The Georgetown Metropolitan

The DC Council advanced a bill yesterday that would dramatically curtail (sort of, GM will get to that) the ability of homeowners to rent out their properties on a short term basis on sites such as Airbnb or VRBO.

The bill, which is a modified version of an earlier bill, makes a distinction between the first and second (or third, etc.) home of the homeowner. With the first home, a homeowner can rent it out on a short term basis an unlimited amount of times, if the owner is present. This covers what Airbnb has always emphasized as their core use: homeowners essentially having paid guests into their home. (This isn’t really how most people use the service though). These owners can also rent out their home while they are absent up to 90 nights a year.

The bill is far less permissive for second homes. The bill would ban people from renting out second homes on a short term basis, period. This essentially prohibits investors from using DC properties for Airbnb.

GM has written about Airbnb and how it impacts Georgetown several times before. When he first looked at it in 2014, there appeared to be about 18 properties in Georgetown available for rent on Airbnb. Later that year he first noticed that investors appeared to be buying properties and converting them to Airbnbs. When he counted the available properties in 2016, it looked like they had jumped to 30 properties.

And now if you go on Airbnb, it appears that there as many as 70 Georgetown properties available, if not more. And the listings can seem to clump. For instance, in and around the intersection of 33rd and Q there are ten different listings. At least three of the nine homes on the south side of Q St. just west of Wisconsin are exclusively Airbnb properties.

One of them, the home at 3256 Q St., used to be rented out on an annual basis. Starting about four years ago, it was shifted to exclusively an Airbnb house. It’s owned by Wavely Veney, but Airbnb says the owner is “Cliff“. Another house on the same block is also “owned” by Cliff (it’s actually owned by yet another person). Clearly Cliff is just a property manager. Airbnb doesn’t list how many properties Cliff manages, but his reviews suggest he manages properties around the city. Continue reading →

Photo by Andrew Griffith.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• Someone’s started a blog just to complain about gas leaks in Georgetown.
• Residents still trying to stop all the plane noise.

3100 block of P St.

GM is bringing back Now and a Long Time Ago for today. It seemed like a nice way of presenting another from the B & O Historical Society archive.

This particular photo isn’t actually of the B & O railroad. It is the Cabin John streetcar, which once ran westward from Georgetown. It is shown here just west of Prospect and 37th, where it was shifted from overhead power to the buried third rail it used in central DC. Continue reading →

Photo by Bob Shrader.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• New Indian joint, Bharati, is now open for dinner too.
• Reminder: Despite DC not really being a sailing town, Hoyas are surprisingly good sailors.

3200 block of Reservoir Rd.

It’s that time of year again, when people start to wonder what the hell are those giant grain brain-shaped fruit around Georgetown. As in past years, GM is ready with the answer, as reprinted below:

This time a year, if you wonder around Montrose or Volta Parks you’re bound to find on the ground weird softball-sized green fruit like the one above. People are often so struck by the sight of the fruit, they pick up one or two of them and bring them home. But what are they, you ask?

Despite their green color, they’re oranges. Osage oranges, to be specific. They are grown by Osage trees, which line the Parrot rope walk. These trees are prevalent in the Great Plains states, where they are often planted along hedgerows. Traditionally, the pliable but strong nature of this tree’s wood made it valuable for fence posts and archery bows. Continue reading →

Photo by Andrew Griffith.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• In the wake of the Kavanaugh hearings, Citypaper suggests re-reading its 2007 article on a similar culture that existed then in Georgetown.
• Georgetowners upset about possible gas leak.

Georgetown University

This week on Georgetown Time Machine, GM returns to the fabulous B & O Railroad archive maintained by Ben Sullivan. This particular shot demonstrates again the imposing scene that was once quite regular on K St. Continue reading →