When I travel alone, it’s always hotels, and I prefer local, small, family-owned.
But when it’s the three of us, staying at a hotel with a child for 2 weeks is impossible. She goes to bed at 7:30 pm. What are we supposed to do? Sit in the dark in complete silence? Suspend our relationship for two weeks? That’s punishment, not vacation. We are a couple in love before we are parents. By myself, I’m mother first and woman second. But with each other, we are man and woman first.
Also, how do I feed a child at a hotel for 2 weeks? Even if I had the money (which I really don’t), I can’t feed her in restaurants three times a day. She isn’t used to that. What she eats is food cooked by me from scratch. I can’t offer her a complete change of diet all of a sudden.
But yes, on my own, I never stayed at an Airbnb. One is a different person by oneself and with a child. In what concerns my child, my only belief is what’s good for her. Spain and everybody else, with all due respect, can get stuffed. Let their own mother care about them.
Clarissa's Blog 
“hotels”
Shorter version of the question: How are people allowed to have opinions that are different from mine?
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I totally understand about the airbnb question: we have the same problem here.
But also totally understand about traveling with kids.
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…and, you know, the Airbnb problem isn’t the customers. It is easily remedied (here, at least, dunno about Spain), by enforcing the existing tax and zoning codes (these are commercial properties posing as residential, for tax purposes). When that is not happening, the fault lies in the local governance, not the customers.
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Can you believe there are people renting an apartment and then in turn operating it as an Airbnb? The apartment building where we stay (partially) solved the problem by taking a cut from the profits of people who are doing this as well as restricting the number of days per month they can use the property in that way.
Also, many subdivisions in the area with an HOA explicitly forbid Airbnbs and other short term rentals, but the local government is not really doing anything about it, I guess they like the fact that the all rents and housing costs soared here as they get their cut by simply collecting more taxes on everyone’s properties.
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Good for the apartment building! IMO it makes sense to collect a fee (there are building and maintenance costs associated with a constantly-rotating set of non-residents, that are different from long-term residents), and establish reasonable limits. In an apartment building, in particular, having a large number of units turned into vacation rentals can have a very negative impact on the longterm residents’ quality of life.
Yes, I suspect jacking up everyone’s property values appeals to local government. But there are signs of hope there, and it’s one area where residents can organize and demand change. It is a growing trend in the US, particularly in tourist corridors.
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The traditional complaint about liberals in SA is that they claim to believe in stuff in principle, unless it interferes with their personal interests.
https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2024-06-18-liberalisms-last-stand-the-gnu-represents-a-last-chance-lets-see-if-sa-liberals-grasp-it/
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