Airbnb in Edinburgh - Trends
Entire-home Airbnb reviews by month. Not all visitors leave reviews versus a very few spoiled or spam, each review typically corresponds to several people - therefore the number is a low estimate of visitors.
The use of Airbnb in Edinburgh during 2020 was expected to grow again, maybe at a slower rate than in previous years. They face increased competition from other STL brokers, lesser supply of new willing owners, and resistance from community groups, though still have plenty of scope to grow further across the city.
Around 145,000 reviews were written for entire-home Airbnbs in Edinburgh 2019, with the number expected to break 150,000 in 2020 (pre-Coronavirus).
There were around 2000 newly listed entire-home Airbnbs in Edinburgh in 2019 (1/3 of which were available during the Fringe only), continuing the upward trend of the past 5 years. Demand for visitor accommodation has never been higher and continues to outstrip the supply of hotel rooms being built.
Losses of homes in the capital to Airbnb for tourism can be said to be removing a large chunk of the existing housing stock, thus damaging the government's target of building new housing to meet demand from the next generation of Scots families.
Dashed lines indicate Airbnbs new in that year but excluding those that since ceased (no reviews in 2019)
- [1]insideAirBnB
- [2]Housing statistics quarterly Mar 2020
- [3]Edinburgh Council Visitor Accommodation
- [4]Colliers Intl Hotel report
Looking to the future, were entire-home AirBnBs restricted absolutely, 5000 existing properties could be freed for use by long-term residents or students. However it would create a massive shortfall of 15,000 beds for visitors, the peak in Summer, comparable to the entire 2019 capacity of hotels. Hotels of course have a massively higher guest-density achieving that number using 97% less properties.
Remember AirBnB is not the sole competitor in this market, and the data here does not indicate additional STL properties that are solely listed on homeaway,booking.com,flipkey,vrbo,homestay etc.
With hotel rooms consistently around 80% occupancy for 7 months in the year, urban space for building a dozen new hotels or dedicate student halls to visitors in summer, just to meet current tourist demand. Far in excess of the estimated 8000 bed increase in hotel room capacity slated for 2030, with Edinburgh airport expecting 5 million more tourists annually by then. The pressure will be on the Council from both sides in the coming years to provide extra capacity for tourism while cracking down on these antisocial STL businesses.
- [1]insideAirBnB
- [2]Housing statistics quarterly Mar 2020
- [3]GVA/Ryden Hotels report 2019
- [4]Colliers Intl Hotel report
- [5]City of Edinburgh Hotel Development Schedule 2018
- [6]Student accommodation figures
Airbnb in Edinburgh - Info
This website allows you to visualise and help identify the Airbnb lets near your home in Edinburgh. Data sourced from insideAirbnb.com (Mar 2020)
*The data is incomplete but can still give an accurate picture of short-term let proliferation. Airbnb make it difficult to identify the location and nature of homes they list for both user privacy and covertness. Exact locations are accurate to 300m. Prices have been averaged over the year, as they vary widely due to demand, date, availability, obscurities (eg. hosts postponing renting by setting high prices). Available days are subject to change as hosts update calendars frequently and can be removed or added after the dataset snapshot was taken. Days available in previous months but no longer could have been booked by guests, the date past unoccupied or simply been removed. Past reviews per month therefore seems the most useful occupancy metric, despite some guests not leaving reviews, but may seem skewed for hosts who only offer rent during Summer months.
Airbnb lists properties for rent on a short-term basis, either Entire-homes, without the host present, or Rooms within the hosts' home.
These businesses operate out with the regulations applied to traditional landlords, HMOs or Bed and Breakfasts. With many hosts never even meeting their guests face-to-face they can become removed from the day-to-day issues caused by their rental, and indignant to criticism of what provides them with a very lucrative income.
The Edinburgh short-term rental market is depriving permanent residents of available housing while causing existing tenants major disturbance and safety concerns, particularly felt in traditional communal stair tenements. Meanwhile long-term letting agents continue to hike prices due to limited supply versus demand, with new-build Student Accommodation given permission to plug the housing shortfall.
From the map you can see the properties are not restricted to just the Old Town or city center. Some of the most popular residences are situated in Leith and Easter Road to the East, to Tolcross and Murrayfield in the West. In total there were estimated to be over 9000 separate Edinburgh property listings on Airbnb in 2019, with around 500 Entire-home reviews being posted each day.
The Scottish government in 2019 rejected calls from residents and focus-groups to entirely regulate short-term letting, by forcing residential owners to apply for change-of-use planning permission, after a long consultation period into Scotland's planning laws.
They instead agreed new powers under the Planning (Scotland) Act 2019, which as of Spring 2021 allow the Council has the possibility to declare zones of the city off-limits to entire-home short-term letters without first procuring a license. But there is no decision yet on how much of the city will be adopted under these zoning laws, what the licensing model will be, the criteria to be granted a license, or what recourse there will be for residents when hosts flout these regulations.
Encouragingly the Council have recently granted a handful of Enforcement Notices barring specific properties from functioning as short-term lets due to the noise, disruption and security concerns of neighbours, and vindicated by the appeals process of the Government.
Residents disturbed by short-term lets in your area and the lack of clarity & action are urged:
- Find and report the presence of unlicensed short-term lets in your area to Edinburgh Council Planning.
- Contact your local MSP or Councillor and tell them your concerns, and details of the situation in your area.
- Report the details of Airbnbs to the Green Party's crowd-sourced homesfirst campaign.