A WAGGA councillor has called for greater regulation of the accommodation sector to prevent providers charging "outrageous" prices when the city hosts major events.
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Hotels and motels are already almost fully booked up for the April weekend when Wagga hosts NRL heavyweights Canberra Raiders and Melbourne Storm.
One room at the Mercure Wagga Wagga for April 9 was advertised on Tuesday at $2000 for a single night, up from about $400 a night on a regular weekend.
Councillor Mick Henderson said he believes accommodation prices should be regulated to ensure people are not deterred from attending major events.
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"It's absolutely outrageous," he said. "I know some people who were paying exorbitant prices to stay here for the touch weekend.
"And [businesses] just use it to their advantage. Some people were paying 500 per cent more."
Mr Henderson wants to see some government intervention to protect people from price gouging.
"I think it's got to be price regulated," he said. "It's going to turn people away from coming to the city when they're paying that sort of pricing.
"There's certainly got to be a cap on it. It doesn't look good on the city and they're going to think twice about coming back."
A Mercure spokesperson defended the significant mark-up, saying: "Pricing is based on a number of factors including market demand, if customers book in advance there are always good deals to be had.
"Our guests benefit from flexible bookings and great guest service."
But Cr Henderson urged providers not to get greedy when pricing rooms for big events on the city's social calendar.
"There's a difference between a margin in making a little more money, and a margin in making a whole lot more money," he said.
At the time of publication there were six properties available on Airbnb for the NRL weekend, with five of those costing between $4000 and $6300 for three nights.
Local Airbnb 'superhost' Glen Oakman owns those five properties and he said he increases his prices on weekends with events to deliberately deter people.
He said he liked to keep his properties available for regular customers as repeat trade is a big part of his business model, especially construction workers who come to Wagga for long-term projects such as the new PCYC.
"I put up my rates to discourage people from booking, I actually don't want people to book. Last weekend out of my properties I only had three booked out for touch players," he said.
"I needed those properties for my regular people."
He said if somebody does grab one of his properties for a "stupid price" that NRL weekend, then that's a bonus.
Mr Oakman, who has 25 properties in the area, said that the people planning events for Wagga should look at spacing them out, as there simply aren't enough places to stay in the area to accommodate multiple events at once.
"Why put everything on the one weekend?" he said. "The people running these events need to all get together."
Cr Henderson said the extraordinary demand for accommodation highlighted Wagga's desperate need for more providers, and he would like to see council simplify the development application process for companies wanting to invest in the area.
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