With 32k Listed Properties, Rio is LatAm's Airbnb Capital

In the above chart, we take a look at four of Airbnb’s largest city presences within the region. Brazil’s coastal gem and former capital Rio de Janeiro takes the lead, with over 32K listed properties as of last month. Of these, an overwhelming majority are entire homes or apartments, while a smaller share are private rooms in a shared home or shared rooms (think hostel dormitories for the latter). As you can tell by our slimmer-than-slim blue line, hotels such as the historic, world-famous Copacabana Palace are the exception for Airbnb Rio accommodation, not the norm.

Rio is followed by Buenos Aires and Mexico City. There are roughly 10K more full homes up for rent in the former, while Mexico’s sprawling capital actually has an above-average number of private rooms available instead. Falling far behind is Santiago, Chile.

Now, Airbnb will continue to be a major player in the housing markets of all four of these cities, as recent declarations from Mexico City officials will attest. However, given the ongoing cost-of-living and housing crises faced by many of the locals in countries across Latin America, there are many factors to consider when legislating Airbnb and similar rental firms.

After all, 25K rentable homes is wonderful for Rio’s visitors, but that also presumably means 25K entire homes off the market for locals. Meanwhile, we love to see families in Mexico City renting out their spare bedrooms to digital nomads bringing in some foreign dollars or euro; even better, this system can entail a greater spread of the wealth rather than concentrating it in the hands of the hospitality industry or property management firms.

Major metropolitan areas worldwide such as London and Barcelona must also face these competing interests. In the case of Latin America, however, the need for foreign capital — and good development — is even larger.