By Hannah Brown, published in https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/
Cambridge City Council is being asked to call on the government to put in more regulation to control short term lets.
People are being ‘squeezed out’ of the housing market due to the rise in Cambridge homes being converted into Airbnbs and short term lets - it has been claimed. Councillor Karen Young has asked Cambridge City Council to call on the government to put in more regulation to help authorities control the number of conversions.
In a motion due to be debated at a full council meeting next week (October 19), Cllr Young said there are currently few controls the city council has to manage how many homes are converted into short term lets. She said the impact of these “uncontrolled changes' means people were ‘squeezed’ out of the housing market, in particular young people who may have grown up in the city.
Cllr Young has called on the city council to write to the government to voice support for more regulation to help councils to control short term let conversions. She also has called for the city council to look at how it can use the emerging joint local plan to “address these concerns” with powers at the authority’s disposal.
Cllr Young said: “Advertising a room on Airbnb and other similar platforms started off as a practical way to generate occasional income for a few, renting out a spare room or a whole dwelling for a few weeks of the year whilst on holiday, but the practice has grown hugely since the site was founded and is now enormously commercialised.
“This has had the effect of taking out privately owned and rented property from the market for long term living, and putting it in the market for short term and holiday lets and other temporary use. Currently, there are few or no proactive controls available to the local planning authority or council to oversee such changes of use, particularly in smaller properties, and therefore no means by which neighbours can put forward their views on such changes, or where additional comings and goings from servicing of such properties can be properly assessed.
“Uncontrolled changes of residential property to continuous short term lets have the effect of squeezing the housing market for people who want to live close to where they work. In particular, driving out young people at the lower end of the price range who want to live where they were brought up and raise children and thus reducing the long term sustainability of communities.
“In some cases [it is] enabling a source of neighbourhood nuisance by virtue of the use of inappropriate buildings or locations, turning Cambridge into a town with unsuitable or substandard accommodation for visitors to Cambridge.” The motion is due to be debated by councillors at the meeting next week, who are then expected to vote on whether they support the motion or not.
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