A relocation specialist believes Bermuda’s housing shortage is hampering international business.

“We are seeing people just not able to find the homes they need,” said Sylvia Jones, founder and director of Corporate Concierge, a business that helps people relocate to Bermuda for work.

She believes Airbnbs are partly to blame.

In the 17 years she has been in the industry, she has seen many long-term rentals turned into tourist accommodation.

“Another large hotel would take a lot of the one-bedroom and studio rentals out of the Airbnb pool to be relinquished back to the long-term rental market,” she said. “That would provide a bit of a breather.”

Corporate Concierge is seeing a steady stream of people moving here. Apartment hunting often results in fierce bidding wars.

“Rental agents could see five clients in a morning,” she said. “I tell my people if you see something you like, put in a bid, on the spot.”

Ben Rego, of Rego Sotheby’s International Realty, said this week that available rental accommodation had doubled in the past two years, but rental availability was still at crisis levels.

For exempt company workers, the situation is worsened by many companies having reduced their staff housing allowances, while home rental prices in Bermuda have only increased.

“In the past, expatriate workers were willing to contribute from their own salary to augment their housing allowance, but that is not the case any more,” Ms Jones said. “They realise that the broader cost of living in Bermuda has also increased.”

She has also seen some clients forced to move after the landlord raised the rent by $2,000, with no investment made in the property.

Ms Jones regularly gets calls from Bermudians experiencing the same challenges.

“They see I do this kind of work, and want to know if I have heard about any potential places to rent,” she said.

She believes the mindset of people coming here to work is changing. Families are less likely to integrate into the community, because they do not intend to stay long.

“We have seen a number of families who were happy to pay $6,000 a month for a family home, but leave the island when their children reach school age,” she said. “They cannot juggle the cost of private school fees here and the high cost of living.”

Some families choose to downsize, but that puts them in more competition with locals also trying to rent.

Enthusiasm for more expensive rentals has also fallen.

“Houses at the high end, $20,000-plus a month, are just sitting on the market,” she said. “Nobody is jumping on them in the way that they did in the past. The worker frequently leaves their family back at home and rents a one-bedroom apartment.”

Ms Jones said policy decisions need to be made around housing, as it becomes ever more difficult and challenging.