The strife of Bath
Hen party hell of couple stuck between online rental houses
AN elderly couple living between two online rental ‘party houses’ say the short-stay accommodation boom is ruining their historic home city.
Veronica and Fred Trenchard have to put up with noisy weekend hen parties on either side of their apartment in a Georgian terrace in Bath.
But they say an even bigger problem is that the rise of short-term letting websites such as Airbnb is forcing up local house prices, meaning ‘ordinary families cannot afford to live and work’ in the tourist hotspot.
Their apartment is between two five-storey homes, one sleeping 16 and the other 12, which are available through Airbnb and other sites including TripAdvisor, Hotels.com and Booking.com.
Mrs Trenchard, a music tutor who has lived in her £335,000 maisonette for four years, said: ‘We get masses of hen parties – I’m not sure why girls these days do that sort of thing. They behave stupidly and dress stupidly. I’m ashamed of them.’
But she added she was ‘ not a killjoy’ and her main complaint was the impact on her community.
‘These houses are empty all week,’ she said. ‘We have no neighbours on either side. It breaks up the community. Airbnbs make so much money. Ordinary families can’t afford to live here.’
The neighbouring property that takes up to 12 people sharing five bedrooms charges around £1,500 for a two-night weekend stay on Airbnb. A spokesman for the owner Longacre, a property development company, said the property is ‘professionally managed’.
The second property sleeping 16 costs around £2,000 for a two-night weekend stay on the same site.
Airbnb said it had received ‘no reports of issues with these listings’, adding: ‘We take local concerns seriously.’ The US firm has faced criticism in other tourist cities. A report last month said one in ten properties in Edinburgh city centre are on Airbnb, amid fears it is adding to a local housing crisis.
But the company has said its activities boosted the UK economy by £3.5billion last year.
Apartment rentals were banned two years ago in Palma, Majorca, and Amsterdam is also restricting short-term lets.