Skift Take
While hosts have to shell out the permit fee, it's sites like Airbnb who stand to lose more, at least for now, from hosts' unwillingness to comply as these sites face fines unless they force hosts to obey local laws.
Short-term rental sites operating in Portland, Oregon had until Friday, February 20 to get their hosts to apply for permits and comply with the city's new short-term rentals ordinance, which includes sites handing over lodging taxes to the city.
Sites, which include Airbnb, HomeAway, FlipKey, and others, could face steep fines for non-compliance.
As of the deadline less than 10% of all short-term rental hosts in Portland had applied for permits and complied with the ordinance passed on January 21, which also requires hosts to have a safety inspection done for their property.
“I’m one of the [90 percent who haven't gotten permits yet],” said an Airbnb Portland host who Skift spoke to about the ordinance. “Honestly, it’s been on my to-do list but I haven’t done it. It’s another barrier.”
The Impact
The city estimates 1,600 short-term rental hosts list their properties on sites such as Airbnb, HomeAway and FlipKey and only 166 permit applications have been received so far. That represents the number of total applications
