Short-term rentals as digitally-mediated tourism gentrification: impacts on housing in New Orleans

Abstract

The ways in which short-term rental (STR) companies like Airbnb re-spatialize tourism are becoming apparent and force a reconsideration of “tourism gentrification” studies. Research on this phenomenon, originally described in New Orleans fifteen years ago, has traditionally focused on the role of the state and corporate interests investing large amounts of capital to promote mass tourism. Drawing on Census data and a dataset of STR listings in New Orleans, our research expands upon this foundational but limited conceptualization. We demonstrate how digital platforms like Airbnb and HomeAway, which enable housing units to be used as STRs, quickly open and close rent gaps, especially in historic, low-income neighborhoods outside of traditional tourist zones. This process results in significant revenues (around $100 million annually city-wide) for an increasingly concentrated set of actors and potentially removes rental units from the market. Although this new form of tourism gentrification involves “organic” processes of homeowners and corporate landlords undertaking investment in under-resourced neighborhoods, implying a diminished role for the state/city planning, state regulation is something even “virtual” platforms cannot completely avoid. While the city’s efforts to govern STR activity have regularized rather than constrained it so far, they could provide the means of mitigating the harmful effects of STRs and moving towards housing justice. Studying this phenomenon is especially critical in a touristic city like New Orleans. However, like the original conceptualization of tourism gentrification, our research is relevant beyond the local context as the actors, processes and forces at play are increasingly common in cities across the world.