus Avenue filed a similar suit in late September. The judge in that case issued a temporary restraining order.

 

David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member

Brookhaven threatens $6K fine, 6 months in jail for short-term rentals​

Suffolk County town cracking down in response to loud parties

The steady drumbeat of bad news on Long Island for Airbnb and its hosts shows few signs of abating.
Brookhaven, the largest town in Suffolk County, is adopting fines and penalties for illegal short-term rentals, Newsday reported. The town board voted unanimously on the measure, which will penalize those who rent their homes for fewer than four weeks at a time, as well as those who separately rent their swimming pools.

Rentals for shorter than four weeks were already against town rules, but enforcement was spotty and penalties were vague.
Next year, that will change. For first-time violations, fines will range from $500 to $4,000 and can include up to 15 days in jail. A second offense could lead to fines between $1,000 and $6,000, and six months in jail.

Some Fire Island communities are excluded from the law because of the prevalence of rental housing.
Landlords opposed the changes, seeing them as likely to depress rental income. But Council member Dan Panico, who will become the town supervisor next month, said short-term rentals to ragers were a significant cause of complaints from neighbors.

A spokesperson for Airbnb said the company would work with hosts to “help them understand the new local rules.”
Those rules could change quickly, but in the company’s favor, for a change: Panico is eyeing reducing the minimum rental to two weeks, a more common threshold across Long Island. A hearing on that will be held early next year.

Short-term rental companies such as Airbnb and VRBO are facing numerous challenges on Long Island as communities crack down on leasing homes for short stays. On the North Fork, towns and villages are stepping up enforcement against owners who allow guests to stay for fewer than 14 days. Some officials are employing new software and artificial intelligence to police online listings or collect rental taxes.
 

David Goldsmith

All Powerful Moderator
Staff member


NYC fines LuxUrban $1.2M for illegal short-term rentals​

Hotel company turned dozens of apartments into tourist lodging

New York City extracted $1.2 million from LuxUrban Hotels in a settlement Monday for illegal short-term rentals, Gothamist reported. A lawsuit against the hotel company and the settlement were revealed on the same day, indicating that the city was using the threat of a lawsuit as leverage in the negotiations.
Between 2019 and 2022, LuxUrban turned 67 units across dozens of Manhattan and Brooklyn buildings into illegal short-term rentals, according to the city’s lawsuit. In settlements, companies generally do not admit wrongdoing.

LuxUrban used Booking.com and Expedia to advertise apartments in Hell’s Kitchen, Chelsea, the Upper West Side, Cobble Hill and elsewhere, renting out the units a combined 4,300 times and reaping nearly $4 million, the complaint alleged.
The company’s attorney didn’t respond to a request for comment from the publication. LuxUrban also didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from The Real Deal.

The company operates properties across the country, accounting for thousands of hotel rooms. Last year, the Miami-based firm signed 35-year master lease agreements to take over operations at two distressed properties in Times Square.
LuxUrban signs leases for apartments or hotels and sublets them as short-term rentals. But its sub-30-day rentals were flagged as the city cracks down on such deals. In most cases, apartments can’t be rented out for fewer than 30 days unless a resident is present. Also, Local Law 18 now requires hosts to register addresses with the city.

Since enforcement of Local Law 18 began, short-term rental companies like Airbnb have suffered a dramatic decrease in listings. In September 2023 — before enforcement kicked in — there were about 10,000 units listed on Airbnb alone. Today there are fewer than 500.

The city’s Office of Special Enforcement is in charge of policing short-term rentals. The state has a Tenant Protection Unit that plays a similar role. It recently settled a case with landlord Steve Croman, who leased nine rent-stabilized apartments to extended-stay platform Blueground, which in turn rented them to customers for more than 30-day stays — a violation of rent stabilization law.
The city’s crackdown is expected to benefit the hotel industry and perhaps apartment hunters while harming hosts, particularly homeowners of small properties reliant on the rental income stream. Some remain eligible to rent their spaces but could not immediately get their paperwork approved by the Adams administration.
 
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