Taking it from Cheap Chic to Budget Boutique, HostelBookers the budget accommodation specialists show off the latest additions to their expanding Design Hostels portfolio.

Budget travellers are becoming more and more sophisticated with their accommodation choices. Just like their need to discover enthralling adventures they also like to find unique places to stay at. Our latest Hostels unobtrusively combine budget and suave to give urban travellers the best of both worlds.

Generator Hostel - Hamburg

The Generator’s new design led vision for their European hostel collection brings to backpackers an eclectic and illustrious haven. The hostel building was originally the first skyscraper to grace Hamburg’s skyline in the 1920s and a former recording studio for the Beatles. The common interior is adorned with black and white wall paintings whilst the dorm rooms remain clean with cool hues. The hostel has a huge 686 beds, from dorms to single and double rooms. Facilities include a Bar, a cinema room, a chill out lounge and café and they host free city tours, what more could a traveller want! Prices start from £18.34 per person per night.

Hostel Tresor - Ljubljana
Situated in the heart of the city on the fashionable Čop Street (Čopova ulica), the Tresor Hostel exemplifies novelty. Once a former bank, the space has been transformed into a vibrant hostel which opened its doors in March this year. The area of a suspended vault is now the breakfast and common room quarters. Dorms beds are designed with floor to ceiling ‘prison’ bars and old filing cabinets stand as the dorm room lockers. In addition, each room is named after a world currency and the walls are decorated with inspirational quotes to keep travel spirits alive. Prices start at £12.77 per person per night.

We Hostel Design - Sao Paulo
Contemporary Retro can be used to describe the interior of the WE Hostel. Located near the famous Ibirapuera Park, the Edwardian period mansion blends together innovation and interactivity throughout the hostel. Here guests are able to access and download custom setlists and maps of the metro and attractions by using the QR Codes set around the building. They have a room for every traveller type including an all-female en suite, one huge double room with a balcony for couples and 6 shared dorms. WE Hostel is just a few blocks away from the bohemian Joaquim daTávora Street, from its many bars and electrifying nightlife. Prices start from £14.34 per person per night.

To browse through the rest of the property portfolio, check out our Design Hostels Magazine online: http://bit.ly/11l0W0u

For additional information, visit our featured page: http://www.hostelbookers.com/featured/design-accommodation/

This was the White House Conference on Travel and Tourism, the first ever event in U.S. history that was meant to elevate travel business and the business of promoting America as a destination to the federal level. The White House invited 1,700 leaders of the travel sector in U.S. for this conference, to unveil the new national tourism strategy.

This was supposed to be the start of opening up of America to tourists globally, making it easier for them to come to U.S., and building up a global marketing machine that promoted the country and its various attractions to visitors worldwide. Atlanta’s Olympic Games were scheduled for the following year, and that would have been the perfect platform to promote U.S. tourism on a global scale.

One line from Rep. James Oberstar, introducing President Clinton before his speech, encapsulated the hopes of this day, and the event: “This is the day tourism wins respect as a pillar of our national economy.”

Alas, it wasn’t to be. The recommendations of Clinton’s speech and the strategy developed in the conference that followed got caught up in the partisan bickering, and any plans of creating an apex organization responsible for tourism promotion, part funded by the government and part funded by the industry, never materialized. Mostly, it was the rise of Newt Gingrich and his brand of small-government conservatism that ensured any new federal spending — much less on what was looked upon as a non-serious industry — wouldn’t ever happen. All plans were shelved by the Clinton administration shortly after.

Not only did that kill any hopes for a new national tourism strategy, it also meant that U.S. essentially killed the existing 35-year old tourism department that was part of Department of Commerce. In 1996 the U.S. also withdrew from the UN World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), citing budget pressures.

Sep 11, 2001 and the security frenzy that followed ensured that travel and tourism in the country plummeted to lows unseen in decades, and the industry never fully recovered from the effect of policies that came after.

After 1995, it took another 17 years before another President spoke about the travel and tourism as an industry that deserved a lot more serious attention than had ever been given at federal level, and led to the creation of Brand USA.

By this time, the travel industry became the world’s largest sector and the largest employer, driven by changes in policies globally to spur movement of humans and money that came with them. America lost out on the global travel explosion over the next two decades since that original Clinton speech.

We have reproduced that 1995 speech in entirety below, mainly for the prescient way in which it indicated what travel meant an an industry, the job creation engine it could have been, the promise of that this sector held for the future of America, and what didn’t happen after. C-SPAN even has a video archive of his speech, which we’ve also embedded below.

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I am very proud that this is the first White House Conference on Travel and Tourism. And I know all of you agree that it’s about time.

This industry has been near and dear to my heart since I was a little boy. I grew up in a resort town that also embraced a national park. As an adult I’ve had the good fortune to travel a fair amount, although as President I must say one of the more frustrating aspects of the job is I go to a lot of interesting places and never get to be a tourist.

As Governor, I enthusiastically attended our Governor’s conference on tourism every year. And I want you to know that this is very important to me personally and that this time is a very important time for you to be gathering here.

This industry holds much promise for the future of America. It has a lot to teach us as Americans, as we stand on the dawn of a new era, moving from an industrial age to one that will be dominated by technology and information and our ability to relate to one another and to move quickly in terms of ideas and technology and people across the globe. We’ve moved at a breathtaking pace from the divided world of the cold war to a global village. If the 21st century is going to be an American century, we have to master this transition as surely as we mastered the shift from the agricultural to the industrial economy. And we will.

To meet the test of the time, we have to dedicate ourselves to promoting and strengthening those aspects of American society which will clearly work best in the global economy. And we know that trade and tourism and travel, all these things are tailor-made for what we do well and what the 21st century will value.

That’s why I have dedicated myself to helping this industry grow. A healthy travel and tourism industry is good for the economy, and it also gives Americans a larger service. If you think back to the first time as a child you left home to go somewhere new, recall the first time you met someone who was visiting you from a faroff place, I know that you came away from the experience with a greater knowledge of other people and other communities, a stronger sense of the common humanity that unites us all. And I would guess that you returned with an increased appreciation for something just as important, your own home, your own community, your own roots.

Travel leads to understanding. It increases the chances of peace, and therefore, it increases the chances of a better life for all. When you just travel this land you learn the miracle of America. Our people are as diverse and wonderful as our landscape. Going to another State can almost be like going to another country, and if you come from another State to Washington, it’s almost like space travel. [Laughter]

Travel is also democratic, with a small “d.” It used to be a luxury reserved for the aristocracy. But in the history of American travel and tourism you can see that the marvelously optimistic quality of our people made this something that everybody ought to do. We look at something set aside for the very few at the top and we say, “Hold on, everybody ought to have the opportunity to work hard and then enjoy that.” Most Americans may not travel first class, but for a long time now our families have been able to load up the car and head for a fallcolored national park or a warm beach or a clean motel on the side of a road leading to a place they have never been before.

Of course, the travel and tourism industries are also essential to providing opportunity for all Americans in the 21st century. You are our largest business service export. As Greg said, in 1993 you generated a $22 billion trade surplus for the United States. You’re the second largest employer in the Nation, providing jobs for over 6 million Americans. And of course, you employ millions more through the industries that thrive when you do well. As the circle of freedom expands around the globe, the tourism industry will keep growing all around the world. And as you grow, here at home the hardworking Americans whose jobs are changing along with our economy will have a chance to find a home with you.

Many Americans have general worries about all service-sector jobs. Somehow they think they’re not as steady and don’t have as good of prospects for the future. But I know that we’re all working to prove otherwise. Service industry wages are among the fastest rising wages in our economy. And I support your efforts to reward hard work and to give people incomes that they can build solid lives on and raise children with. For all these reasons, I have committed myself to giving your industry the opportunity to flourish that it deserves. It is part of a strategy that I have embraced to restore the American economy and to ensure the American dream and America’s leadership into the 21st century.

The first thing I want to tell you is that your country is clearly on a roll. We have a resurgence of economic growth. We have a dramatic reform in the size and scope and way of operating of our Government. And most important of all, we have a reassertion of basic American values in every community in this country.

In the last 2 1/2 years since I have been privileged to be your President, Americans have produced 7 1/2 million new jobs; 2 1/2 million new homeowners, bringing home ownership to a 15year high; over 2 million new small businesses, the most rapid growth of small businesses in American history, with the lowest combined rates of unemployment and inflation in 25 years. The Government’s role in this economic resurgence was to reduce the deficit while increasing our investment in education, in training, in technology, in research, and in partnerships with the private sector to promote American products and services all around the world.

Our trade with other countries has increased by 4 percent in ’93, 10 percent in ’94, and 15 percent in ’95. As a percentage of our national income, the deficit is less than half of what it was when I became President. For the first time since Harry Truman, the deficit has actually been driven down for 3 years in a row. As a percentage of income, the United States of America now has the lowest Government deficit of any industrial country in the world except Norway. Every other country has a higher deficit as a percentage of their income than we do. I’m proud of that, and you should be proud of it, too.

We are now debating here in Washington how to balance the budget. But the good news is the leaders of both parties want to finish the job. I believe we have to do it in a way that is consistent with our values, that keeps our economy going, and that maintains our leadership in the world.

More important even than the economy to me is the encouraging signs that Americans are getting back together around the values that make life worth living. In almost every State and significant community in America the crime rate is down, the murder rate is down, the welfare rolls are down, the food stamp rolls are down, the poverty rate is down, the teen pregnancy rate is down, and child support collections have increased 40 percent in the last 3 years. Our country is moving in the right direction and coming back together. That is a terribly important development.

Specifically with regard to the tourism and travel industry, we have taken a series of very specific steps designed to help you succeed at what you do. First of all, we have a disciplined, coordinated leadership effort and a commitment to promoting travel and tourism, beginning with the Secretaries of State, Commerce, and Transportation; our Trade Representative, Ambassador Kantor; the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, led by Ruth Harkin; and the Export-Import Bank, led by Ken Brody. Secondly, we have worked very hard to open markets and to support U.S. exports including travel and tourism around the world. We have concluded more than 80 separate trade agreements in less than 3 years. Tourism is an export, and we have fought for it just as we have fought for other industry.

The U.S. Trade and Tourism Association is leading a public-private partnership to double the number of Japanese visitors to the United States by the year 2000. The reason is clear: Of the 7 1/2 million new jobs that have come into the United States since I have been President, 2 million, 2 million came from the expansion of the sale of American products and services overseas. International visitors spent $78 billion here last year.

The second thing we’ve worked to do is to sign open-skies agreements with more countries to facilitate air travel here. Earlier this year I signed an open-skies agreement with Canada, deregulating the world’s largest aviation market: more flights, lower fares. Last month we concluded an open-skies pact with nine European countries. We’ve expanded air service around the world to Great Britain, Brazil, Ukraine, the Philippines.

We’ve worked hard to give you a healthy airlines industry. They were in deep trouble when I came into office. Every airline in America but one was losing money. Three were in bankruptcy. From 1988 to 1992, the industry lost $12 billion, more money lost in 4 years than it had made in its entire history. I appointed a special commission headed by the former Governor of Virginia, Gerry Baliles, to revive the industry. Secretary Pena has now carried out the vast majority of its recommendations. Today the airlines are healthy, the fares are down, the passengers are up, and they are turning a profit. We are moving in the right direction.

We’ve also worried about industry safety, to try to make America a safe harbor and to try to guarantee the safety of Americans around the world. We see today ironic and mostly encouraging developments, peace in the Middle East coming along, more peace and less violence in Northern Ireland, tomorrow peace talks opening about Bosnia here in the United States, something we are proud to host. We also know that there are new threats to our security that go across all national boundaries, that the organized forces of destruction and terror know no nationalism.

We saw terrorism at home blow up the Federal building in Oklahoma City and foreign terrorists try to take the World Trade Center down, plan to bomb the United Nations. We see abroad when a religious fanatic sect can take a small vial of sarin gas into a subway in Japan and break it open and kill scores of people and injure hundreds of others. And we know we have to work together, together with other countries, to reduce the menace of terrorism and violence and drug trafficking and organized crime in this world. That was the subject of the speech I gave to the United Nations last week on the occasion of its 50th anniversary.

But I also want you to know that we are doing everything we can to help your local officials and your community bring the homegrown crime rate down in America. The crime bill that was passed in 1994 was an astonishing piece of legislation. It provided for putting a hundred thousand more police officers on our street in community policing settings so that we could reduce the incidence of violent crime. It provided for prevention programs, not designed and run by the Federal Government but run by local communities to give our young people something to say yes to, constructive endeavors, avoiding a life of crime. It provided for tougher punishment. And we now have the first convictions coming in under the “three strikes and you’re out” law, where we take career criminals and just put them away. It provided for all these things, plus the Brady bill, which kept 40,000 criminals from getting handguns last year— 40,000. Next time somebody tells you that didn’t work, tell them to think again.

Now, that’s one big reason the crime rate is down. We’re on time—we’re actually slightly ahead of schedule in putting these police officers out there on the street. And we are trying to give you a safe America that everyone is happy to travel in and to be a part of, in every State in our community, in cities and rural areas alike. That is a very important priority with me. And we’ve got to keep this crime rate coming down, down, down.

The other thing we’re trying to do is rooted in a lesson I learned as a Governor when I realized that every time we opened a new State park or refurbished an old one, or did something to one of our State’s landmarks, we helped the private sector tourism in the area. We have done everything we could to promote and enhance our national parks and our national landmarks and our national monuments, as well as to maintain the ability of the United States to have clean air, clean water, safe drinking water, and a generally very healthy and high-standard environment. I am therefore opposed to changes which would undermine our ability to provide a clean environment or would require us to sell off any of our national parks or national assets.

I congratulated Congressman Oberstar on the victory won and headed by Congressman Richardson of New Mexico, in the Congress just last week to get rid of this hit list of over 300 American treasures that some in the Congress wanted to sell off, including the home of President Roosevelt, where I met with President Yeltsin last week. I hope that idea is dying a very timely death. We need to enhance our public investments.

So we are committed to doing things that will help the tourism industry, that will promote travel, that will enhance your efforts. Let me say, we are also doing it with a much smaller Government. There are 163,000 fewer people working for the Federal Government today than there were the day I became President. Next year, the Federal Government will be the smallest it’s been since John Kennedy was President, under the budget we passed in 1993. And as a percentage of the civilian work force, it will be the smallest it’s been since 1933. The era of big Government is done. The era of smart Government is here. It is the right thing to do.

We have 16,000 fewer pages of Government regulations. My favorite, because I’m from Arkansas, was when I showed up I realized there was a whole page of Government regulations on what grits were. [Laughter] And I could have just given the name of 400 people they could teach something to, and they could say this is grits or it’s not. [Laughter] So we’re getting rid of a lot of that. We got rid of 16,000 pages— you think I’m kidding, it really was there— [laughter]—16,000 pages of regulations have been eliminated. We have proposed to eliminate hundreds of programs.

But we also want to make the Government work better. A lot of you are small business people. Maybe you’ve had some help from the Small Business Administration. In the last 3 years, we have cut the budget of the SBA by 40 percent, but we have doubled the loan volume. We have emphasized making loans to women business people and to minorities without in any way reducing the loans that white males were getting or without watering down the standards for making the loan one bit. The SBA is simply working in a more entrepreneurial, more effective way to try to help more small business people get started in the United States in every part of the United States no matter who they are or where they come from. That is the kind of Government that the taxpayers of this country are entitled to. And it will help the travel and tourism industry if we can accelerate the growth of small business in America.

Another thing we are trying to do in this Congress—and I think we have a good chance to get a bipartisan agreement on this—that affects an awful lot of small business people, and I would imagine a lot of you in this audience, is to make it easier for small business people to take out retirement plans for themselves and their employees. The present rules and regulations are a nightmare. They are too cumbersome; they are too expensive. The legal fees alone keep thousands of small business people from doing anything in this important area.

So if you’re interested in this and this will affect you personally, I would urge you to contact your Member of Congress and get a status report on this. As far as I know, there is no partisan difference here. We just know that small business is creating most of the new jobs in this economy; that retirement programs, health care programs are often too burdensome, too inaccessible for small business people; and this legislation can make it much, much, much easier for people in small business to take out retirement plans for themselves and to help their employees. And I would urge you to help me get this done. I think we have a broad coalition for it. It just needs to be made a priority so that no matter how busy we are, we take care of this. I am committed to it, and I hope you will be as well.

Finally, let me say that we are trying to do two more things to make the Government work better and cost less that directly affect the travel and tourism industry. The Vice President is going to speak to you tomorrow, and he will talk about the work we’ve done in reinventing Government with the Customs Service and the Immigration and Naturalization Service which has changed the way we greet our own citizens and visitors as they enter the United States. If you’re coming or going legally, we want to get the Government out of the way and get you on your way. And that will make a big difference if we do it right.

Now, finally, I want to mention this second point. We have worked very hard to enact reforms at the Federal Aviation Administration. Having a Federal Aviation Administration that works, that has the confidence of all Americans, that operates the airports efficiently and safely, that has a lot to do with how well those of you in travel and tourism do, unless you get all your customers off the road. And it is a very important thing for the United States, for our economy, for the convenience and for the safety of our people.

The FAA controls the bottom-line efficiency of the airline industry. Yet, believe it or not, its air traffic control system in many places still depends upon stone age technology that’s often older than the flight controllers using it. [Laughter] I know that’s hard to believe. At a time when our private sector is building the most advanced airplanes in the world, the FAA is still buying vacuum tubes like this—the Vice President gave me this just before I came over—to run the computers and the radar systems that ought to be run by chips. We actually have to buy these vacuum tubes for some of the old computers and radar systems from other countries because they’re not even produced here anymore.

Now, this is unacceptable. Americans have a right to believe that the FAA will be run with the highest technology in the world and that they will get where they’re going on time at a reasonable cost and at maximum safety. I never want a parent to think twice when a child asks if the flying is safe.

Now, we’ve been very blessed by very safe and careful airlines, and our control and regulatory system has worked very well over time. But we also know that there’s no point in pretending something’s all right when it’s not. It is not all right that the FAA does not have the highest technology, safest, most efficient equipment in the world. That is not all right. We have to change that.

That’s why more than 2 years ago I made FAA reform a top priority and asked the Vice President to include it at the top of his list in the National Performance Review. In early 1994, almost 2 years ago, we sent Congress a plan to overhaul the Agency. Building on suggestions from the airline commission that helped us to turn the airline industry around, we called for a procurement system that gets the FAA new technology while it’s still on the cutting edge, a new personnel system that puts controllers where they’re needed and rewards them for good work, and a radically new financing system that ensures stability, demands accountability, and provides incentives for efficiency.

We’ve done everything we could to fix the FAA on our own. Secretary Pena and Administrator Hinson brought in a new management team and put in plans to modernize the system. We have speeded up the replacement of failing computers at some of our busiest air traffic centers, so there will be fewer of these and more of the chips. And we have stepped up training for controllers and technicians.

But unfortunately, we cannot do everything we need to do alone. We have to have some legislative help. And I am very pleased that Congress has put together finally a transportation appropriations bill that embraces the personnel and the procurement reforms we asked for 2 years ago. I am very gratified that members of both parties came together to create this important legislation, and I’d like to give a special word of thanks to Senator Mark Hatfield of Oregon. When this bill hits my desk—[applause]— we’ve got the Oregon group back there. When this bill hits my desk, I intend to sign it. And we will get FAA back on a glide path to the 21st century.

But there’s more to do. We still have to overhaul the financing of FAA. Today’s budget process simply does not guarantee the agency the long-range funding it needs to operate safely and efficiently. Again let me thank Congressman Oberstar and Senators McCain, Ford, and Hollings for their work on this. I want Congress to redouble their efforts. We have got to fix this problem once and for all.

Now, let me say that these are my ideas for what the National Government can do to support you in what you’re trying to do. I’m sure that you have some ideas about that, too. I never met a group of people that I thought had more consistently higher levels of energy and more consistent openness to new ideas than the people I work with throughout my career who are in tourism and travel.

One big point of a White House Conference on Travel and Tourism is for us to listen to you, not for you to listen to us. I came here to make a report to you because you’re entitled to that and it will help you to know where we are and how we’re thinking. But when you leave, I want you to report back to me and tell me what more you think we can do to help you to succeed.

I will say again: Next year the whole world will be looking at the United States when the Olympics open in Atlanta. They may let the Braves carry the torch in now. [Laughter] But the world will be looking at us. It will give us a new opportunity, an even greater opportunity, as billions of people all over the world look at the United States, to enhance the chances that more and more and more of them will want to come here to see what America’s like up close, to share in all the things that too many of our fellow countrymen sometimes take for granted.

We want to be ready for that. We want to keep this country on a roll. We want to keep coming back to our values, and we want to keep pushing our economy forward. And we want to keep being a leading force in the world for peace and freedom and prosperity.

In order to do that, we have to have a healthy travel and tourism industry. And by next year when the eyes of the world are on America in a clear and focused and open-hearted way, I want to know that you and I together have done everything we can to make sure that one of the things those eyes take away from the sight of the Olympics is a deep, yearning desire to come to America and to be with us in friendship and partnership as we pave the way for greater opportunity for these young people in the 21st century.

Thank you, and God bless you all.

Source

According to a survey released in May by Orbitz, the travel search engine, 77 percent of people expect to take a summer vacation this year.

For anyone who is young and on a tight budget, one traditional way to save on travel is to stay at no-frills hostels. But if you think a hostel stay means piling into a shared room with five strangers, think again. While dorm rooms are still common, you can also find single and double private rooms, including some with en-suite baths.

Several websites now help you sift through and make a reservation at a hostel, including hihostels.com, hostels.com, hostelworld.com and hostelbookers.com. For tips on how to book a room — and get the best deal — Dan Zbijowski of HostelBookers offered this advice. The answers are slightly edited for clarity.

Q. How far in advance should you book?

It is usually possible to make a booking and find availability in at least a dorm room at the last minute. However, it depends on the destination and accommodation. For example, if there are events going on — festivals, concerts, etc. — it is advisable to book in advance.

Q. How much more do travelers pay to get a private room?

On average, private rooms in hostels cost 40 percent more than shared rooms.

Q. In addition to the room charge, are there other fees?

To reserve through hostelbookers.com, travelers must pay 10 percent of the room rate upfront. The rest is payable to the hostel by the customer upon arrival. (Some websites may charge an additional flat fee of $1.50 to book.)

Fees for other services, such as breakfast, linens and towels, will depend on the accommodation. For example, Clink78, a hostel in London, charges $3.11 for towels, but linen and breakfast are included. When booking, you can find this information in the accommodation description.

Q. What if you have a change of plans? Will the 10 percent fee be refunded if you need to cancel a booking?

The 10 percent payment is not refundable unless you sign up for something called Payment Protection, which is an optional insurance charge of 20 percent of the 10 percent, and you have canceled within the cancellation period.

Q. How have hostels changed in recent years?

Hostels offer so much more in terms of accommodation and amenities than in the past, including swimming pools, saunas, baby-sitting services, elevators and free Wi-Fi. Competition is fierce with many new hostels, and the standard of quality is increasing. We now have 22,000 accommodations listed on our site — hostels, budget hotels, apartments and guesthouses — in more than 3,500 destinations worldwide.

Q. Have room rates been rising?

As always, prices depend on demand, the accommodation and the destination. HostelBookers runs sales campaigns in January and February, as well as June through August. These allow accommodations to promote their special rates in a dedicated landing page.

In order to review the property, travelers must have stayed in the accommodation. Once the customer checks out, an email is sent, asking him or her to review the accommodation. We have more than 1 million customer reviews on our site.

Source

In Kairos Future’s survey on the Global Youth, 6500 young voices between 16-29 in eleven countries seem to agree on one point: in order to have a future we need a common goal. And today that goal is not to be seen anywhere.

The discontent among young people around the world cannot be mistaken. In all surveyed countries except Sweden and Russia, the youth is convinced that most people in their generation will be worse off than their parents. A majority also states that society has become too individualistic, and that it is politics that is to blame.

Instead all their dreams and aspirations are focused on another arena – the personal one. The small, close collective: the family. And when it comes to family young people are anything but short-sighted. They want relations that are so strong they will hold a lifetime.

According to them, the achievements that are most worthy of respect are not making lots of money or saving the world, but being a good parent and keeping a family together for years. The small dreams about settling down seem to be the dreams the young can hold onto in turbulent and uncertain times.

GlobalYouth2013 and share your thoughts about the results on Twitter, using #globalyouth2013.

Source

With growing demand for student accommodation in the Netherlands against a shortage of supply the sector is becoming increasingly attractive to both domestic and international investors, according to a new market report from real estate advisor Savills.

Evidence of this trend include the redevelopment of Snippe BV in Diemen, known as project Diemervijver, involving the conversion of five former office buildings into a student campus including 534 student housing units to be delivered by September 2013 and a further 402 by early 2014.

There is also the recent conversion of former office building Rembrandtparkgebouw in west Amsterdam into a hotel, a higher education school and 128 student apartments by landlord Pronam and the Student Hotel in west Amsterdam, a former office building which is currently being redeveloped as student housing.

Jeroen Jansen, head of research at Savills in the Netherlands, said that the redevelopment of former office buildings into student housing accommodation is helping to alleviate a problem in both markets.

‘Banks are more and more willing to finance this sort of property and achievable yields are in the region of 6.0% and 7.0% depending on location,’ he explained.

Student registrations are expected to increase 15.7% to 767,000 students by 2025 requiring approximately 60,000 new student beds in this period to meet the rising demand. The supply shortage is further reflected in the time students have to wait to obtain a room, recorded at an average of 16 months in 2012, or 23 months in Amsterdam.

Nonetheless, the international real estate advisor suggests that in order for student accommodation to become a mainstream asset class the Dutch government needs to revise its strict regulations which stipulate maximum rent levels.

‘Interest in student housing is notably growing, however we believe that for this sector to graduate from niche to a main asset class in the Netherlands the current government regulations need to be adjusted to allow for a fully commercial operation of student housing alongside the regulated segment,’ said Jan de Quay, investment director at Savills Netherlands.

‘This way the undersupply can be addressed more quickly and domestic and international students will be able to choose from a variety of suppliers from budget to high end,’ added de Quay.

Marcus Roberts, head of student investment at Savills, also pointed out that overall there is a shortage of student housing across Europe where student registrations are rising but markets are still immature compared with the UK and US.

‘This is has created an opportunity for buyers wishing to tap into the shortfall. We are currently seeing particular investor interest in Germany, France, Ireland and the Netherlands,’ he added.

Source

Agoo Hostel is a new hostel providing the cleanest, safest and friendliest hostel accommodation in central Accra, Ghana.

Agoo Hostel aim is to be a hub for international youth travellers to explore this vibrant city and wonderful country.

The Independent Holiday Hostels of Ireland and STAY WYSE have teamed up to provide all seventy-four members of The Independent Holiday Hostel of Ireland membership of STAY WYSE.

The seventy-four members of The Independent Holiday Hostels of Ireland will receive access to all STAY WYSE member benefits such as research, publications, discounts and benchmarking.

The Walrus Hostel is the ideal choice for you to get the most out of your trip to London.

The Walrus is within walking distance of all of Londons most famous landmarks and after a long day of sight seeing you can come and enjoy a drink in our traditional English pub where we serve a fine selection of beers, wines and spirits.

Trekksoft is an easy, straightforward and free to use online booking and payment system. Their Software as a Service allows you to easily make your products available for your customers and to administer them in a single database.

Sales features make it possible to market effectively through various channels.

STAY WYSE offers its members the following benefits and services:

• A global network of trading partners across the youth and student travel industry.
• Access to accurate and reliable industry intelligence and market research.
• Additional Benchmarking KPIs through our partner Hostelbench.
• High profile representation of the STAY WYSE community at travel industry events worldwide.
• Networking opportunities at annual industry events such as the World Youth & Student Travel Conference.
• Best practice guidelines and sharing of leading industry practices.
• Lobbying of tourism boards and government officials industry to raise recognition and develop opportunities for this sector in countries around the world.
• Professional development seminars that support member’s ability to learn from each other and operate to high professional standards.
• Raising the global profile of member organisations with a listing in the annual WYSE Travel Confederation Member Directory and on the STAY WYSE website.
• Use of the STAY WYSE logo, a trusted global brand.
• Annual membership of the World Youth, Student and Educational (WYSE) Travel Confederationwhich provides direct access to a global community of 550+ member organisations providing travel experiences to 10 million youth and students.

If you too would like to join STAY WYSE, please click here.

For more information please contact carla.vaz@wysetc.org

Fire safety and tax evasion

Earlier this year the city announced that is would be intensifying its investigations into properties listed on websites such as Airbnb.

Their concerns lay in the fire-safety regulations for hotels which some apartments were found not to have followed, as well as the potential tax avoidance of people renting via the websites.

Incentive to tourism

A further consideration for the  municipality was that the properties listed were contributing to the already fiercely competitive Amsterdam housing market, but research has shown that the effect is, in fact, minimal.

The research conducted by the municipality found that the market for these properties actually acted as an incentive towards the growth of the tourism sector and thus the economy of the city.

Regulations to be strictly enforced

Despite this partial u-turn by the city authorities, any properties that wish to partake in these holiday rental websites will have to abide by strict regulations.

The owner of the house must actually prove that they still live there, a rental can be made to a maximum of four people and social housing may not be rented in this way.

Furthermore, the municipality will employ the fire services in order to ensure that fire safety regulations are met in any participating properties.

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Last week we expressed our grave concern that the US may be turning its back on this cornerstone of US public diplomacy. As our research shows, such a move also stands to have a negative impact on the US economy too.

Advanced economies and emerging nations -a key source of talent

Our research, taken from the latest New Horizons III study shows that the United Kingdom and China were the biggest source markets for work experience programmes globally. Major developed nations such as Germany, France and Canada were also major source markets for those participating in work experience programmes.

Mexico, Russia and Brazil are all recognised as being of major importance to US Foreign Relations and also represent important source markets for this sector.

Work experience travellers: net contributors to the destinations they visit

Spending among those who work and travel is greater (average spend: $4500 per trip) than spending by travellers generally (at $3800 per trip).

The bulk of travellers’ spending goes directly to local businesses and municipalities in the form of sales and tax receipts as funds are mainly spent, -whether in the host community or through an extended period of travel- on accommodation, food & drink, activities and entertainment. Whether as a source of tax income, skills or innovation, work experience participants on the J-1 visa programme give an important boost to the US economy.

Creating people-to-people connections that span the globe and last a life time 

The desire to ‘increase my knowledge’, ‘explore other cultures’, ‘experience life in another country’,  ‘interact with local people’ and ‘build friendships’ were the top five factors chosen in our study. Such motivations were even more common for work experience participants than for travellers generally.
Originally conceived more than 50 years ago as a means of giving young individuals from overseas first-hand experience of American cultural life , the J-1 visa programme meets the desire of work experience participants to experience life in US society close-up.

Conclusion

WYSE Travel Confederation’s survey of over 34,000 travellers worldwide demonstrate the positive impact that work experience programmes can have on young people and the communities they work in when travelling overseas:

• The United States is the world’s leading work experience destination and derives many benefits from the personal ties that are made with citizens of countries of strategic importance.
• Work experience travellers bring in more money than they earn in a country.
• Money earned whilst travelling is re-invested in the host country and is more likely to reach local communities and businesses than the average tourist dollar.
• Structured work experience programmes in the US offer young people from around the world a unique chance to learn about life in the US and build connections with US citizens that last a lifetime.

Find out more

• Learn more about the Immigration Reform Bill and what you can do to protect cultural and educational exchange programs in the US.
• Find out about WYSTC, the essential global youth travel trade event where we’ll be debating the future of the US J-1 visa programme
• For additional information please contact WYSE Travel Confederation Marketing and Communications Dept: communications@wysetc.org Tel: +31 2042 12800.

The apartment share service Airbnb received an avalanche of bad press when it was reported by CNET on May 21 that a host had been fined, and then erroneously re-written by countless other sites that Airbnb was illegal in New York City.

In reality, a judge sitting on the city’s Environmental Control Board found an Airbnb host named Nigel Warren guilty of breaking the state’s short-term housing law. Airbnb, while it did submit arguments to the court, was a big-name bystander rather than a party to the violation. But the impact of the ruling was still a blow to the company in its efforts to legitimize its service.

After the ruling Warren told reporters “I plan to talk to Airbnb before making any decision on whether to appeal.” Today David Hantman, Airbnb’s Head of Global Public Policy, wrote on the company’s public policy blog, ”I am pleased to report that we will assist Nigel and his landlord as they appeal this ruling. We may lose again before we prevail, but we intend to fight this ruling until justice is done.”

Hantman writes that Warren’s appeal process will likely be drawn out, but that Airbnb is in it for the long haul. “We know the road at first will be hard,” he states. “So even if the City prevails at the ECB level, we will assist in the appeal to New York trial courts and beyond, if necessary.”

Airbnb’s listings, like those of many other apartment and vacation rental websites, in cities such as New York, Paris, San Francisco, Hawaii, London, and other major markets are filled with a large number of housing options that violate local residency and zoning laws, but the service of connecting hosts and customers is not in itself illegal. Warren, not Airbnb, was on the hook for the fines.

A new law

The day after the Environmental Control Board judge’s ruling, New York State Assemblyman Karim Camera, a Democrat who represents Crown Heights and parts of other Brooklyn neighborhoods, introduced New York Assembly Bill A 7495, which amends the definition of “class A dwelling” so as to authorize tenants of such a dwelling unit to sublease it for a period of less than 30 days.

If passed, the bill would legalize rentals such as Warren’s where the host is renting his or her own apartment, as well as any secondary properties. Three other co-sponsors — two from the Bronx and one from Queens — have signed on to the bill.

Camera’s explanation for the bill states that the current law “has denied citizens of New York City the opportunity to rent out their extra space when they are out of town to help make ends meet.”Airbnb would neither confirm nor deny that it played a role in drafting the new bill, and Assemblyman Camera was not available to answer questions about the bill.

A representative of Airbnb told Skift last week “We very much appreciate that Assemblyman Camara has started this important discussion. There is universal acknowledgment that the current law was intended to crack down on illegal hotels, not regular New Yorkers trying to make ends meet, so any legislation that makes that clear would be a great step for New Yorkers.”

“Everyone agrees that average New Yorkers were not the target of the 2010 law,” Hantman wrote on his blog, “and I am pleased to note that recently, legislation was introduced in the New York State Assembly and the New York State Senate to exempt from the 2010 law those individuals who are renting out their own homes.”

Who’s an average New York host?

New York State Senator Liz Krueger, one of the authors and sponsors of the bill that established the current law, told Skift that Camera’s bill, like a handful of others circulating will never pass as currently written and act as conversation starters.

Sen. Krueger has sat down with Airbnb on a number of occasions to discuss changes, but little has come of it. She told Skift, “It’s not a matter of us not being open to changing the law, but the ideas they have for loosening the law wind up making it unenforceable.”

And Krueger argues that the “average New Yorkers” make up a small portion of hosts.

“I believe that some of the companies with big PR operations are purposely mis-characterizing the types of listings on their website,” Sen. Krueger told Skift. “When you actually count through how many people are in it as a business, it’s clear they aren’t being honest about what’s happening on their site.”

The poster child for illegal hotels is SmartApartments, which the city sued and shut down in October of last year. SmartApartments managed short-term rentals in hundreds of apartments in New York’s most desirable neighborhoods and grew out of the successful Airbnb listings of a man called Toshi.

The difference between a large-scale illegal operation like SmartApartments and Toshi used to run and a listing like Warren’s is very clear. But in New York, the space between the two is vast.

“There’s a real disconnect between what they say their business model is and what’s really happening,” Sen. Kruger said. “Are you someone who lives in an apartment and occasionally rent it out while you’re away? That’s very different than taking a housing unit off the market.”

A search on Airbnb will show many host listings similar to Joe & Fab, who list seven units across Manhattan, or Seith, who has three units in the trendy East Village, or David, who has nine listings.

This is the flip side of the host renting out his or her place to make an extra few bucks or pay the mortgage. The units they are offering have been removed from the long-term rental market because the per-night prices landlords can get from tourists is much higher than they can get from a New York City resident on a yearly lease.

Kruger argues that considering the historic low availability of affordable units in the city the growing popularity of short-term rentals is morally questionable.

“Every residential unit that gets pushed out of the system adds to a domino effect that creates housing problems across the city,” Sen. Krueger said.

“Your individual win in this business model is everyone else’s loss.”

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Friends of Friends Travel is an online marketplace that gives members the chance to share opportunities for free accommodation, storage space, travel tips and local meet-ups through, well, you know — friends of friends.

Co-founders are Krissa Curran (CEO), Mark Strickland (chairman), and Daljeet Singh (head of marketing).

Launched last year, the company is bootstrapped with money from the founders, close friends and family.

The founders’ plan is to raise money through the startup’s premium membership service — at rate of between £12 and £20 to join for a year. Membership gives access to discounts via the site’s partnerships with STA Travel, HostelWorld, travel insurance supplier World Nomads, among other companies.

By year end, the founders hope to secure a round of funding from venture capitalists and angel investors.

READ COMPLETE STORY…

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