Help with Understanding The Short Term Rental Law

The short term rental (STR) regulations that passed in Massachusetts were complicated – and leave many issues up to local cities and towns to hash out and implement. To help you and buyers who are interested in potentially using short term rentals as an income source, we created a form you can use that lays out all of the provisions as simply as possible.  Thanks to Jonny at MAR for all of his help with this, we now are happy to share this Short Term Rental Disclosure PDF version with you now and are working to get it uploaded to Flex, Ziplogic, and Dotloop.  In a nutshell, if you rent your home for more than 14 days a year on a short-term basis, (1) the Commonwealth of MA will be taxing short term rentals at a rate of 5.7% (same as B&Bs), (2) Cities and towns can add up to 6% more in local tax (3) Cities and towns can add “impact fees” to those that have more than one STR property (4) The state has requirement that anyone doing any STR must register with the state (4) Cities and towns can add their own registry (5) Cities and towns can add inspection requirements and finally, (6) all STR operators must hold $1million dollars in liability insurance.  Read the form for details, and reach out to Sandy if you have questions.  Feel free to share!