Mid-term rentals and the Airbnbification of housing

This article critically examines the expansion of the mid-term rental market, situating it within broader debates on the platform economy and the housing crisis. It offers an empirical analysis and mapping of the main digital platforms operating in this segment across Italian cities, to explore their attractiveness for property owners, the ways in which they reshape access to housing for different tenant groups, their role in driving up rental prices and their potential impacts on the most affected cities and neighborhoods. Mid-term rentals, it is argued, constitute a strategic intermediate ground for extending the logics of platformization across the entire rental market. Their effects resemble those observed in the short-term rental segment, while also penetrating more peripheral residential areas, contributing to specific exclusionary and gentrification dynamics, and generating more complex regulatory challenges.