A short-term or vacation rental is a residential dwelling unit rented usually for periods of less than a month. These lodging accommodations are commonly booked through one of the many online marketplaces available, such as Airbnb, VRBO, Booking.com, FlipKey, and others.

Short-term rental (STR) licensing requirements are mandated entirely at the local city or county level, as there is no universal federal or statewide STR license. As a result, licensing processes and requirements can vary significantly from place to place.

STRs have become a lightning rod for passionate policy debates in many jurisdictions because of the tension between their benefits and challenges to the communities in which they are situated. Vacation rentals can be easy sources of additional income for property owners and provide accommodations for tourists and business people visiting the area and spending money at shops, restaurants, and other local businesses. However, they can also become nuisance properties in settled neighborhoods due to traffic, noise, and other disruptions to the normal activities of the neighborhood. Also, when properties are used for short-term vacation lodging, those properties are removed from the available long-term rental and home-ownership market, which can decrease the available housing stock for local residents and drive up housing prices.

Because of these concerns, local governments have to create thoughtful, deliberate policies, procedures, and ordinances that best address the challenges and benefits present in their communities. Identifying, licensing, managing on-going legal compliance for STRs is time and labor-intensive, so many local governments have turned to software solutions to automate much of that work.

MaintStar’s Short-Term Rental Module for its Public Works Suite is very easy-to-use for both staff and property owners, is highly-configurable to match the specific processes of various communities, and is seamlessly integrated with other MaintStar products. At a competitive price and backed by MaintStar’s legendary customer service, it efficiently and accurately manages local short-term rental licensing, freeing agency staff time, generating licensing revenue, and ensuring compliance with local laws.