The legislature has sent to the Governor a bill that taxes and regulates short term rentals. The bill levels the playing field by taxing short-term rentals and accommodations rented through hosting platforms like AirBnb at the same uniform tax rate imposed on stays at traditional brick-and-mortar lodging accommodations like hotels/motels/bed & breakfast establishments.
Newton has a local 6% excise on rooms occupancy for hotels, which will now apply to short term rentals as well. In addition, the state now provides for a new 3% community impact fee on operators who rent out 2 or more professionally managed short-term rental units within the municipality. The city should seriously consider taking advantage of this new fee. The law requires at least 35% to go towards affordable housing, but the city can spend a larger portion or all on affordable housing. Affordable housing that we desperately need.
We shouldn’t let this opportunity pass by without seriously considering the potential benefits Newton could accrue from this new revenue source.
What about medicinal short term rentals though?
This is a major victory for everyone who wants more regulation, more bureaucracy, and higher taxes. What “problem” is the legislature solving? How much did the hotel lobby spend on this?
@Jeffrey – what problem is the legislature solving? The exacerbation of a severe housing shortage because investors are buying up condos in Boston to rent full-time as AirBnBs. This takes them off the market for people who would actually live in them plus drives up condo prices. It also turns apartment buildings that should have stable populations into transient housing.
Most people don’t understand the effect of that last point. I grew up in NYC apartment buildings and my family members still live there. In the buildings I and they lived in, the building was a community. You know your neighbors and can count on them in emergencies, plus have more security. You lose all that when it becomes housing for transients.
If AirBnB was just individual owners making a little extra money out of their houses or apartments with occasional rentals, it wouldn’t be a problem. But that’s not what it is any more.