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Tel Aviv's Hayarkon street
Photo: Ryan

Tel Aviv’s tourism scheme

More Tel Aviv apartments turning into unofficial hotels, but are locals paying the price?

In the past year, officials in Tel Aviv and Herzliya have been taking pains to prevent buyers from turning vacation flats into permanent residences, in an attempt to keep Israel's well-to-do from taking over shoreline property.

 

However, at the other end of the scale are thousands of apartments designated for permanent residency that are being leased by owners to tourists for big money.

 

Currently there are thousands of such flats in Tel Aviv, and the phenomenon is cutting the number of apartments available for rent and indirectly driving up rental fees in Israel’s most expensive city. Calcalist found that entrepreneurs are capitalizing on the trend and buying up entire buildings, which they convert into unofficial hotels offering full tourist services.

 

For now, the authorities are turning a blind eye to the phenomenon, as this scheme is considered a grey area, and possibly also because of the shortage of hotel rooms in the city.

 

The tourist rental market may include anything from private residences leased to tourists during the summer vacation to realtors who manage the lease of dozens of apartments and entrepreneurs who own many tourist flats available all year and offering auxiliary service.

 

In Tel Aviv, the most expensive tourist flats are located near the beach; next are those in the vicinity of the city's cultural centers and in luxury apartment towers. Prices can run as high as three times the average rent in the area during high season.

 

The Tel Aviv municipality issued the following statement: "As the apartments in question are used by owners and tourists, the line between the designation for permanent residency and tourism is thin and depends among other things on the occupant turnover…it's hard to monitor this area when residents are not filing any complaints."

 

Read original article in Hebrew here

 

 


פרסום ראשון: 04.05.12, 07:08
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