Mayor Walsh today announced a new proposal for dealing with short-term rentals that would by default bar investors from buying up units or even entire buildings and offering rentals on Airbnb and similar sites.
Under the proposal filed with the City Council for its consideration, investors could still offer units for short-term rental, but only if they could convince the zoning board to grant them approval to switch residential units to commercial - a potentially lengthy process involving public hearings in which nearby residents could have their say.
Walsh's proposal, backed by at-large City Councilor Michelle Wu, who had earlier offered her own proposed regulations, would let occupants of apartments, condos and houses offer space via Airbnb and its ilk under certain conditions:
- Anybody could rent a private bedroom or shared space in the owner's primary residence, provided the owner paid a $25 annual licensing fee.
- Homeowners could rent out their primary residences - for up to three months out of the year, upon payment of a $200 annual fee.
- Owners of two or three-family buildings, in which they live, could rent out one or more of the units they don't occupy for up to 120 nights per year - as well as list their priimary residence for rent at any times, for a $200 annual fee.
The proposal would bar rentals in units that have safety, sanitary or zoning violations altogether.
In the preface to his proposed ordinance, Walsh said he decided to strip out the investor-owned units he would have initially allowed after talking to residents over the past couple of months:
Bostonians want to be able to access the economic opportunities that short term rentals can provide, but they recognize the importance of establishing reasonable regulations that limit certain short term rental uses in a way that protects long term housing from being converted to commercial short term rental use. ... Ultimately, we decided that this type of short term rental use in residential units was not what most Bostonians wanted, so we've removed it from the policy.
In a statement, Wu said:
This ordinance offers reasonable regulations of short-term rentals to close corporate loopholes, protect our housing stock, and stabilize neighborhoods. I'm proud to support this legislation as the Mayor and City Council work together to stem Boston's housing crisis.
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Comments
Investor/Owner - Operator.
By downtown-anon
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 2:05pm
It appears there is a pretty big loop hole. An Operators may operate one unit for 365 days a year and have permission from owner. So you just need to line up a bunch of "operators" and you can still have a bunch of units as AirBnB.
The key here is "primary
By anon
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 2:28pm
The key here is "primary residence" which the city already keeps tabs on via the residential exemption.
Operators must be property owners and not even LLCs
By Michelle Wu
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 2:40pm
It's in the definitions section: "Operator. A natural person who is the owner of the Residential Unit that he or she seeks to offer as a Short-Term Rental. Only one owner may be registered as an Operator on the Short-Term Rental Registry for a Residential Unit, and it shall be unlawful for any other person, even if that person is an owner and meets the qualifications of Primary Resident, to offer a Residential Unit for Short-Term Residential Rental."
Great work, Michelle!
By tmrozzie
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 3:23pm
Thank you for leading the way on this. AirBNB has gone from a way to make a little extra money to a full on underground hospitality business. Absentee owners and LLCs should have to follow local ordinances if they are going to operate their own inns. Hopefully some will consider actually leasing to tenants to help with our housing crunch.
Great work, Michelle!
By tmrozzie
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 3:23pm
Thank you for leading the way on this. AirBNB has gone from a way to make a little extra money to a full on underground hospitality business. Absentee owners and LLCs should have to follow local ordinances if they are going to operate their own inns. Hopefully some will consider actually leasing to tenants to help with our housing crunch.
Hey Michelle
By Will LaTulippe
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 3:50pm
You don't represent my interests. I look forward to voting against you again.
You can't please all the
By Frank Rizzo
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 4:21pm
You can't please all the people all the time.
Yeah
By Will LaTulippe
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 4:26pm
But you gotta please all of the people some of the time.
Hey Michelle, introduce a resolution to end the Boston Licensing Board, and I'll vote for you. No joke.
Yeah
By Brian Riccio
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 8:52pm
I'm sure Michelle will be able to go on without your vote.
Really, politicians only have
By Dot net
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 5:29pm
Really, politicians only have to please some (a plurality) of the people some of the time (election time).
No politician can please all of the people for even one day. Governor Baker is the most popular governor in the nation, but even he can't break beyond 70% in favor of him in polls.
Hey Michelle
By erik g
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 7:57pm
You totally represent my interests, and I look forward to voting for you next time around, specifically because of the principled stand you’re taking on this issue. You may get not be a regular around these parts, so don’t worry too much about old Will here... you’re not getting his vote unless you’re planning to pass out pistols and gold bullion at trivia night.
Fully agree
By MattyC
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 8:37pm
Fully agree
I laughed
By Will LaTulippe
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 10:42am
You wanted that to be insulting to me, but it isn't.
Thanks, Michelle.
By Lee
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 5:36pm
AirBNB is out of control.
Astroturf BnB
By anon
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 2:18pm
So much for their big "push" on local politicians.
Am I the only one getting solicitations through their app to rent out my house during marathon, graduation season, or just during the summer weekends?
I think this is very
By cden4
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 3:00pm
I think this is very reasonable. Props to Wu and Walsh.
Whoever AirBNB hired to
By Joe P
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 3:05pm
Whoever AirBNB hired to handle government relations on this should be fired and never hired again in this city. Their strategy to attack Walsh and councilors blew up in their face badly here. Wow.
I’m not sure...
By Lee
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 6:11pm
.... I’ll ever use AirBNB again.
I’m struggling to put into words
By erik g
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 8:01pm
just how badly they screwed the pooch here. It’s lile 3 parts Streisand Effect, one part class warfare. You could teach a PR seminar based entirely on the last two weeks as a screeching example of what not to do when your business model is threatened by municipal regulation.
Same Strategy
By Banrion
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 10:45am
I saw that AirBnB is using the same aggressive strategy in NYC. I can only hope that is backfires on them there too.
For sure
By tmrozzie
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 11:09am
I was booking a rental for an overseas trip and the past week swayed me entirely away from AirBNB and back to VRBO/Homeaway. Not that some of these issues aren't the same on those platforms, but they're not actively fighting reasonable regulation from what I can tell.
This is happening to me
By Frank Rizzo
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 3:32pm
This is happening to me realtors from Lexington are buying up units in my building in boston and renting via Airbnb. These units are affordable and should not be rented but they don't care and no one regulates it.
So report it
By Bish
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 6:53pm
Probably no one on the government knows it is happening. And if those are deed restricted afforidible units, call DND and report them. File with 311.
Holy crap
By anon
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 3:45pm
I'm very pleasantly surprised with this proposal.
If this goes through, Marty Walsh will be my hero.
LOL. The communities are not
By .
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 4:13pm
LOL. The communities are not going to see a dime of this money.
The money is not for the
By MattyC
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 5:15pm
The money is not for the community, it is to fund the enforcement of the regulations, as said above.
Regulations that didn't exist
By Will LaTulippe
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 6:18pm
Until government invented them. Why should the community have to pay for the city to invent a job for somebody?
Because the community has
By Banrion
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 10:49am
Because the community has been asking their elected representative aka the government to do something about the unregulated hotels that have been destroying their neighborhoods and draining housing stock. It's literally what happens in civil society with a functioning government.
$25 a year sounds reasonable enough
By djc1414
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 4:14pm
Now if we could only get the City to process the licenses for less than $25 we'll be getting somewhere.
The City of Boston is a joke
By anon
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 4:24pm
The City can not even enforce vehicles with out of state plates from parking in areas that are posted for resident parking.
Have you tried 311?
By MattyC
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 5:15pm
Have you tried 311?
#doyourjob
By anon
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 9:09pm
If the BTD was doing their job 311 would go the way of the pay phone. From the amount of "illegal parking" complaints on 311 BTD is not doing their job or the citizens of the City are beating them to the vehicles.
#waaaaaaaaaaaa
By MattyC
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 9:38am
The city is a community of people. Contribute or whine, your choice.
311
By anon
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 4:58pm
The app for rats. Rat out your neighbor instead of being a man and talking to them. Boston is a city of passive aggressive rats.
I suppose it would be too much to ask
By UHub-fan
Wed, 05/09/2018 - 4:49pm
to ban investor-owned units of all kinds?
[ducks behind couch]
Walsh proposal Sounds
By anon
Thu, 05/10/2018 - 7:16am
Walsh proposal Sounds reasonable. As an Airbnb user the income i generate via rentals (all recorded by airbnb via 1099 btw) allows me to do updates to my unit that i would not be able to afford. So as a small landlord it has helped. I also think it has been a boon also for run down properties in frindge neighborhoods that until recently have been ignored by investors/ home seekers.
In Europe these type if rentals are called “pensiones†or something similar. There is an obvious need for them. I also believe many more people are able to travel to places they would not have before due to the cost of hotel stays. So these people who visit are spending money in local and downtown restaurants, taxis, shopping.
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