City looking for rental solutions
New Vancouver rules would allow most Airbnb-style rentals, with a licence
Vancouver is proposing new regulations for short-term rentals including Airbnb and Expedia that would require hosts to hold a licence and only allow them to rent out their primary residence.
The city has been mulling rules for the popular vacation-rental websites for more than a year and on Wednesday unveiled a plan that will be debated by council next week.
Mayor Gregor Robertson said Vancouver is in a rental housing crunch, with a vacancy rate that has dipped below one per cent. He estimated at least 1,000 rental units could be freed up by the new regulations.
“Short-term rentals like Airbnb have gobbled up a lot of the long-term rental supply,” he said. “Our bottom line continues to be that our housing is for homes first, and for business and investment second.”
People who rent out their units on Airbnb or similar websites would be required to hold a $49 annual licence issued by the city, and the licence details would have to be included on the rental platform advertisement.
The framework would ban short-term rentals of secondary residences but would allow home owners and renters to list and rent their principal homes, including entire units and private rooms.
In addition to the fee from operators, rental platforms such as Airbnb would have to apply a transaction fee of up to three per cent and remit that money to the city.
Robertson said short-term rentals now make up 30 per cent of Vancouver’s accommodations for tourists and Airbnb is effectively the city’s largest hotel.
“Our focus is on ensuring that we do protect our long-term rental housing and also that we ensure that people can make supplemental income from short-term rentals,” he said.
“It has become an important income source for many Vancouverites.”
Currently, rentals of less than 30 days are prohibited without a hotel or bed-and-breakfast licence. Ninety-seven per cent of short-term listings are illegal, according to a staff report issued last fall.
Robertson said the new rules would legalize up to 70 per cent of existing “entire unit” listings and virtually all “private room” short-term rentals.
Following the council debate next week, a public hearing will be held in the fall before the rules are expected to be enacted in April 2018.
Robertson said Airbnb had been co-operative and the company has a good working relationship with city staff.
A spokeswoman for the San Francisco-based company said Airbnb welcomes the regulations and continues to recommend fair, easy-to-follow rules that support its host community.
“The vast majority of Airbnb hosts in Vancouver use home sharing to help pay the bills and afford to stay in their homes. Airbnb is transforming travel by allowing people to experience cities like a local and support neighbourhood businesses,” said Alex Dagg.
Vancouver is home to about 5,100 Airbnb hosts, she said.
It’s the latest Canadian jurisdiction to grapple with the rise of Airbnb and similar websites.