The neoliberal tenant dystopia: Digital polyplatform rentierism, the hybridization of platform-based rental markets and financialization of housing

Abstract

Converting residential housing into short-term rentals (STRs), through platforms such as Airbnb, has become a very profitable business, and a tourist-led rentier class has been formed in connection with this activity. However, the pandemic stalled this process and STRs began to be listed on residential rental platforms. Our paper questions whether these STRs have actually returned to the residential market. Our research shows how the pandemic fostered what we term as the emergence of digital polyplatform rentierism through the hybridisation of rental markets. This process amplifies the exchange value of housing and the owners' future expectations of profits, enhancing the opportunities and means for the financialization of housing. For tenants, this model produces a neoliberal tenant dystopia: the supply of rental housing is reduced and the power dynamic between owners and tenants altered, with the former empowered and the latter weakened. Consequently, without stricter public policy to protect the right to housing and the right to live in the city, the platformisation of housing will result in less stable and less affordable rental prices, thereby fostering housing precarity and tenant impoverishment.