Tourism is the lifeblood of Kangaroo Valley. Travellers flock to the lush greenery of the New South Wales town for the trails, rivers and wineries. It also hosts folk and arts festivals, is a popular wedding spot, and is a short drive from south coast beaches.
But Kangaroo Valley finds itself in a bind brought on by its own popularity – it’s almost impossible to find somewhere to live there.
In the town of about 1,000 residents, there was just a single listing for a residential lease advertised this week. But if you want to stay for a few days, there are 76 homes listed on Airbnb, Stayz and VRBO to choose from.
Kangaroo Valley. People moving from Sydney and working remotely for capital city wages have helped push up prices and restrict availability. Photograph: Jessica Hromas/The Guardian
Businesses in Kangaroo Valley have had to close due to a shortage of local workers and inability to house anyone willing to move there.
Across the wider Shoalhaven region, the problem is even more pronounced. There were 94 long term residential leases advertised in April, but 4,131 homes available to rent for short stays – an imbalance that locals fear is contributing to homelessness, and making it near impossible for businesses to attract workers.
Short-term accommodation websites rose to prominence more than a decade ago as a relatively straightforward way for Australians to make money when their holiday homes were sitting empty.But now many listings on sites such as Airbnb have become commercially run properties available all year round.
That brings more tourism money into regional economies, but a growing number of towns are beginning to question whether the benefits outweigh the costs.
And governments at state and local level are increasingly looking to regulate the short-term accommodation sector as one lever to address the housing crisis.
‘I might get a second or third property now ’
Laura Crommelin, a senior lecturer at the University of NSW City Futures Research Centre, says the demographics of a town or suburb can begin to shift as more and more owners convert their residential properties to short-term leases.
Crommelin, who began researching technological disruption in private housing markets in the middle of the last decade, says smaller communities find it particularly hard to adjust.
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