To help address housing crunch, Assembly members seek more data from Airbnb and other hosting platforms

Three Anchorage Assembly members are proposing that Airbnb, Vrbo and similar hosting platforms provide more information about the growing short-term rental market in Anchorage, in an effort to better understand the market’s impact on the city’s housing crunch.

The proposal places no requirements on the operators of the rentals, according to a memorandum discussing it. It would require the platforms to provide “a breakdown of the number of operators, rooms rented, and taxes due by zip code,” the memo says.

The platforms currently are not required to provide that information when they submit Anchorage room taxes on behalf of the operators.

The measure was proposed by Assembly vice chair Meg Zaletel and members Randy Sulte and Daniel Volland.

Zaletel said it’s a small step to better understand how short-term rentals affect a tight housing market that has been blamed for contributing to higher rent and home prices in Anchorage.

It follows an earlier proposal vetoed this spring by former Mayor Dave Bronson that also sought to gather data about the market. That proposal would have created a licensing program for short-term rentals, while adding costs and potential penalties for the property owners. The Assembly did not attempt to override the veto.

The Assembly in recent years has taken several steps to create more housing in Anchorage, including this summer broadly expanding where duplexes can be built.

Zaletel said this new measure is an “information-gathering tool” to help the city shape any future policy that might be needed to address short-term rentals.

“Trying to get the data isn’t a bad thing,” she said. “Do we need regulation right now? We don’t know. And so we figured this was an appropriate interim step to take after the other ordinance didn’t pass.”

The new ordinance was introduced at the Assembly meeting on Aug. 27. A public hearing on the measure is set for Sept. 10.

One thing is clear: The short-term rental market in Anchorage has grown rapidly.

Anchorage room taxes submitted by hosting platforms reached $6.5 million last year, up about 20% from the year before.

Those taxes are submitted primarily by Airbnb and Vrbo, said Paula Reiswig, the Anchorage Treasury official who supervises the room tax program.

The taxes represent about 15% of all the room taxes, which are also submitted by hotels, lodges and traditional bed and breakfasts.

A representative with AirDNA, a firm that analyzes the short-term rental market, said in an email that Anchorage short-term rental listings have roughly doubled over the last five years. The firm counted 4,628 listings on average, over the 12-month period that ended in July.

Zaletel said the platforms can provide more accurate information about the market.

The platforms consider the number of operators to be proprietary information, according to the memorandum. The memorandum suggests the effort to gather more data could lead to “pushback” from the platforms.

A representative with Airbnb declined to immediately provide comment for this story, citing short staffing during the Labor Day weekend. Representatives with Vrbo could not be reached for comment.

Other cities in the Lower 48 and in other countries have enacted laws that attempt to rein in short-term rental markets. Some have added rules limiting the number of units a person or company can own and rent out for short-term use. Others have set rules on the total number of vacation rentals allowed in an area, have implemented new taxes or have banned them altogether.

Zaletel said she thinks other cities that know their operator and room numbers have generally done so as part of a broad regulatory program.

“And we said we didn’t want to do that yet as a community,” she said. “So to me, this feels like an appropriate baby step.”

Sulte, whose South Anchorage district includes Girdwood, said the percentage of short-term rentals is especially high there.

He said the operator numbers could help the Assembly determine how to best address the issue there. The community might benefit from a limited, carefully constructed policy addressing short-term rentals, he said.

“How can we make changes today before we end up where workers can’t afford to live in the community?” he said.

Mike Edgington, co-chair of the Girdwood Board of Supervisors, the local governing body in the town of about 2,000, said estimates of online listings show that about 20% of the housing in town is short-term rentals.

Estimates indicate that close to one-quarter of the city’s room taxes from short-term rentals are collected in the town, he said.

Edgington said he supports the measure.

The data could help with an effort by the community to create a registration scheme for short-term rentals in the town. It’s currently in development. It would be similar to the one vetoed by Bronson but specific to Girdwood, he said.

Other cities in the Lower 48 receive the operator data from the platforms, but only after they requested it, he said.

“This is a useful step,” he said of the proposal.

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