You haven’t lived in Medellin, Colombia if you don’t think digital nomads can have an effect on housing prices.

My experience is from 2015-2024. I did the digital nomad thing for 9 years and lived in Medellin 4 separate times over that period for 6 months to a year each time.

I saw rents for normal folks, not furnished and not Airbnbs, do a 4x in that time period. Laureles was a middle class suburb for locals in 2015 and was just overrun by nomads by 2024. Poblado, Laureles, even as far as La Estrella saw a really noticeable impact.

Clearly I contributed to the issue and nomads did inject money into the economy but it also had a really visible effect on housing. I don’t have any ideas on how to do it right but it is something that should be approached carefully or locals get priced out.

EDIT: I believe they started more tightly regulating things in 2024 with required registration for <1 year rentals. Not sure how that has played out. Also added the specific neighborhoods that I saw things shoot up.