Marseille looks to be latest French city to crackdown on Airbnb rentals
Mayor of the city also plans to ‘wage war on slum landlords’, and improve social housing
The mayor wants to crack down on ‘slum landlords’ and Airbnb hosts
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The mayor of Marseille has announced he wants to force Airbnb hosts to also buy a property and put it on the long-term rental market, in a bid to stop them from “emptying the neighbourhoods”.
“‘From the first second home [rented out on Airbnb], I'm going to oblige the landlord to buy a flat and rent it out long-term [as well],” said Benoît Payan, to FranceInfo on October 15.
He said that “75% of investors [in Marseille] are not from the city, and are using Airbnb”. This growing phenomenon is “emptying the neighbourhoods”, he said, and making it too difficult for local people to find long-term tenancies.
According to the city council, Marseille now has more than 12,000 properties rented out on short-term rental platforms, mainly Airbnb.
“I'm going to use everything the law gives me as a weapon [to prevent this phenomenon],” said Mr Payan: “It's going to make [Airbnb hosts] stop wanting to make money off the back of the people of Marseille.”
Short-term rental crackdown
Mr Payan’s idea is similar to rules already applied by some other authorities in other towns and cities in France (such as Paris and Bordeaux), where some require owners who put their second home on Airbnb to buy a property of equal or greater size, and put it on the traditional rental market as well as running their Airbnb listing.
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‘War on slum landlords’
Mr Payan also said he was working to crack down on ‘slum landlords’, who rent out properties in poor condition, and defy occupancy laws.
"I'm sending these people to the public prosecutor, one after the other,” he said. “So yes, I'm going to wage war on them, I'm waging war on them and I will continue to do so.”
“There's no reason why people should take advantage of poverty in this city," he said, saying that he was particularly mindful of this need on the upcoming anniversary of the collapse of two buildings on Rue d'Aubagne, which killed eight people on November 5, 2018.
Similarly, a residential building collapsed in April 2023, from a suspected gas explosion.
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Mr Payan said that ‘slum landlords’ come to “take over rotten flats…slums”, and “exploit people” who rent them, with negative knock-on effects for the housing market.
“We've put some order back into social housing,” he said, saying that the city has seen a slower rate of social housing construction decline since he became mayor in 2020.
The decline in the rate of the construction of social housing rate is 10% in Marseille “compared with 30% on average in Bouches-du-Rhône”, he said.
