Latest / STR Unpacked / Airbnb just announced $93 billion in US economic impact. Strategic timing.
Transcript
- Ben: Good morning and welcome to your short term mental bulletin. So Airbnb just dropped a $93 billion economic impact report. But here's what I think they're not telling you within that report. So this week Airbnb said it generated $93 billion in US economic activity last year. It supported 1.1 million jobs and $54 billion in wages. So there's no denying that these are impressive numbers, but It is also very strategic timing because we're just 33 days away at this point from where Europe flips the switch on the regulation. For those that don't know, on the May 20th, the EU will introduce its new regulation. And what that means is that every short-term rental platform, Airbnb, Booking.com, Verbo, all of the others must share monthly data with all 27 governments across the EU. Listing, registrations, booking nights, all of it. the lot, no more estimates, no more Airbnb commission studies, real numbers. So Europe's been fighting with short term rental regulation, with scraped data and guesswork and that era ends in May. So Lisbon's already lost 40 % of its listings, Barcelona's banning them in 2028, Amsterdam is cutting caps to 15 nights a year in high pressure zones. When the EU data pipeline opens, enforcement's gets real really. So when Airbnb talks about a 93 billion economic activity in America ⁓ that is a number that they are choosing to share. So in Europe from the 20th of May we don't get to choose anymore. So ⁓ information down in the comments on this because I know this is a big story happening at the moment. Thank you for watching and I'll see you next week.