Truckee, California, caps vacation rentals

Under new short-term rental rules in Truckee, California, the number of vacation rentals will be capped at 1,255 — the number of active registered short-term rentals at the end of 2021 — amid concerns about the availability of local affordable housing.

In addition, Truckee will start phasing out short-term rentals in multifamily units and accessory dwelling units and requiring new homeowners to wait 365 days before registering as a short-term rental. The town will also be able to issue inspection requests for short-term rentals, with 30 days for owners to respond. Owners may have to pay a fee for such inspections.

The new ordinance increases fines for breaking short-term rental rules to $1,500 for a first violation, $3,000 for a second, and $5,000 for further violations. Owners will have 30 minutes to respond to property disturbances and an hour to correct any issues. If an issue isn’t resolved within that time frame, a compliance officer will investigate and could issue a fine.

Short-term rental operators who already hold short-term rental registration certificates have until May 15 to renew, with new applications and placement on a wait list available starting June 13.

The town will assess the first quarter of the short-term rental program in July, with biannual reviews starting in spring 2023. This summer, the council will also look at a potential workforce-housing incentive program that would reward the development of workforce housing with access to short-term rental registration certificates.

In addition to requirements for registration and disturbance response, short-term rental operators must abide by occupancy limits and follow rules on parking, fire code, defensible space, trash, and quiet hours.

Short-term rental hosts must also collect the town’s transient occupancy tax and Truckee Tourism Business Improvement District (TTBID) assessment from guests and remit them to town tax authorities. While Airbnb and Vrbo automatically collect short-term lodging taxes from guests on behalf of hosts in some California cities, they do not do so in Truckee. 

It’s been a tumultuous couple of years in the Lake Tahoe area when it comes to short-term rental regulation.

Truckee placed a moratorium on new short-term rental registrations in September 2021,­­ which it extended through June of this year while the town considered new rules.

Placer County recently passed a new ordinance that will cap the number of short-term rental permits at 3,900 and require permits for all short-term rental operators.

In Washoe County, Nevada, the County Planning Commission will soon consider proposed amendments to change short-term rental rules on parking, insurance and permitting, and trash and garbage collection rules, based on community feedback. The proposal would also address criticism that current occupancy calculation rules disproportionately impact condominiums. Washoe County passed its law regulating short-term rentals in 2021.

In 2020, the city of South Lake Tahoe also approved a new ordinance allowing hosted short-term rentals in the city and El Dorado County capped the number of short-term rentals, limiting them to 900 in unincorporated parts of the Lake Tahoe Basin. 

MyLodgeTax can help California short-term rental hosts automate lodging tax to streamline and simplify their lodging tax compliance. For more on lodging tax in California, see our state Lodging Tax Guide. If you have tax questions related to vacation rental properties, drop us a line and we’ll get back to you with answers.

Cover photo by Canva