The ongoing fight between the nation’s largest cities and the largest short-term rental platform now has a new battleground.
Airbnb has already gone to war with New York City and Boston after each city issued new laws addressing the rise of short-term rentals in each location.
And now, Los Angeles is joining those two cities in moving to limit short-term rentals.
Last week, the Los Angeles City Council approved new short-term rental rules that will make it more difficult to rent out a house or apartment on Airbnb or other similar platforms.
The Los Angeles Times has the details:
As it stands, renting out a home for fewer than 30 days at a time is legally barred in much of the city, according to planning officials. But L.A. has rarely cracked down on such rentals, and their operators have fought — and sometimes won — when it has tried to do so. Bonin said the existing rules have been “absolutely unenforceable.”
Under the new rules, Angelenos can host such rentals only in their “primary residence,” defined as the place where they live at least half of the year. Hosts must register with the city, pay lodging taxes, keep records for city inspection, and make sure they have working smoke detectors, fire extinguishers and information on emergency exits, among other requirements.
There are also specific rules for the multifamily industry, prohibiting “hundreds of thousands” of apartments from short-term rental platforms altogether:
And some homes are off-limits for such rentals: Angelenos cannot host them in hundreds of thousands of apartments covered by the Rent Stabilization Ordinance, which limits rent hikes for tenants, or units that fall under affordable housing covenants.
The new rules go into effect in July.
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