The short-term home rental service, Airbnb Inc, has recently agreed to comply with a New York state probe on potential state occupancy and tax regulations it and its hosts in the area might have committed. Citing the accord, Bloomberg said the San Francisco-based company, who has been earning in listing fees, will be handing ober information about its hosts in the New York City area on an anonymous basis. The company had agreed to provide identifying details later for people who have been deemed to be subjects of the investigation.
The accord reached with Airbnb will now allow the office of Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to move forward with its investigation. Schneiderman has since described some of the hosts on Airbnb's website as illegal, enterprising individuals who have violated the state law on banning spot rentals of whole homes. In a phone interview, Schneiderman clarified that people who rent out rooms as oppose to entire dwellings are not being targeted in the probe.
Principal analyst Brian Solis at Altimeter Group, an Mateo, California-based research firm focused on disruptive technology, said, "It buys New York a year to examine Airbnb data and find patterns for egregious law breaking. (Airbnb gets a year) to use New York as benchmark on how to improve its regulatory compliance, improve service for legitimate renters and better lobby on how to change the law."
Schneiderman sounds pleased with the accord, and said, "This is a great result. I think we've worked out something that's going to be a model or a template for other jurisdictions where this issue has been raised."
Bloomberg said that Airbnb will be informing other hosts about the illegal hotel law as well as other housing regulations as part of its accord with Schneiderman's office. Hotel rooms in the city of New York are subject to a 14.75% occupancy tax.
