By Brandon Kim, NOlympics Campaign Intern

June 24, 2025

Across Spain, residents are protesting tourism using signs and water guns. Spain is in the throes of an housing affordability crisis driven by mass tourism and the rise of short-term vacation rentals. The country has seen a huge surge in rent prices—in some areas, rents have risen 30% in just one year. Unaffordability has led to the gradual disappearance of entire neighborhoods, as once occupied properties lay dormant until the next vacation cycle.

With the FIFA World Cup right around the corner, and the 2027 Super Bowl and 2028 Olympic Games on the horizon, L.A. is facing a similar crisis. Airbnb is the Official Alternative Accommodations and Experiences Booking Platform as a 2025 FIFA Club World Cup partner, and a 2026 FIFA World Cup and 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup supporter. Through this multi-mega-event agreement, Airbnb promises to “deliver unforgettable travel experiences to fans, alongside economic opportunities for local communities and valuable support for Host Cities.” But we know how this ends for Los Angeles: As Randy Renick, executive director at Better Neighbors LA, argues, this partnership puts “rent-stabilized housing that Angelenos depend on at risk.” 

According to Airbnb, the FIFA partnership may allow participating hosts to “earn up to $210 million,” which the company calls a “significant economic opportunity.” But for whom? Property owners stand to profit, but neither Airbnb nor FIFA seem to care about the negative impact the partnership will have on L.A. tenants. The “economic opportunity” is the thousands of fans flocking to L.A. who will pay high prices for short-term rentals, incentivizing property owners to shift from housing the people who live and work here to hosting tourists because it’s more profitable. 

When property owners convert rental units into Airbnb listings, L.A. loses even more of its rental housing stock, exacerbating our affordable housing crisis and driving up rents. Murray Cox, founder of InsideAirbnb, a project that tracks and displays how Airbnb impacts residential communities, notes that these mega events incentivize property owners to host on Airbnb not only during the event, but also throughout “the whole year, even if it’s illegal.” And, during mega events, demand for short-term rentals rises exponentially, causing Airbnb prices to skyrocket and rents to rise, according to a study by the Harvard Business Review. Ahead of the 2025 Super Bowl in New Orleans, Airbnb average daily rates soared 47% higher than the previous year, resulting in an uptick in home and rental prices.

Without adequate protection, the FIFA-Airbnb partnership will result in the disappearance of affordable housing, the displacement of Angelenos, and higher rents. The partnership will also incentivize illegal hosting, already a major issue in L.A. The city estimates that about 60% of short-term rentals in multifamily buildings operate illegally. To combat this, the Los Angeles City Council adopted the Home Sharing Ordinance (HSO) in December 2018, which outlines regulations landlords must follow in order to host on home-sharing sites such as Airbnb, including:

• Units must be the host’s primary residence, in which they live for more than half the year.

• The unit can’t be subject to the Rent Stabilization Ordinance (LARSO), which regulates rent increases/changes in an effort to protect L.A.’s limited affordable housing.

• The landlord must have written permission from the city, through a Transient Occupancy Registration Certificate (from the Office of Finance) or must agree to host exclusively on a hosting platform partnered with the city.

Airbnb and hosts regularly fail to adhere to these guidelines, and illegal hosting goes largely unpunished. According to InsideAirbnb, over 70% of the city’s short-term rental listings are unlicensed. Both Airbnb and unscrupulous property owners are profiting from illegal units without consequence, and the partnership between Airbnb and FIFA only enables and encourages more illegal hosting.

In contrast to L.A., the Spanish government has begun taking effective measures to protect tenants from Airbnb by enforcing its short-term rental regulations. The Consumer Rights Ministry ordered Airbnb to take down over 65,000 listings for illegal hosting. Additionally Barcelona is working to shut down all of the 10,000 short-term rental apartments by 2028 to combat over tourism and high rent prices. 

In March, SAJE, along with a number of other L.A. tenant organizations, urged the city to strengthen the HSO and punish violators. Perpetrators of illegal hosting should be met with larger fines to deter bad behavior. Additionally, SAJE recommends that the HSO include a right to private action, allowing those impacted by illegal hosting to sue violators. 

And it’s not just FIFA: the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has also announced their partnership with Airbnb, ensuring the negative impacts of Airbnb will remain long past the FIFA World Cup. It is imperative that we fight back against Airbnb and illegal hosting to protect our communities. You can report illegal Airbnbs in your area through Locks On My Block, a site produced by NOlympics LA and the Anti Eviction Mapping Project to report and track illegal Airbnbs in L.A.

For more information on how mega events will negatively impact our communities, check out NOlympicsLA.com.