We have a lot of events here in the Austin Texas area that draw crowds from all over the world. We have the SXSW music festival, Austin City Limits Music Festival, we have the new F1 track which starts races this year. As Austin grows and more and more people learn about it the need for short term rentals keeps rising. This has lead to a conflict in the community, one said does not want to allow short term rentals in neighborhoods, while the other…well that seems self explanatory:). With the city gaining in popularity around the world the number of people moving and buying homes in Austin just seems to continue to pick up steam even as the markets remain soft in many other popular places in the country. Austin still seems to be one of the most affordable “coolest” cities in the country and the world.
We had a vote last night in the city council and they did pass some restrictions on short term rentals. They have limited the number of short term rentals to only 3 in each census tract and they are also requiring short term rental owners to register their properties and pay a 15% tax on the rentals. With all that said, if you are a private owner of your home and live in the home and not a company or investor that just leases their home then the restrictions do not apply as best I can tell. Most of the details I have discovered so far were in an article on the Austin American Statesman, here is that full article:
http://m.statesman.com/statesman/pm_21986/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=6K1907Qc