Paris (AFP)
Parisian owners wishing to rent on Airbnb must from Thursday compulsorily enter the registration number obtained from the town hall, said the platform which had committed in February to strengthening its tools for better regulation of furnished tourist accommodation.
This measure will apply to Bordeaux at the end of July, to Lyon at the start of the school year, then to Lille, Marseille, Nantes, Nice, Strasbourg and Toulouse by the end of the year, indicates in an Airbnb press release which has created a "portal for cities "so that cities report ads that do not comply with local regulations.
Airbnb had on April 1 made this registration number mandatory for any new ad created in the capital.
It is now also the case for all rental companies who were previously already present.
In Paris as in other cities in France, owners who wish to rent their main residence on the platform cannot exceed a ceiling of 120 nights per year.
Beyond that, they must request a change of use from the Paris town hall.
"This new step is part of Airbnb's series of commitments for responsible tourism made last February to Ms. Emmanuelle Wargon, Minister of Housing, to support the regulations applicable to short-term rentals, and place responsible travel at the heart of the recovery in tourism ", suggests the temporary rental platform.
The same month, the City of Paris had won an important victory in its tug-of-war with tourist rental platforms like Airbnb, the highest French court having deemed its regulations to comply with European law, allowing it to prosecute hundreds of unscrupulous donors.
In 2020, more than 95% of entire accommodations available on Airbnb in Paris were rented for less than 120 nights, says the platform, for whom "the vast majority of nights booked in entire Parisian accommodations were in previously registered accommodations , or who benefited from an exemption from registration ".
According to Airbnb, Paris only represented 10% of searches for stays in France in May, while searches for rural stays on its platform increased from 24% in the summer of 2019 to 45% for the summer of 2021.
© 2021 AFP