City and state officials have reached an $845,000 settlement with a real estate firm and broker over illegal Airbnbs at a pair of Manhattan buildings, continuing New York’s crackdown on short-term rentals.
Mega Home and broker Katherine Cartagena had converted four residential units into Airbnbs at 311 E. 51st St. between First and Second avenues in Midtown East and 207 W. 75th St. between Amsterdam Avenue and Broadway on the Upper West Side, according to the city’s Office of Special Enforcement. The listings saw more than 550 bookings from more than 2,000 guests between 2019 and 2022, and Cartagena and Mega Home received more than $2 million in payments for them from Airbnb, the agency said.
Cartagena and Mega Home, which state records show is based on Long Island and lists her as its CEO, have taken down the illegal listings, and Cartagena will lose her real estate license if she advertises illegal short-term rentals again, according to the city.
“This settlement highlights the importance of robust reporting requirements for booking platforms and short-term rental registration in combatting illegal short-term rentals and the attendant loss of housing,” Office of Special Enforcement Executive Director Christian Klossner said in a statement.
Cartagena did not respond to a request for comment by press time.
A short-term rental is any place rented out for less than 30 days. Under city law, for them to be legal, hosts must live in the same residence as their guests and have no more than two guests at a time. Hosts also cannot rent out an entire apartment or home to a guest for less than 30 days.
Since September the city has required Airbnb hosts to register their apartments with the city in order to be paid by the company, a move Airbnb strongly opposed. The law was endorsed by Mayor Eric Adams and backed by New York’s powerful real estate and hotel industries, and it has dramatically curtailed Airbnb’s presence in the five boroughs. The city had 22,247 short-term rentals in August, a month before the new rules took effect, and this plummeted to 3,011 in January, according to the research firm AirDNA.
The regulations have helped boost the city’s hotel industry, with average daily rates reaching $301.12 last year, the most expensive they have been, according to data from the commercial real estate firm CoStar. They are expected to rise even further this year.
Eddie Small , 2024-03-21 17:31:35
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