If you own a car and own or rent a house or apartment you may have an asset which can be rented to others for short periods of time. What makes this simple concept so revolutionary and disruptive to the hotel and taxi industries, particularly in New York and San Francisco, is the connectivity between owners and renters provided by Internet “digital clearinghouses”1 such as Airbnb, Uber and Lyft. Airbnb is a short-term home or apartment rental company that matches close to 350,000 hosts worldwide with rooms to let with tourists who want to rent them in 35,000 cities2 (15,000 hosts listed on Airbnb reside in New York City).
Uber and Lyft both offer car service, but with a twist. They pay drivers to supply and drive their own cars. Passengers order car service by using a smartphone app to locate an available Uber or Lyft vehicle.3 This article reviews recent actions by the New York State Attorney General to control the onslaught of these Internet-based companies.
