Home Away From Home
By Zhang Shasha
China's home-sharing rental market is booming,but concerns persist about its expansion
Gao Nan met her first tenant the day after she registered on the home-sharing platform Airbnb. The 30-year-old was among the first people to start a lodging business shortly after the U.S. company entered the Chinese market in 2015. Her first guest was a young woman living in Beijing,who had just gotten a nose lift. With gauze covering her nose, the woman chose to stay in Gao’s shared home in Beijing temporarily to escape her disapproving family.
“The woman sent me a photo after the gauze was removed and she looked gorgeous,” Gao told Beijing Review, adding that they have stayed in touch.
After a job transfer from Beijing to Shenzhen in south China’s Guangdong Province, Gao’s home-sharing business went with her. Over the past four years, she has hosted more than 500 tenants of various occupations and nationalities and become friends with many of them. “I’m not supposed to earn money in this way, since I have my own job,” she said, “For me, it is more like a lifestyle to enrich myself in my spare time.”
Home-sharing rentals have gained momentum in China in recent years. While creating a new possibility for accommodations, platforms like Airbnb have ushered homeowners into a fast-growing and fiery market where there are opportunities for people like Gao who want to pursue a new way of life and for those who are in need of financial gain. On the other hand, as more people take a bite of the market, problems such as fierce competition and lack of regulation have emerged.
Short-term tenants share a dinner in Gao Nan’s apartment in Beijing in 2015
A lucrative market
In 2018, about 147 million people booked short-term lodging accommodations in China and the figure is expected to surpass 300 million by 2020, according to a report by market researcher iiMedia.
Meanwhile, China’s home-sharing market was estimated to reach 50 billion yuan ($7.4 billion) in 2018, with the number of shared homes exceeding 6 million, said a report released by the State Information Center (SIC), an affiliate of the National Development and Reform Commission, in May last year.
In addition, a lack of industrial standards has factored into the reasons why some homeowners are weighing their expansion options.
According to the Zhenguo.com report,hosts with less than five rooms enjoy a higher lodging rate than those who have more than 50, with the former exceeding 50 percent and the latter coming in at only 25.7 percent.
“In 2015 when I registered with Airbnb,there were only a few hundred listings in Beijing,” Gao said. “The story is totally different now.” Following her example, seven of her friends joined the home-sharing service in these past years, she added.
During the May Day holiday on May 1-4, the change in people’s lodging choices was evident.Statistics released by Tujia.com showed that its home-sharing bookings in the period increased by 60 percent year on year.
本研究针对当前应用型心理学课程教学存在的弊端，在心理卫生学教学中，整合合作学习和探究性学习两种学习方式，以学生学习小组为单位，结合相关教学内容，通过探究性学习，研究和解决实际心理问题，深化学生对心理卫生学理论的理解，培养学生的心理卫生学应用能力。
According to Airbnb data, over 8.6 million Chinese tourists have used the platform,which had about 150,000 listings in China as of August 2018. Although it is the world’s largest home-sharing firm, Airbnb has only managed to garner a 7-percent market share in China, falling behind local rivals Tujia.com and Xiaozhu.com,which together control nearly half of the market. The company is stepping up its efforts to win the race, however, saying it expects China to become its largest single market by 2020.
The trend foretells a huge potential in the market. At present, the penetration rate of home-sharing rentals in China’s lodging industry is only 2.5 percent, which is much lower than the UK’s 37 percent. There is room for six to eight times worth of growth in the next five years. It was expected that by 2030, the penetration rate in China would reach 15 percent, according to a report released by the home-sharing platform Zhenguo.com in April.
Regulation challenges
A homeowner tidies up her shared home in Pan’an County, east China’s Zhejiang Province, on April 24
Tenants enjoy tea at a shared home in Xuanen County, central China’s Hubei Province, on September 20, 2017
However, the regulatory approaches and market access requirements used for the hotel industry are no longer applicable given the current development of the home-sharing business, industry insiders said during a recent symposium held by the SIC.
“Normally, the income just covers my rent and sometimes, in the high season, it’s possible to earn a few thousand yuan per booking,” Gao said, adding that this situation was due to high rents in large cities like Shenzhen and a growing number of competitors including both individual homeowners and budget hotels. Currently, Gao’s tenants mainly consist of business people and overseas students. She doesn’t want to expand her business, citing that it is too time-consuming.
从被访者的薪酬福利来看，对于当前大专学历毕业生而言，殡葬行业工作稳定，工资较高，有的殡仪馆甚至将大学生当做人才引进，给予较高经济待遇，并提供培训学习的平台以及较好的住宿条件等。目前我国大部分殡仪馆的硬件设施都比较先进，软件正处于建设发展中，急需具有专业学历的人员加入。因此，绝大部分被访者认为薪酬福利满意度高于其他职业选择，一进入工作单位，往往成为业务骨干，因此目前尚无职业竞争压力。他们的压力一般来自于职业声誉压力。
译文：一位医学检验实验室技术人员的职责是在检验科学家的直接指导下，处理与准备用于检验和测试的人体、动物、视频、谁、土壤、空气等标本，并按照写好的标准实验程序进行常规检验分析。
疗效共分为治愈、显效、好转、无效、恶化、死亡6个标准：治愈，患者所有临床症状全部消失，肺动脉CTA显示肺部状况恢复正常；显效，患者临床症状明显好转或全部消失，肺动脉CTA显示缺损肺面积缩小75%及以上；好转，肺动脉CTA显示缺损肺面积缩小50%～74%；无效，患者临床症状与治疗前对比无改善，且CTA显示缺损肺面积缩小低于49%；恶化，与治疗前对比临床症状加重或转入ICU监护治疗。
“Currently, the customer-to-customer business model prevails in the home-sharing market. As the hosts and tenants are major participants, platforms are unable to conduct direct management of the shared homes and prevent their facilities and equipment from being damaged, which needs to be improved,” said Cai Hong, head of the Department of Tourism Management at Beijing-based Capital University of Economics and Business.
“Most of the early entrants into the industry made money regardless of the quality of their homes or services, whereas since 2018,the situation for some homeowners has not been encouraging since competition has intensified,” Feng Weihe, CEO of Zhenguo.com, told online media ThePaper.cn.
Feng explained that the economy of scale doesn’t work very well for the homesharing industry. If a homeowner cannot guarantee the quality of services, and the cost remains the same, the efficiency decreases, which leads to failure.
In 2018, a group was jointly established by Xiaozhu.com, Airbnb and a sharing economy research center of the SIC to promote the issuance of relevant industrial standards.In the same year, the SIC also released its proposals for regulation on home-sharing services, which are the first of its kind in China.
Some local governments have also taken steps. Zhuhai in Guangdong has issued regulations to improve the management of the home-sharing market, clarifying the definition of home-sharing, location requirements,registration procedures and penalties for violations. Beijing has also included clauses on home-sharing rentals in its revised tourism management regulations.
“While issues such as safety, sanitation and fire protection are part of the market access requirements, law-based management of the home-sharing industry is urgently needed,” Zhang Xiaojun, President of the China Tourism Homestay and Boutique Hotel Association, said.
农艺性状表现∶根据试验田间观察及现场测产结果可以看出，在同等生态及栽培管理条件下，兴佳2号、费乌瑞它、安薯1号三个品种成熟期较早，薯块大，品相好；中薯26号、天薯11号、宣薯6号等品种结薯较多，小薯多，大薯少；YS902结薯不集中，小薯多，品相差；综合田间性状及产量表现，青薯9号、兴佳2号、费乌瑞它等品种的大薯多，较抗病，生育期适中，产量较高，品质较好，适宜我县大面积推广种植。
Gao is optimistic about the prospect of home sharing and believes that customers want high-quality services. She is waiting for Shenzhen’s regulations on the industry, which she said will strengthen her confidence to continue by providing more services to future tenants.
平台层服务器部署在第三方云服务平台，本地楼宇管理中心或远程移动管理客户端可通过Internet访问服务器数据，在管理客户端或监控中心大屏上进行呈现，这种模式主要适应于分布在异地的多个建筑或建筑群的管理。
Copyedited by Rebeca Toledo
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