[00:00:57] John: Good morning, Mateo. How are you?

[00:01:00] Mateo: I am good. I’m doing really good. It’s been a, rollercoaster of a month, but ended on a high note.

[00:01:07] John: I’m excited to be recording. We have an amazing guest.

[00:01:10] John: we have some interesting news that came out that we’re going to dive into. Regarding our oversees guest. You know what? I’m just going to let’s just dive in. I’m going to let you go ahead and introduce.

[00:01:20] Mateo: I think it’s good to talk about too. The guests that we have today, we had to reach out to our international friends about something specific that, we’ll dig into in a minute that’s, potentially, massive for our industry. I do want to get into and, we’ll love to introduce, my friend Jaume Barberena, And Jaume, you got to forgive me for this because, I’m going to throw a lot of titles out there.

[00:01:43] Mateo: All of them meant out of love. My good friend who is what I like to call a Catalan OG. He is from the amazing city of Barcelona, runs an amazing business, called Bizflats, but is a, I like to call him a scientist, data scientist, one of the. Most pragmatic and intellectual minds in our space. yes, he is a friend, but he is also a colleague and someone I have an immense amount of respect for his business acumen, for his thoughts on the business and the world. I’ve had the opportunity to not only experience the real Barcelona and real Catalan and Catalan culture with my friend., without further ado, without any more introductions, Jaume, welcome to the No BS podcast. Let’s dig in my friend. How are you? Where are you? Let’s get it going.

[00:02:35] Jaume: Thank you for having me on. I hope to live up to this amazing billing that you have just introduced me with. I am in Barcelona. I just got back from a small trip to Egypt, Cairo. I love to travel and in doing that, it’s one of the bedrock for the experiences that. I see and that I have when I go out in different places in the world, which, I also want to be part of the foundation of what we offer to our guests when they come to visit us here in Barcelona.

[00:03:16] Mateo: So let’s start, let’s take it from the beginning, man. You and I met a long time ago, but you had been in the business before. Give us a bit of your background. How did you get into the space? How did you get into the business? Wow.

[00:03:34] Jaume: It all started with a wedding in Kiev, of all places. That was, 21 years ago. And we were invited and our hosts there said, Oh no, you don’t book a hotel. I have these apartments for you. We thought, okay, that sounds pretty cool.

[00:03:53] Jaume: Different, innovative. Of course, it was a place we didn’t know much about. Now it’s been in the news for a lot of not great reasons. And so we did and they’d stocked the refrigerator for us. And, we got picked up at the airport and so it was a fantastic experience and we thought.

[00:04:14] Jaume: We were in that process, my friend Mark and I, who started this business together, we were already thinking about this because it was something that was already being done, say in the coastal towns, in the ski resorts. But back then it was a nascent thing in urban environments. And then when we got to experience it firsthand, we said, yeah, man, we got to do this, right?

[00:04:38] Jaume: This was just before Christmas. And so we started the company in, the first business day of 2004.

[00:04:47] John: It’s similar here in the States, vacation rentals or, traveling of this sort and staying in lodging in hospital of this sorts has been going on forever, 40, 50, you’d go on, you’d stay at someone’s vacation home, but it was definitely vacation destinations. Talk to us about those early days of setting up in an urban STR in Barcelona and, the reception of this in an urban environment,

[00:05:13] Jaume: Let’s just say that, it was a greenfield. There wasn’t any framework there. So we just, made it up, flew by the seat of our pants basically. And then we checked out what everybody else was doing and we thought, okay, let’s Differentiate in this aspect.

[00:05:31] Jaume: One of the aspects of why it’s called Bizflat is because we wanted to approach more of the business type users, the people who came to trade shows, the people who are relocating on account of, their company. So there was an element of that. The other part is that we needed inventory, right?

[00:05:50] Jaume: So we started cold calling people who were renting their apartments on. a long term basis and we offered them, here’s a business proposal. How about we do short term rentals? You’ll get more money out of them. You won’t have some of the big issues that you have with the tenancy laws that are still in place in Spain, which have very strong protections to tenants As we can eliminate those problems that, you may have had. And in fact, the people who best responded were usually people who either had bad experiences with long term tendencies, or the people who Had left the city for a time, but they knew that they’d come back and didn’t want to be stuck with, a long term contract that I know the day I sign, but I don’t know the day it will finish because they can keep renewing the contract at the tenants will until say five to eight years.

[00:06:53] Jaume: So together with, as we started speaking to people, we still had a fair bit of bewilderment. I remember one, Which I remember to this day, a conversation with a chap who said, What? You’re going to rent a flat for two weeks? Are you mad? And I said, No, somebody’s coming for a vacation or they’re coming to visit family or whatever, it makes perfect sense.

[00:07:19] Jaume: So enough, enough, people were You know, we’re getting, there was a certain say through the grapevine hearing about this, that by the end of the year we had, we had a few flats that we were managing already and we had a interest, we had a really good summer that year and then, and it grew quite well.

[00:07:43] Jaume: And we knew we were on to something, then that’s when the problems started, so to speak, a lot of the things that are still Issues that are semi solved problems in the industry, even to this day, were already apparent back then. Things like getting distribution, like having channel management, all of these things, which back then people, like the owners of the properties had to do manually, right?

[00:08:11] Jaume: Now it’s a little bit more streamlined, but there still isn’t say, a perfect standard or something that is. Widely accepted industry wide and, those were the early days.

[00:08:25] Mateo: So in those early days, there had to be pushback, right? Because, again, the unique situation with housing and, housing affordability and access, it seems like all of these things always attach themselves or always have been attached, but Barcelona has always been a city of extreme hospitality also, right?

[00:08:46] Mateo: That has and draws, people from all over the world, whether it’s by ship, by plane, by car, you name it. Enter a country, it’s an international place that everyone loves to come. How did the city, get to, because I know where we got to with the news from last week, where they’re just going to ban all foreign, right? How did we get here? Because I’ve seen bits and pieces. I remember one trip. I came out and you and I went to a local organization that you went with. I think it was an advocacy organization. They acknowledged you for the work that you were doing at that time. I was happy to be there. And you, there seemed to be a vibrant community that was engaged, that was responsible, that was, Putting standards in place, wanted to professionalize and ensure that, the short term rental, vacation rental community in the city, had a voice, operated responsibly and, as business owners and. Again, it seems like even with that, there’s still this overwhelming kind of tidal wave of fear of our industry. So talk to us a bit about how we came to, to get to this band.

[00:09:53] Jaume: So Barcelona, arguably is probably the most highly professionalized in urban markets anywhere in the world. Because from an early start, and I don’t know the exact date, but I believe it was 2005, 2006, which was when Apartur was founded. This is the umbrella organization for, the property managers and owners

[00:10:22] Jaume: of short term rentals in the whole Barcelona province.

[00:10:26] Jaume: Of course, a sizable focus on Barcelona City itself. And so even all that time ago, there was an understanding of the requirement that this industry needed to speak with one voice. With many of the stakeholders in the city, right? Whether those be, the commercial groups, the neighborhood associations, the political in the different spheres, both local, regional, and later on as we needed.

[00:11:02] Jaume: To speak with the government in Madrid. Even back then, this was apparent, that, getting together, putting the industry together was an important goal in its own right. Throughout this time, Barcelona has always had an industry that has been very progressive in addressing many of the issues that, of course, always appear, right?

[00:11:29] Jaume: And it’s always, there’s always a problem du jour. In terms of in vacation rentals, so

[00:11:37] Jaume: sometimes it’s problems with neighbors, and in other times it’s your, you’re doing away with affordable housing, and other times it’s tourismophobia. You name it. There’s never

[00:11:50] John: here in the states. It’s trash. It’s there’s so much

[00:11:53] Mateo: Party houses. Yeah.

[00:11:57] John: What’s interesting to me about this is you checked all the boxes, right? We talk all the time on the podcast about how important it is to establish yourself early in the community as industry leaders, as thought leaders, as the go to people or person. As as the professional, of the space and how important it is to go ahead and align yourself with the local and regional governments and the different advocacy groups, both for and against you, to show that, we’re doing this right.

[00:12:31] John: And we care and we want to educate in the right way. And

[00:12:35] John: you’ve been, it sounds like, that, for 18 plus years now, there’s been some sort of, of advocacy group that you are, have all been a part of. And what’s disheartening about this is that you’ve been doing it all right for the whole, time and still shit’s hitting the fan.

[00:12:59] John: So that, that’s, I don’t want this to be a cautionary tale or don’t do this kind of tale because it doesn’t matter because that’s not the point. The point is No matter how hard you try or work or put your, efforts together, sometimes you’re still up against it and then you have to even fight harder. And then that’s where you guys are at right now.

[00:13:18] Jaume: Yes, I couldn’t agree more. I think that our, a friend of mine likes to say that at his at his parent’s his parents meetings at school. He’d rather say he was a pimp than a guy who runs STRs.

[00:13:35] Mateo: Oh, wow.

[00:13:35] Jaume: bad of an image problem the industry has. Or at least that, it’s perceived that way.

[00:13:42] Mateo: How did we, get to that? Like, how is it to the point where. Property management,

[00:13:47] Mateo: doing the right thing.

[00:13:49] Jaume: one word. Airbnb.

[00:13:51] Mateo: Okay. Let’s talk about

[00:13:52] Jaume: So up until the explosion of Airbnb, which was 2010, 2011 around around here,

[00:14:02] Mateo: Mhm.

[00:14:04] Jaume: there wasn’t, there was a booking. com, which was starting out and people were starting to use it, but booking. com caters to professionals. So people like me were using it,

[00:14:17] Jaume: as professional managers, but then Airbnb comes around and creates this image, of, anybody can rent their place out. It’s really easy. Take some photos with your phone,

[00:14:32] Jaume: Them on this site.

[00:14:33] Jaume: Exactly. They, lowered the barrier to entry in a

[00:14:36] Jaume: And, all of a sudden, and the other thing that happened is that Barcelona began its licensing program around the same time, around 2010.

[00:14:44] Jaume: So then everybody who wanted to could sign up for short term rental licenses. And of course we all did because that was the thing to do. And it ensured that we’d also have a legal footing. For the industry. So we were for that. There was

[00:15:03] John: Right.

[00:15:04] Jaume: the flip side was that then. Almost anybody could do it, right?

[00:15:09] Jaume: And there were no standards, right? Because a lot of the new entrants were not professionals. And, they didn’t necessarily care about the industry as a whole. Because, I’m just some dude who has a little apartment, I’m renting out a room, or I’m renting out a car. The other apartment turned some spare cash.

[00:15:35] Jaume: So the story looks good on the surface, right? Little Joe Schmoe who can, make some extra cash on the side, whatever. But then you multiply this by several thousand, right? And they’re all over the place. And then

[00:15:49] John: now millions globally,

[00:15:51] Jaume: on a global, then definitely millions and millions.

[00:15:55] Jaume: There was another thing, and this is very much a Latin character,

[00:15:59] Jaume: kind of thing. The fact that in Barcelona, of course, all, almost all apartments are in vertical housing, right? So you’re you’re one unit in 10, 20, 30 in the building. And people say, oh this dude is bringing in tourists and, and, People like to talk and they like to gossip and, Oh, he’s got new tourists here every three, four days.

[00:16:24] Jaume: He must be making a mint.

[00:16:26] Jaume: And so there’s that envy factor as well. That’s possibly a very Latin thing and not so much, maybe in, in some places like the U S I don’t know. I’m just, but

[00:16:37] John: It’s still very much a, it’s a, it’s still urban. The majority of our markets are, are, I don’t know, I’d say the majority of the, If you were to look at, the United States, I’d still say the majority of STRs are in where families are booking, they’re going to vacation destinations still, but the urban

[00:16:56] John: markets are still very vertical, and probably running it.

[00:16:59] John: We’re running, we ran into not as extreme, we’ve had issues in San Diego and in New York City most

[00:17:06] John: recently which, has, Made a huge negative impact as far as tourism money. And we’ll get into all that as well with what’s going on in Madrid, in Barcelona.

[00:17:16] Jaume: So the narrative changed starting with the explosion of Airbnb and that, that started to build this within the communities, within the HOAs this thing about, Oh, we don’t want tourist apartments here because, Tourists cause all the problems in, all the problems in the Bible are caused by tourists.

[00:17:42] Jaume: They’re dirty, they make noise, they da, so then we started seeing that many of the HOAs wanted to pass bylaws where they would outlaw. short term rentals. Some of them didn’t do it well. They realized that the costs of doing that were going to be very high. It’s just a very arcane and complicated system where you have to, take these things to a notary or whatever.

[00:18:10] Jaume: It just, it’s a lot of, it’s a high expense and it’s also a bit of paperwork. So not everybody did it. And that was one thing. The other thing is that if you voted against the rule, then it wouldn’t affect you anyway, right? So they couldn’t stop you. They couldn’t effectively stop the people who were already legally operating.

[00:18:34] Jaume: So it backfired in, in, in many cases. But I think the dye was cast already That in many people’s minds, the short term rent, the urban short term rentals are something that is it’s a cancer to society. And then there came the, those far left wingers who were like, tourists go home, which Mateo will tell you, he’s seen the spray painted walls, in, in different places.

[00:19:04] Jaume: neighborhoods in Barcelona. Then, some of their, the political, allies then started harping on about how housing was being affected so gravely. Yeah. So overall it, it really has it has snowballed. It didn’t start It did start little by little, but now it’s become very broad based. We’re getting attacks on all these fronts.

[00:19:34] John: This is, And again, we, I mentioned earlier that this is at a whole different level, what’s going on in, in Barcelona to to an extreme that we have not seen yet and for a major city in the world, like this is the most extreme measures, but, I’m looking at this article and it’s saying that, talking about this ban, which is what, 2028, right?

[00:19:55] John: Supposedly in 2028, there is a ban on all foreign short, short term stays in outside of like hotels, correct? Is that, can you recap the, what the new this new ruling is? And then we’ll go from there.

[00:20:10] Jaume: Yeah it’s interesting that you said that nobody has gone this far anywhere else, because I guess that’s why it’s made the world news. I’ve had friends from Hungary, from Italy, from the US, from, even from Australia asking me, so what’s going on in Barcelona? I think if City Hall wanted to, for this thing to be done and be hush, it definitely backfired.

[00:20:36] Jaume: I think their motivations are different and we can get into that maybe a little later on.

[00:20:42] Mateo: Yeah.

[00:20:42] Jaume: For now, the main driver behind this is a decree that was done by the regional government of Catalonia. In November, in which they were, they are going to essentially cancel all STR permits in Catalonia in at the end of a five year period, which is November 2028.

[00:21:07] Jaume: Hence the 2028, which you’re seeing published in every news bulletin. The catch is that each local authority has this five year period in which they need to create a new regulation for short term rentals. And then, Anybody who wants a short, a new short term rental license can apply for it. So not just anybody who was a holder before,

[00:21:35] Jaume: but anybody else who wants in. Now, the catch to that is that a local authority has to create a specific plan. So if a local authority doesn’t create a plan, then, oops, there’s no short term rental licenses because you require something specific. This,

[00:21:54] John: so, this, was sensationalized. But at the same time, it’s still very much a, as far as the news bulletins that, cancel, like normal media will do. But at the same time, it’s a time to act as now, if you don’t start, all these, You’re talking and I’m not familiar with the geography, so I apologize if I’m murdering this.

[00:22:14] John: But these regions or neighborhoods or cities or towns all have to go ahead and create their own short-term rental licensing and rules and bylaws that everyone now has to go ahead and apply to. And anyone, it’s open to anybody. And if you were previously part of something, you have to reapply. And if. In that time frame, there is no new law or new rules set in place, then it is banned for it,

[00:22:43] Jaume: exactly, then your licenses will, cancel after, at the five year mark. And then until and unless new regulation is introduced. Then that city, that local authority does not have any permits.

[00:23:02] John: So

[00:23:02] John: now is a huge super important time to continue your mobilization effort and education effort. And

[00:23:10] John: education is the big word here

[00:23:12] John: is to let the local communities in the, because you are right now, all eyes are on Barcelona, right? All eyes are on Barcelona. How you handle this because this is going to be, unfortunately what is happening in Barcelona now is going to be replicated worldwide. Cities in across the States or globally are going to go ahead and say, Oh, look at what they’re doing. And this is which could be positive or negative, depending on how these local communities handle it and how these advocacy groups mobilize in a way to, to get the correct education out.

[00:23:48] Jaume: The irony of this is that Barcelona, the mayor of Barcelona has, is on the record saying that his model is New York. Which is very ironic because New York introduced a licensing regime , where there was none.

[00:24:04] Jaume: I think it was about a year ago

[00:24:05] Jaume: or a year and a half. Therefore it’s, he’s saying he’s copying New York. I think he wants to copy the effects of New York, but, going about it a totally different way. So I think that there’s a little bit of irony.

[00:24:20] Jaume: The other thing is that this measure is only thought of. is mostly thought of, and it’s quite populist as you can guess, as a housing measure.

[00:24:32] Jaume: Given there’s about from 7 to 10x the number of empty apartments in Barcelona, so somewhere between 70 and 90, 000, compared to the number of short term rentals, which is somewhere between 7 and 10, 000. There’s different ways of calculating. Some are the ones that are active, the other ones are the ones that

[00:24:55] Jaume: are licensed. So

[00:24:56] Jaume: hence

[00:24:57] John: So even if you’re looking at,

[00:24:58] John: Rounding up, say there’s 10, 000 short term rentals in Barcelona, there’s six times empty. Apartments in buildings that aren’t being rented right now. , in your opinion, what’s the true reason for these, This article that we’re saying that that we were reading. The boom in short term rentals in Barcelona, Spain’s most visited city by foreign tourists means some residents cannot afford an apartment after rents rose 68 percent . in the past 10 years. And the cost of buying a house rose 38%.

[00:25:34] Jaume: So you want to know, you want to know what’s really funny. Barcelona city council has not issued a single license since October of

[00:25:43] Jaume: 2014.

[00:25:44] Mateo: So thank you, because that’s where I was going to go. Yeah, that’s where I was going next with it, Jeremy, because I know Barcelona capped licenses, you couldn’t get a new one. And so that’s another effect that is going to really shake things up for especially for business owners and other people who already had licenses in place.

[00:26:04] Mateo: Now it’s just you’re throwing it up in the air. And

[00:26:08] Jaume: yeah so it calls into question what you get a license from the government, what it’s worth.

[00:26:15] Jaume: Because, they’re going to come and revoke it at any time.

[00:26:19] Mateo: Right.

[00:26:20] Jaume: you’ve asked me a couple of times what we’re going to do about it. And here’s where I can tell you right now what the game plan is.

[00:26:30] Jaume: And a lot of this will, we’ll need to add more. As events further develop. But when the decree came out in November, we did a crowdfunding with Apartur and all the other associations in Catalonia to raise funds to hire some, artists. important advocates and law firms to write up a petition to Spain’s constitutional court, which has been admitted, and so they will hear the arguments. Now, we think that this law is on, the decree from November is unconstitutional,

[00:27:16] Jaume: therefore the ban that the mayor of Barcelona plans on taking place based on that law is destined to fail.

[00:27:26] Mateo: Mmhmm.

[00:27:27] Jaume: we won’t know the results of this for a while. In the meantime, we’re also planning to sue

[00:27:32] Jaume: Both the city and the regional government for The financial economic damage that it will create for all the owners, all the property managers. And, and that’s going to be quite, quite a sizable sum of money. They may come to their senses that, possibly being awarded a damages in the billions of euros is not very much in their favor and that they could do away with this at the stroke of a pen. It’s very much politically motivated. It’s not gonna, I don’t think that anybody who has a little bit of an analytical thought would think that adding 10, 000 units to the housing supply would change the problems of Barcelona’s housing. Least of which because most of those are not going to make it into the housing supply because you know You may think of other ways to manage the property which are not necessarily going to go into long term housing anyway

[00:28:40] Jaume: All right,

[00:28:41] Jaume: you could just say okay since I can close an apartment and not have any ill effects I could just move out Lock the door and let that be that, or do temporary rentals, but not short term under, under a month.

[00:28:53] Jaume: So anything above a month is still fair game.

[00:28:56] John: right.

[00:28:57] Jaume: There’s, so many, there’s so many options and opportunities there that it’s unlikely that any or a very small percentage maybe will actually make it into housing. And a lot of this is just, window dressing because Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain have not had very successful social housing programs over, over the years. The effects of that are getting more acute, as you as you said, and this has been widely published, increase of 70 percent in rents when there’s been no new tourist apartments, that must mean that there’s other issues at play.

[00:29:40] Mateo: Yeah.

[00:29:41] Jaume: contribution from is

[00:29:44] John: here in the States.

[00:29:45] Mateo: The empty apartments alone is, is in the fact that’s not being talked about, right? Like the unoccupied units that are already there. It seems like there’s a lot of cities. It seems like Vancouver also has a very similar situation to this Vancouver, BC. And I get the other side to a certain point.

[00:30:02] Mateo: You get a lot of foreign money that’s coming in, parking, buying, and not, not living. Not renting. So it’s, again, it’s, we’re not part of that conversation. One of the things that I am starting to see here in one of the things that, we’ve talked about even at your time, when you came to visit in Atlanta, the things that we’re working on here in terms of partnership with the government.

[00:30:22] Mateo: Is that a path? Do you see organizations like Apartheid and others being able to actually start working in conjunction with the government to rectify these problems for the longterm? Because, the reality of the allure of Barcelona, the ships are not going to stop coming.

[00:30:38] Mateo: The airplanes are not going to stop coming. The people are not going to stop coming. And I’m pretty sure, while there are some, decent hotels within the city that there’s not enough hotels to, to take on the hospitality demand that the city has. And so what do you do with that?

[00:30:55] Mateo: You’re going to go build more hotels in areas that also, again, have decent hotels. could, require new building, new land in an area that doesn’t have it. And that you’re saying, you’re going to build new hotels. Why not build more housing, or build housing or build mixed communities or build in a way that supports both because the other part that we talked about the funds, but we haven’t talked about the economic impact of, what’s going to happen to these businesses and the people who work for these businesses.

[00:31:21] Mateo: Now you’re going to take an area which. needs more employment opportunities for, everyone from the young through throughout, the community, you’re going to take away something that is core to that. And if done right could actually help solve that problem. You could solve housing, expanding in the right way will create more jobs and more opportunities.

[00:31:43] Mateo: So I guess who has that conversation? Is that even possible or does that have to be litigated?

[00:31:49] Jaume: This is of course, why it’s such a, why it’s a complex issue because you just pulled on at least five different threads, right? Economic development, housing, tourism, You name it, right? And these are not, there are relationships, sometimes they’re direct, sometimes they’re second order or even third order. And, most of the time in the political sphere, that kind of talk isn’t really, The matter for public discussion, because it’s much easier to say, look, I’m going to shut these guys down.

[00:32:30] Jaume: And, it’s bluster and it’s, Hey, look how strong I am. And I’m going to fix this. And in the end, I think the political effect is probably already, has already taken place, right? Everybody’s talking about, we’re going to, Barcelona’s tourist short term rentals are going to be shut down in four years. Hooray. And if you look at informal opinion polls, say on the newspaper articles, are you in favor of the short term rentals ban in Barcelona? 70%? 80%? Yes.

[00:33:07] Jaume: Because they don’t look at the discussion, right? It’s okay,

[00:33:11] Jaume: The mayor said this, right? And he came out and thumped his chest and said, Yes totally agree with you, Mateo, in respect to, yes, that would be a much better scenario. However, this has not been the case.

[00:33:26] Jaume: So ever since there’s a mayor, his name is Jaume Colboni. Damn, he shares a name with me. So ever since Colboni

[00:33:34] Jaume: was elected in May of last year, so already one year in office, they have, they don’t even pick up the phone. Aparthur the, who speaks for an industry that has 40 Percent of the beds in Barcelona and you can’t speak to anybody at city hall.

[00:33:52] John: Are you up against, we see this here, are you up against very deep pockets and that’s, there are, there’s, are there some pockets getting greased here in your opinion?

[00:34:04] Jaume: It’s definitely crossed my mind that there’s, that there’s some deep interactions some of the hotel and and construction lobbies

[00:34:14] John: yeah. It’s the

[00:34:15] John: same here

[00:34:15] Jaume: that have deep ties with with some of the politicians.

[00:34:19] Jaume: And that, they are working their way through the back door to get a larger part of the pie.

[00:34:29] Jaume: And we can see it in the way the rhetoric has escalated ever since Colboni was elected. At first he said, I want to do away with the apartments that are in the old town of Barcelona, the Ciutat Vella, and I want to build singular hotels. in special historical buildings. Then the next thing said, I want a substantial decrease in tourist apartments. He didn’t say if it was just Ciutat Mella or across the board. you can read between the lines.

[00:35:09] Jaume: And of course, leading up to the crescendo of two weeks ago. Okay. I’m going to ban everything full stop.

[00:35:17] Mateo: right

[00:35:17] Jaume: but wait, there’s a kicker. A couple of interviews come out and he says yes, I’m actually thinking that we should have, we should build the 5, 000 more beds in for, we should build 5, 000 more hotel rooms.

[00:35:34] Jaume: Little by little, I feel like that mask is coming off.

[00:35:38] Jaume: It certainly looks that way.

[00:35:39] Mateo: yeah,

[00:35:41] Jaume: And it’s, the thing is, you guys said people are coming because the city is attractive and it has so many attractions, right? It has it has it has great restaurants, number one restaurant in the world, right? It’s here in Barcelona. It has the great monuments, cathedrals, all the historical stuff. It has beaches, it’s very close to ski resorts. So it has this very all around, year round appeal that, and it’s also great for families. It’s a wonderful place. You can come with your partner, you can come with the kids, You can come, as a multi generational group. There’s things here for everyone. That’s not going away. The other trend that I think is also unstoppable is that people want to have these vacations together. And the Having a house in which you can stay in, in which you have your living area, the kids can play and with their cousins and with grandma and grandpa and so on, right?

[00:36:48] Jaume: That is an immense appeal and people have gotten used to traveling and being able to do this and it’s a far better value proposition than, get multiple hotel rooms and see if maybe they’re adjoining or not or who knows, right? So that’s not going to go away either. Hence, what I foresee is that the reality of the market will end up asserting itself one way or the other.

[00:37:21] Mateo: yeah.

[00:37:21] Jaume: We’re going to do our best, obviously, to ensure that meantime, the legal facts ground, we can establish those to be favorable. to the short term rentals industry, but unless Barcelona wants to destroy itself, which it could do,

[00:37:40] Jaume: right? If it removes 40 percent of the capacity, of its lodging capacity, then it’s obviously there, there will be a concomitant skyrocketing of hotel rates, exhibit one, New York.

[00:37:57] John: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:37:59] Jaume: So is that

[00:37:59] John: we’re starting to see some data come out with the effects of New York and we’ll, as time goes on, we’ll get more and more data to see exactly what, the effects of that and which has been, exactly what you said, increased rates for across hotels and the few SDRs that are still operating and then there’s still a bunch of illegal activity, illegal activity going on because why, there’s loopholes and there’s ways around it, but it doesn’t make it easier for the traveler and we are in a, We’re in hospitality.

[00:38:32] John: Like the whole point is we need to be hospitable.

[00:38:36] John: And when we’re not being hospitable and we’re making you jump through loopholes and doing illegal things just to have a vacation with your family and to enjoy the sights and sounds and smells of a city, then we’re doing a disservice to, to tourism and just, culture in general.

[00:38:56] Jaume: I couldn’t agree more.

[00:38:58] Jaume: And this is also detrimental to quality, right? If you’re operating illegally, what’s the recourse for the consumer?

[00:39:08] John: Absolutely. Yeah, there’s none. There’s none. You mentioned briefly, and I want to just revisit, your plan of action as a community, as you’re, what are your next steps? As moving forward here to come together to, to make this, cause I’m just curious what your thoughts are on that.

[00:39:28] Jaume: So the most, one of the most I think, Enheartening. Enheartening. Is that a word? Anyway , one of the best outcomes of this is that the the membership of ApartTour has grown by leaps and bounds on account of

[00:39:43] Jaume: this. From 300 member companies at the beginning of, or in 2022, we’re almost at 400 now,

[00:39:52] Jaume: right?

[00:39:52] Jaume: So this has really shocked the industry into coming together and understanding that action needs to be taken and that action needs to be collective as well as individual.

[00:40:05] Mateo: Mmhmm,

[00:40:06] Jaume: Therefore, As I told you, we’ve already presented this this suit for unconstitutionality.

[00:40:14] Jaume: The the civil suit for damages that’s ongoing and that, each company and each owner has to present their allegations of unconstitutionality. What, how much they are they, what their own damages are. And then these are going to be collected further to that. It’s going to be a lot of grassroots advocacy,

[00:40:39] Jaume: Just. Explaining to the community what the effects will be.

[00:40:43] Jaume: I, in fact, today I was with a guy who runs a maintenance company

[00:40:48] Jaume: and he says, my clients are afraid and that makes me afraid because in four years time, I could lose a lot of business, right?

[00:40:57] Jaume: That means I would probably have to sack people. It means I might go out of business even, right? In in his. Maintenance specialized in, in short term rentals.

[00:41:12] Mateo: Yeah, mmhmm,

[00:41:14] John: immense.

[00:41:15] Jaume: they are immense. There’s another thing, right? Hotels are heavily concentrated in central areas of the city, whereas short term rentals, while there is a higher concentration in the center, they’re also far more spread out in many, in, in many neighborhoods. Where I live, which is say almost non tourist area, there is a building and it’s got 30 units in it. They’re very smart, high end place. It’s very cool. And the cafeteria where I sometimes go for breakfast each morning. It’s full of people. You can see them, right?

[00:41:56] Jaume: They’re foreigners. They’re the only ones who speak English, whatever. And, in the cafeteria, sometimes you see the anecdotes of the ladies who work there trying to understand what these people are telling them.

[00:42:09] Mateo: yeah.

[00:42:10] Jaume: So even in, this non obvious area, there’s an impact, right? And that impact is positive because, this cafeteria has a better turnover on account of the neighboring STRs. These are the impacts that are, that, need to be coalesced into discourse, right? Where the people who are. against short term rentals because the mayor says so. They might be using, short term rentals when they go on vacation. They just haven’t

[00:42:45] John: 100 percent they are.

[00:42:47] Mateo: That’s everyone, right? They want to use the, they want to use it when they go on vacation and it’s convenient to them. But then when they come home, it’s they’re the not in my backyard type people. Like it’s good everywhere else, but my house.

[00:42:59] Jaume: Exactly. So we, we definitely want to help people see that, that there is a positive outcome from from short term rentals, especially in the way that they make for better livelihoods for commerce in the areas that don’t generally benefit from tourism. And that’s the flip side.

[00:43:25] Jaume: A lot of the tourism phobia is because tourism tends to be very concentrated around some monuments and specific neighborhoods, and therefore those places see over tourism.

[00:43:38] Jaume: And it’s it’s the Venice conundrum, it’s a tiny place. It’s hugely popular. They just pour in and, and then a coffee costs you 10

[00:43:49] Jaume: Because they can, but it’s a bit like that.

[00:43:52] Jaume: And a lot of the tourism phobia comes from, A few specific places and then they want to make it into something that’s generalized as opposed to, okay, let’s see what can we do, micro surgically in this neighborhood, in this area to, lessen those effects or increase the benefits and ideally Both of those things.

[00:44:21] John: right. And so you’re lessening the effect and you’re capitalizing as a community.

[00:44:26] Mateo: Yeah.

[00:44:27] John: How can we help?

[00:44:29] John: We want to help in any way that we can. We have a voice however big or small that may be. We’d love to help. How can we help this cause or, what you guys are going through,

[00:44:40] Jaume: I think in a way there’s two things I could propose. One is obviously this podcast in its own right. The fact that it will go out to an audience, a sizable audience that is international in scope. So that can filter back, right? The media talks about Barcelona and Barcelona listens to what is being said in the media around the world.

[00:45:05] Mateo: Alright.

[00:45:06] Jaume: Number one. Number two, and I think this is more important in the big scheme of things is, it’s going to happen, right? This hammer is coming. down in one form of another in many places.

[00:45:21] John: right? I

[00:45:22] Jaume: there’s going to be pushback from, it may be the authorities, it may be neighborhood associations.

[00:45:29] Jaume: It may be, the politicians in a state capital that is far away and are thinking of Whatever interests happen to be in the capital and not what’s going on in the areas where the industry is strong. Therefore, organization seeking out the people who have influence.

[00:45:52] Jaume: In these decisions

[00:45:54] Jaume: and, and looking at the broad spectrum of the toolbox, there’s social media, there’s press there’s lobbying, right?

[00:46:04] Jaume: And one of the things that we’ve, we consider ourselves is that we’re transforming from a purely advocacy type. Organization into a lobby type organization, right? Which means that it’s, there’s a higher level of agendas. There’s a higher level of interlocution. There’s more specifically political and legal type of Arguments that are going to be made when, when we speak with the people who are either stakeholders or they are influencers.

[00:46:39] Jaume: And that to me is the most important message, right? This is an important, we have an important industry. You have a brilliant industry.

[00:46:50] Jaume: We love what we do. We’re, I think we’re great people, but I would say that

[00:46:54] Jaume: . But look, we give pleasure to so many people and they make so many, they make so many memories slightly aided by us. Therefore, I think this is an important industry to preserve. We don’t poison people. We don’t do bad stuff. Look, we can we. Get along better. Yes, let’s do that. Let’s have a constructive dialogue, but the solution is not to say, okay, a ban is the answer.

[00:47:25] John: You hit the nail on the head with a constructive dialogue. That’s what is necessary for Barcelona for globally, that’s what’s necessary. The ability to have a constructive dialogue and how do we get there? And it starts, you started 18 years ago. It starts with representation.

[00:47:43] John: It starts with professionalism. And it’s not too late to start. So if you’re listening and you’re in a community, no matter where you are in the world, and there’s no sort of representation or advocacy group for your community start one get involved,

[00:47:58] John: make yourself known, introduce yourself, say hi, let them know what you’re doing.

[00:48:03] John: This is so very important because 18 years later, This is, it’s still an issue in Barcelona, and they did all the things right. They checked all the boxes, they’ve done this correct, and it’s still an uphill battle.

[00:48:17] Mateo: Think it’s one of the things we got to change the dialogue to like we have to and I don’t know that this doesn’t happen in other places. I just know that we have to stop looking for outside validation for us to be bonafide. We’re here. There are professionals within our group. We should be leading the push to be a part of and demanding that we’re a part of the conversation in reality, not in these mythical fears of what our industry is doing.

[00:48:47] Mateo: That’s just absolutely not true. It should be a database conversation around, look, these are the facts and we’re here to help, right? We want a vibrant, we want vibrant communities that work right. That work and work for the majority of the people there. We’re not an industry that wants to come and take people’s houses away at any cost so we can just go make money.

[00:49:07] Mateo: But that’s the narrative that plays. We’re neighbors, we’re friends. Jami, I’ve walked in these neighborhoods with you. I’ve stayed in multiple of your apartments and every single one of them was a blessing to the community, was fulfilling to the community, was done very well. And I think that’s the part that gets missed out because there’s so many things that we offer.

[00:49:28] Mateo: Both tangible and intangible to the communities in which we serve. Now, that being said, we need to do a much better job of engaging as partners with these communities, as neighbors with these communities, and as citizens in these places that we work, pay taxes, and contribute to. So I think it’s just a matter of, again, and I understand all of the things that come into play, the politics and other things that happen, But from where we stand, I think you hit the nail on the head.

[00:49:56] Mateo: Like we have to start acting in our own self interest instead of acting and allowing others to define what our interests are and what we, who, and what we should be instead, we should be out there demanding, telling people who we are, the value in which we bring and the spirit in which we’re willing to be helpful neighbors in caring and concerned citizens of the places that we live in.

[00:50:17] Jaume: Yes, but and that in itself is the challenge, right? To be heard in that way, rather than to always to have to be dealing with this adversarial type of dialogue. Where it’s always on the defensive and you’re right, having our place, the, what we have found is that, we are not being listened to as willing participants and community members, but rather being put on trial. without having a say. And that’s what we hope to achieve. We have these four years, four and a half years, in which to achieve that, if not before, if any of the legal recourses go our way. And that’s definitely the number one challenge, right? Is to be seen As a more balanced type of look, it’s an industry.

[00:51:17] Jaume: It’s there just like every other, and nobody thinks that the industry X, Y, Z is all bad. And they only want to, keep grandma without a house.

[00:51:28] Mateo: Right.

[00:51:29] Jaume: Gaining respectability, if we could put it into just encapsulated in one word, respectability.

[00:51:36] John: We are here in whatever capacity we can be in assistance, and we’re here for you. We’re here for all communities that are fighting. And let me change that word. Fighting’s the right, yes, it feels like you’re in a fight, but I think Mateo nailed it. We need to partner. Sometimes it feels like we’re in a fight, but how do we make that into a partnership to to get the goal where, the desired goal that both parties or multiple parties are looking for. Thank you so much for joining us today. This has been a great conversation and we’re going to follow very, follow very closely and assist in any way that we can.

[00:52:14] Mateo: A hundred percent.

[00:52:16] Jaume: Thank you, John. Thank you, Mateo. It’s been a pleasure.

[00:52:19] John: Absolutely. And for those of you listening, please subscribe do all those things that you do. And we have started a new Facebook group called the No BS STR Resource Page. It is for hosts and co hosts and property managers that want to operate in a professional manner. This would be more of our tips and tricks side of the things.

[00:52:41] John: If you want to go ahead and join that Facebook group, we would love to have you in there. Just search up the No BS STR resource page. Until next time. Thanks so much.

[00:52:52] Mateo: See you guys soon.