There has been a proliferation of short-term rentals (STRs) in many U.S. cities, driven in part by trends like increased budget tourism and remote work. While STRs can boost local economies through increased patronage to businesses and tourist sites, it can also lead to community concerns around infrastructure and proper regulation.
Enforcing STR ordinances has proven difficult for many agencies, and the lack of a central point of oversight can cause regulations to be enforced irregularly and ineffectively.
This article explores five ways short-term rental registration software solves these challenges to make regulation simple and effective.
1. Streamlining Registration & Compliance Processes
Short-term rental registration software simplifies the registration and renewal process for property owners. Rather than having to visit government offices, fill out extensive paperwork, and navigate bureaucratic processes, STR owners can utilize a user-friendly online portal to handle everything from document submissions to payments.
The software provides a systematic and intuitive registration process. New users select their desired licenses or renewals from a central menu, after which they are led down a funnel with relevant forms that collect details like their name, property type, and address.
These forms are enriched with multi-format file upload capabilities, allowing users to submit different kinds of supporting documents, such as scanned utility bills and property images. The forms also provide e-signature options, enabling the agency to create legally binding agreements online.
Once all required information is submitted, the software prompts users to pay the necessary fees through a variety of supported payment gateways.
The automation capabilities of short-term rental registration software help local governments streamline their operations. When a registration or renewal is completed, the software automatically notifies and assigns the review task to the appropriate staff members. The software also maintains an accurate record of the compliance status of each registered short-term rental, changing it automatically when the license expires or is renewed.
Ultimately, STR software helps reduce administrative burdens on government staff, enabling faster processing of applications and renewals
Example in Action
The city of Oceanside, CA, faced with rapid growth in Airbnbs, Vrbos, and unlisted short-term rentals, procured short-term rental software to bring these properties into compliance. The tool streamlined the identification and registration process, helping the city achieve a 93% compliance rate.
2. Enhancing Transparency & Accountability
Traditional paper or spreadsheet-based short-term rental management systems are often opaque and disjointed; accessing data can be difficult, sometimes leaving stakeholders in the dark. Short-term rental registration software solves this by centralizing data, providing governments with full visibility into their STR ecosystem. The software keeps real-time records of registrations, renewals, and payments, giving administrators immediate insight into current operations and helping to significantly reduce non-compliance.
To streamline information access and retrieval, short-term rental software consolidates all data, from property IDs to license types, in a central database. This database feeds into a portal, where agency staff can sort and filter listings to identify non-compliance or irregularities. A dashboard displays key metrics, such as total registrations and the number of non-compliant STRs, giving staff an overview of the health of STR regulation in the jurisdiction.
The centralization of data also promotes collaboration between departments. For example, the STR agency can share data with the city planning department to collaboratively improve zoning regulations.
The software also links actions—such as approvals and rejections—to staff, thereby enhancing accountability.
Short-term rental software is equipped with a detailed reporting suite. Insights from the reports can help the STR agency to adjust policy and enforcement strategies for better regulatory outcomes and a fairer STR landscape for the community.
Example in Action
Bela Del Valle, Accommodations Compliance Program Manager for the town of Breckenridge, CO, shared how their short-term rental software enhances transparency, saying, “I can see where the active and inactive licenses and accounts are, separated by map zones within the GovOS system. This makes it very easy to sort through the data and create something that’s easy to look at and compare year over year.”
3. Improving Community Engagement & Communication
Using short-term rental registration software, government agencies can bridge the gap between constituents and policy makers. The platform provides tools that enable the STR agencies to gather valuable public input on existing and proposed regulations. Using surveys, the government can gauge public sentiment on current laws, fees, and even the effectiveness of the software itself.
During policy formulation or revision, the short-term rental software can host public comment procedures, where regulation drafts are shared, and residents provide feedback and ideas.
STR software may also help boost public engagement by making guidelines clear and accessible to constituents. It supports multimedia formats, allowing agencies to host documents, explanatory videos, or audio recordings of public meetings. This makes guidelines easier to understand for STR owners.
Additionally, short-term rental software enables guidelines to be uploaded and downloaded in various formats, which is vital for long-term preservation. Unlike with physical documents, staff can make real-time updates to digital regulations to ensure everyone is reading from the same script.
For simpler direct communication with short-term rental owners, the software includes a bulk messaging feature. Government staff can send renewal reminders, policy updates and other communication to owners in bulk via email or in-app messages.
By providing opportunities for feedback and making policies transparent, the software fosters trust between the government and the community, leading to improved compliance rates.
Example in Action
Heather Paschal, Board Service Agent at Okaloosa County, FL, had this to say about how short-term rental software enhances communications at her agency:
“A benefit of being in the GovOS short-term rental site is keeping track of our notifications to our new tax clients. We’re able to send out those notifications and keep track of our enforcement process.”
4. Supporting Efficient Enforcement & Inspections
While some communities have robust short-term rental regulations in place, implementing them effectively has long been an issue. The high number of listings and listing platforms, inadequate tracking systems, limited staff, along with other factors have hindered enforcement.
Using short-term rental registration software, governments can overcome capacity limitations and support efficient enforcement. With built-in automation, the software simplifies the scheduling and tracking of inspections. When a complaint is lodged or when a property’s license is nearing expiration, the software can automatically schedule and assign an inspection to agency staff. This way, agencies can ensure compliance while maximizing staff and resource efficiency.
Cloud-based STR software further empowers enforcement by allowing inspectors to access and update property information in real time from the field. Using their mobile devices, inspectors can submit reports, document violations (e.g., uploading photo evidence), and update records immediately after the inspection.
As enforcement becomes more consistent, governments can resolve violations faster, promote public safety, and encourage proactive compliance among property owners.
Example in Action
Bay County, Florida faced challenges with regulation implementation due to a significant number of unregistered properties. Using short-term rental software, the County was able to identify unregistered rentals more effectively, track compliance, and automate enforcement processes.
5. Maximizing Revenue & Economic Impact
A dedicated system for managing short-term rentals ensures governments maximize revenue collection to support public services. The short-term rental registration software separates rental revenue from other government activities, simplifying accounting and planning.
In addition to license fees, the software simplifies collection of short-term rental taxes and surcharges. Property owners can submit tax documents and remit taxes securely via the in-built payment portal. The system can even connect to listing platforms to collect taxes automatically.
The software’s reporting tools offer valuable insights into the broader economic impact of short-term rentals. By analyzing STR revenue data and other statistics, government agencies can assess how short-term rentals contribute to tourism, local businesses growth, and job creation. This information helps the agency develop policies that maximize the benefits while maintaining oversight.
Example in Action
Okaloosa County, FL, used short-term rental software to boost its Tourist Development Tax (TDT) collections. The additional revenue has been crucial for supporting ongoing tourism efforts and funding various initiatives, such as marine life conservation and beach restoration projects.
Streamline Short-Term Rental Management With GovOS Software
As your government strives to effectively manage short-term rentals, the benefits of adopting short-term rental registration software cannot be overstated. Streamlined registration, increased transparency, greater public engagement, efficient enforcement, and optimized revenue collection are just the beginning. GovOS empowers you to achieve these goals with our secure, enterprise-grade cloud platform that handles the entire lifecycle of short-term rental registration and oversight.
