ana033: Tim Battles Town Hall | Tom Woods Interviews Tim | Short Term Rental Ordinance

We released episode ana027: 11 SPOOKY Fears about Short Term Rentals | ASSUAGED! on Halloween in 2019. Hours later, there was a multiple homicide at an Airbnb renter’s Halloween party in Orinda, CA. Tim wrote a blog post discussing this incident with a view towards understanding what went so wrong.

In November 2019, Tom Woods interviewed Tim about the Orinda shooting and the broader topic of short term rentals. This was a more succinct presentation of our earlier episode, but they also covered some new ground.

Since then, Tim has spent over a year arguing against new regulations on short term rentals in his home town in Maine. At the same time, he renovated his basement into an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) for short-term rental in a race against the clock.

This episode starts with Tim’s interview on The Tom Woods Show, and then Tim reveals all the gory reality of small town politics. We close out with some profound lessons learned for libertarian principles and strategy.

Use hashtag #ana033 to reference this episode in a tweet, post, or comment

View full show notes at https://anarchitecturepodcast.com/ana033.

----more----Intro

Tim is now a recurring guest on The Tom Woods Show.

Joe was not invited back.

The Tom Woods Show, Episode 1542

• Tom likes Airbnb
• “There’s no way that this is going to be interesting”
• Airbnb’s aren’t allowed in many NYC buildings
• Short term rentals allow people to generate income from an unused asset
• Concerns about depleting housing stock
• Short term rentals are a longstanding property right
• Single room occupancy (boarding houses)
• Nuisances
  • Caution to libertarians: also defend property rights of neighbors
  • Libertarians have thought about these issues more than anyone else
  • The wedding venue next door – where every weekend is “September”
• Short term rentals vs long term housing
  • Santa Monica, CA study – compared area with ban against areas with no ban – no significant impact found
  • 2018 NYC study – 5,600 units off the market (out of 3.4 million) – 0.1% reduction in supply caused a 0.5% increase in rents?
  • Permitting delays and costs taken for granted
• Airbnb’s role in mitigating nuisances
  • Airbnb is essentially a listing service, but with their own terms of service
• Orinda Shooting
  • House rule: No Parties
  • “Airbnb Mansion Party”
  • Renter charged as accessory to murder
• Airbnb three announcements
  • Verify all listings
  • Ban party houses – artificial intelligence to flag party rentals
  • 24/7 neighbor hotline
  • Party houses leading to bans and restrictions – why has Airbnb allowed them for this long?
• Regulating Short Term Rentals
  • Mostly at the local level
  • Bans
  • Owner occupancy
  • “One host, one home”
  • Limiting number of days per year
  • Existing regulations – Zoning – no transient occupancy
  • Building codes
    • NFPA life safety code – “family plus three”
  • Licensing, permitting, registration
• Speaking out against regulations
  • Study the existing regulations
  • Address local concerns
  • Listen to the neighbors
  • Differentiate party houses
  • Get involved – nobody knows what to do
  • Home Rental Mediation Service
    • Anonymous complaint service
    • Noise violations difficult to enforce

I think you have a really unique and important podcast.

TOM WOODS Discussion

• Interview Reaction
  • Tom doesn’t often say upfront how boring the topic is
  • Tim immediately went off script
  • Earth, Wind and Fire joke bombed
  • Update on Orinda shooting – No convictions
  • Airbnb response – changed policy to revoke service for party houses
  • No more parties after COVID hit
    • Bookings disappeared during COVID, but came back when Maine had low case count
  • Airbnb verifying identities for listings
  • Airbnb Neighborhood Support Team
• Tim Battles Town Hall
  • A red flag – Accessory Dwelling Units (ADU) ordinance, no STR in an ADU
  • “A housing unit is a housing unit”
  • Tim posts his L’s – STR’s now on the agenda
  • Economic development committee meeting
  • Tim sings praises of the Town Manager
  • Is the Town Manager functionally similar to a privatized town?
  • Only 3 or 4 problematic properties
  • Noise ordinance enforcement – ambient noise louder than the ordinance allows. You can’t enforce intermittent disturbances
  • Informal workshop – Town Council, Planning Board, and one community representative – Tim!
  • “And then they asked what I thought…”
  • Draft ordinance is a laundry list of the usual concerns
    • Owner Occupancy requirement
    • Registration / License
    • Limit on rental duration
    • Occupancy Limit
    • Parking requirements
    • “Is there anything you like in it?”
    • “But there are just three more things…”
  • Not invited back to the second workshop
  • A list of listings
  • Rule #1: No chainsaw races… inside the house
  • Map of all listings in town
    • Viability (or lack thereof) of seasonal rentals
    • Ratio of listings in downtown area is consistent with the rest of town
    • A lot of units were ADU’s or single room rentals
    • Many listings on main roads, not in neighborhoods
    • 72 Dwelling Units listed; 1.4% of all units in town
    • Highest concentration in downtown: 5% of properties
    • Affordable housing concerns
      • 42 properties list the address as the owner’s mailing address
      • 50% had 3 or more bedrooms
      • Most units in more expensive areas
      • Housing affordability crisis is caused by restrictive single family home zoning
      • Only 12 owners outside New England – most are second (vacation) homes
      • Short term renting requires constant attention to the property
      • Short term rental empire – Tim is the only short term rental emperor in town.
    • Data helps to debunk myths, but stories persuade
    • STR income helps people to afford their houses
  • Second workshop (without Tim)
    • Business license requirement
    • Minimum parking requirement – additional space required
    • Occupancy limit – 2 people per bedroom
      • Does nothing to limit big party houses
      • Hurts 1 or 2 bedroom units
    • 2 guests? 3 Parking spaces!
    • A license is something they can take away
    • Vague wording of “violations”
    • Penalty: $500 per day. $180k per year?
    • “None of that stuff got a single mention”
    • Cap on licenses – effectively a ban
    • 5% increase each year = 3 new licenses
    • “My wife was livid”
    • A strongly worded letter
  • Final revisions
    • Direct discussions with councilors
    • Tim is the special interest group
    • The last holdout – “I can walk to 12 listings within 5 minutes of my house”
    • Normalcy Bias
    • Second order effects of losing housing units – no school football team?
    • Higher priorities – parking changes and tax reassessments
    • The inefficiency of small town politics
  • Public Hearing
    • Cancelled due to COVID
    • Surprise hearing – notified by Airbnb, not the council
    • Zoom council meeting, mail-in comments
    • No public opposition to short term rentals
    • So little of the process is public – it’s a done deal
    • Every time they go back, it gets worse
    • One size fits all
  • Aftermath
    • Tim has applied for 3 licenses
    • Basement ADU project rushed to complete before end of year
    • 60 licenses issued; 5% cap raised to 8%. Now 4 new licenses per year
    • Now they have to enforce it
    • Tim’s list – “eyes only” confidentiality
    • People try short term renting, don’t start out as a business
    • Waiting list
    • Re-evaluation of ordinance after 2 years
    • Tim has his special interest monopoly privilege
    • Fighting against the status quo
    • The ordinance does nothing to stop party houses
    • It could have been worse
  • Takeaways
    • Difficulty of public process
    • Drafting workshops aim to build consensus
    • It can’t be a direct democracy
    • Impossibility of rational discourse
      • Feelings don’t care about your facts
      • Councilors aren’t impartial
      • Libertarian awakening – there exist people who aren’t hyper-rational
      • Joe vs the Normies
        • People only care about comfort, convenience, complacency, and conformity
        • Aggressive Normieism – aggression of oblivion
        • City council is the pinnacle of normie aspiration
      • Don’t mess with dog people
      • A liberal sees the light on property rights
      • Confirmation Bias
      • Discourse can be messy
      • Discourse leading to legislation can cause real harm
    • Civil law for nuisance complaints – a lead balloon
      • Civil courts don’t work – too expensive and onerous for small disputes
      • Anarchic legal system depends on efficient civil courts and common law
      • Civil courts are a state monopoly
      • Legislation crowds out bottom of market for adjudication
      • Informal processes could emerge
      • Standard of evidence may be lower, more subjective
      • Damages could be proportionate to amount of evidence
      • Judge Judy is the model for an anarchic society
      • Common law is less efficient, but legislation can’t be effectively enforced
      • Civil cases also have high standard of evidence
      • Everyone is presumed guilty, the end.

Links/Resources

• The Tom Woods Show Episode 1542: Do you really Own Your Home?
• Airbnb Neighborhood Support Team
• AirDNA
• Furnished Finder
• Earth Wind & Fire – September

Episodes Mentioned

• ana027: 11 Fears About Short Term Rentals | ASSUAGED!
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