The more Airbnbs an Auckland suburb has, the more likely it is to see an uptick in property crime, a new study has found.
Using data from the city's census, University of Auckland researchers have found an interesting paradox: Airbnb brings improved property value to suburbs – but crime associated with them then sees values drop.
Speaking to 1News co-author of the paper Dr William Cheung said the suburbs most affected are higher-density urban areas with lots of apartment buildings. The most common types of crimes are vandalism and burglary.
He said that this was because of how easy it is to find and get into the properties.
“The security can be compromised in those apartment buildings with Airbnb rentals, and you need to share security codes with short-term guests.
“That will increase the risk or some unauthorised access to the building that makes some long-term residents feel less secure, and therefore, the homeowner may be discouraged from buying this type of property.”
He also said the property’s locations being publicly available means criminals can find “information about the unoccupied situation".
“Some of the criminals may use the public platform to scrutinise those unoccupied places that can easily be targeted.”
Cheung also said shared spaces and amenities were another vulnerability of these properties.
"With the growth of peer-to-peer online accommodation services, such as Airbnb, safety options such as coded gates no longer provide the same levels of security."
Through the paper, Cheung wanted to explore the positive and negative impacts of Airbnb on communities, hoping to help develop policies to keep people and their property safe.
Through this, he found a paradox, with different findings across papers contradicting each other.
“Other research tries to articulate that Airbnb is just a demand driver for the rental component. That's why we saw a positive impact on the sales price.
“But in this study, I tried to look into another aspect of Airbnb that is associated with something not so great, the negative impact or negative externality, if you like."
Crime was one of those negative impacts, and it could lead to property value decrease.
To fix the problem, Cheung suggested looking overseas and using body corporates to regulate the properties.
“They have at least the consensus from older residents in the community to better manage and maintain some of the property facilities.”
“I would like to say that by regulating the short-term rentals through the body corp, a framework that can better control and maintain the property and help mediate some of those urban conflicts recommended in the community.
“Airbnb hosts may be required to disclose the basic information of those guests to the body corp so that they can be more aware of how to manage their communal spaces.”
He suggested the body corporate be able to ask the property owner if they do Airbnb, and if so, contribute to the insurance – so that residents are compensated in some way.
1News has contacted Airbnb for comment.
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