However, it s important that we do not conflate the symptoms with the causes. I m of the opinion tha

A study commissioned by Airbnb on the effect of their listings on the city of San Francisco has just been published which seems to indicate that the vacation rentals listed on the site have had a positive impact on the city s economy.
Some of the data was visualized in an infographic to illustrate the distribution of Airbnb s properties vs hotels in the city, which you can view to the left. As you can see, vacation rentals seem to be overtaking hotels cubs tickets by sheer number and pervasiveness. If I were a hotel owner, cubs tickets I might be a little worried!
There has been a rather heated cubs tickets discussion recently cubs tickets around the topic of Airbnb s legality, but now Airbnb and their users are bolstered by economic data. In addition to finding that $43.1 million was spent by Airbnb s users on local businesses over the course of a year, the study found that :
The finding that 60 percent of Airbnb hosts make below the median cubs tickets income for the area and that 56 percent are using the additional income from Airbnb to pay their rent or mortgage seems to suggest that, for many, the practice is very much a financial necessity. Renting out their property or a spare room allows many of San Francisco s residents to continue living in the city, which counters one of the stronger arguments by those who are supportive of taxing the activity namely, the argument that short-term rentals discourage people from living in the city by reducing the available options for those shopping for permanent housing. (But equally preventative of permanent residency in a city is if the city is too expensive to live in!)
With the purpose of comparing Airbnb s properties to a traditional hotel/motel, we ve looked at two options available to a consumer looking to spend $100 dollars (or so) on housing cubs tickets in the neighborhood cubs tickets of North Beach in San Francisco for one night.
For $89 + a 14.5% hotel fee of $12.90, totaling $101.90, cubs tickets a traveler can purchase a room at the San Remo Hotel with a full-sized bed and a sink, and an external shared bathroom and shower across the hall.
For a mere $4.10 more at $106 ($95 + $11 Airbnb cubs tickets service fee), a traveler can purchase, on Airbnb, the master bedroom of a 3-bedroom apartment, with a queen-sized bed, private bathroom and shower, kitchen access, and a walk-in closet.
While city officials have concluded that short-term rentals exemption from the hotel tax is detrimental cubs tickets to the city s well-being, the results of Airbnb s study above is irrefutable evidence that short-term rentals do contribute palpably to San Francisco s economy, even if city officials aren t collecting revenue directly with an official tax. Whether the contributions are worth the risks is another matter.
There are strong arguments on both sides of this debate, but ultimately, the city will have to formulate an effective way of enforcing any regulation of Airbnb s inventory because simply placing a hotel tax on them has already proven cubs tickets to be ineffective in other metropolitan cities cubs tickets in the country.
As an aside, how much more revenue does the City of San Francisco need? They already exact an exorbitant amount of money from individuals through other means; for instance, through parking meters and traffic fines. In 2011, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency collected $41.5 million in parking meters revenues, and about  $86.3 million  in traffic fines CRIMINAL, and yet they still receive too many complaints about lackluster enforcement cubs tickets of residential parking zone rules, blocked driveways and abandoned vehicles to satisfy.
However, it s important that we do not conflate the symptoms with the causes. I m of the opinion cubs tickets that all of these financial issues the city of San Francisco is faced with are symptoms of a larger problem than one that can be solved by simply increasing or decreasing a number in a lawbook.