Boston’s strict rules governing Airbnb rentals are finally in full effect

As of this week, around 700 people had been approved as hosts, under rules allowing short-term rentals of guest rooms, owner-occupied units for up to 90 nights a year and additional units in owner-occupied two- and three-family dwellings. deckers, said Dion Irish, commissioner of the city’s inspection services. About 200 more have pending applications.

That’s a fraction of the city’s 6,100 units listed earlier this year on Airbnb. Irish said this indicates the rules, which essentially ban landlords from renting out their flats at night, appear to be working.

“That’s exactly what we thought would happen,” he said. “This ordinance does not prevent short-term rentals in Boston. It simply restricts who can operate.

The restrictions primarily target landlords and building owners who are taking apartments off the general rental market and instead renting them to tourists – an often more lucrative proposition. That’s what the owners of most of the 208 properties that have been fined were doing since the rules came into force on September 1, Irish said.

He said he hopes the prospect of fines and a new partnership with Airbnb — starting December 1, it will require hosts to display city registration numbers — will deter would-be fraudsters. Fines are $300 per violation.

Still, supporters of the regulations note that other cities that have enacted tough new rules, including Cambridge, have struggled at times to be enforced. Determined operators who know how profitable short-term rentals can be will continue to look for ways to carry on quietly, said Ford Cavallari, president of the Association of Downtown Civic Organizations.

“This mole game is going to be really tough,” he said at a recent city council hearing. “There’s going to be a lot of mole heads popping up, and we’re going to need a lot of paddles to push them back.”

But the Boston rules seem to make a difference.

Several major short-term rental operators in the city say they are running fewer units than before. Landlords of large apartment buildings who have rented entire floors from corporate housing providers have terminated at least some of those contracts, although several declined to be questioned. And city officials say they’re optimistic that hundreds, if not thousands, of apartments that had been used as short-term rentals will return to the general housing market, possibly helping to rein in rising rents.

That’s the hope of housing advocates and neighborhood activists who, along with the Boston Hospitality Workers Union, have spent years pushing the City Council and Mayor Martin J. Walsh to crack down on rentals at short term. In 2018 they did, and in August the city settled a lawsuit from Airbnb challenging the regulations, paving the way for full enforcement.

“You had these de facto hotels driving up housing prices, causing issues with late nights, trash, parking,” said Councilman Ed Flynn, who represents Chinatown, the South End and other neighborhoods. where there have been many short stays. – term rentals.

“It’s a compromise that will help ensure that Boston is still a city for everyone.”

But this compromise is not without some victims.

As the short-term rental industry grew, it spawned a wave of small businesses – property managers, booking agents, cleaners – that specialized in the high-volume business and fast-moving business of preparing apartments for new clients. These people say they are crushed by the strict limits on rentals.

Recognizing the need to house families in town for a relative’s long-term hospital stay, Kama Cicero launched STARS of Boston four years ago, which eventually managed about 30 units for small property owners in the city. city.

Now the business is down to about 20 units, Cicero said, which often sit empty because rules typically require a 28-night stay — far longer than most visitors need. This means less work for Cicero and the 10 people she hires to book, manage and clean the properties.

“I can’t sleep at night. We have all these vacancies,” Cicero said. “Each month we are going further and further into the red.”

Some of Cicero’s biggest competitors are trying to find ways to exist under the new rules.

Sonder, a San Francisco company that at one point managed more than 300 short-term rentals in Boston, dropped about 125 units when the regulations went into effect. Sonder wants to reclassify the rest as “executive suites,” a separate zoning category that allows short stays but mandates hotel-level security and disability access standards, and seeks city permission to do it.

“We’ve spent over $500,000 to make sure we can make the upgrades we need,” said company spokesman Mason Harrison. “We just want certainty.”

But some, like Flynn, worry that this kind of reclassification is just a loophole that will entrench short-term rentals in buildings that are supposed to help ease the housing crisis.

“It goes against the spirit of the order and would essentially allow hundreds of units to continue like this,” he said. “We have to be very careful when approving exemptions.”

Irish agreed and said that while there are legitimate and long-standing needs for short-term rentals – for hospital stays, visiting researchers or business travelers in town for a few weeks – the activity of renting hotel-style apartments to tourists en masse “will cease.”

He was optimistic that the new partnership with industry giant Airbnb — the result of months of legal wrangling — would help, as would a statewide registry launched this year.

“People doing this should understand that we now have a lot of effective enforcement tools at our disposal,” he said. “They have to find a way to comply with the rules or find a new line of business.”


Tim Logan can be contacted at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at @bytimlogan.

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