Brisbane City Council’s short stay accommodation laws explained
Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner has announced that short stay property owners will face tough new laws. Here’s what will change and what owners will have to do.
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Owners of short stay accommodation face new restrictions under a raft of changes announced in Wednesday’s Brisbane City Council Budget to crack down on anti-social behaviour and “mini hotels’’.
The June 12 Budget included funding to fast track development of a new local law, a mechanism Council said was the most effective way to control “amenity’’ problems such as noise, property damage and anti-social behaviour.
Although the State Government must sign off on the local law, it announced in February that it would introduce a registration scheme for short term rental properties, like Airbnb, and not stand in the way of councils making new policies.
Two major changes coming for Brisbane property owners was making them seek a Council permit and to prove they had proper planning approvals.
This would apply to both hosted and non-hosted properties.
Council defined short stays as typically less than three consecutive months.
Properties covered by the definition included motels, backpacker hostels, cabins, serviced apartments, hotels, farm stays and temporary private rentals.
The cost of permits was yet to be worked out.
But in Noosa, where short stays were a much bigger issue, application fees for a house sub-let for a maximum of 60 days and a maximum of four times a year cost $259. Short stay letting unit permits cost $346.
Hosted accommodation owners only had to pay for a one-off application, with annual renewal.
Brisbane owners also faced higher rates bills under the changes outlined in this week’s Council Budget.
Council’s previously implemented transitory accommodation rating categories would continue to apply this year, with an additional 10 per cent surcharge outlined in the 2024-25 Budget to ensure owners “paid their fair share and to encourage more properties to be available on the long-term rental market’’.
It was expected most permit applications would be approved and in Noosa, for example, 97 per cent of applications between 2022 and March this year were approved, with only 128 compliance notices and 19 fines issued.
But Brisbane City Council Finance Chair Fiona Cunningham revealed in yesterday’s Budget that a Council taskforce had identified 424 properties in low-density suburbs which were unlikely to be granted permits.
FULL COUNCIL SHORT STAY ACCOMMODATION TASKFORCE REPORT
Short-stay accommodation owners would also need to have a property manager available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
And they would now need to develop a code of conduct for guests and allow conditions to be implemented to resolve complaints.
They must also develop a tool to help customers map their short-stay accommodation activity across all regulatory requirements within Council.
Other details were yet to be worked out. But in Noosa, for example, dwellings must display their approval notice at the front of the property which identified the approval number and a 24/7 complaints hotline number.
There also must be a contact person, responsible for the management and supervision of the premises and dealing with complaints.
A contact person may be an individual, a letting agent, property manager, security firm or the like.
Cr Cunningham said the driver for the changes was not improving longer-term housing rental supply.
That was an issue in holiday destinations, but Council’s taskforce found that less than one per cent of Brisbane dwellings were used for short-term accommodation.
It also found the sector helped supplement the city’s hotels during peak times, such as major events.
The taskforce did, however, find that amenity impacts were a problem and that it was currently difficult for Council to regulate short-stay accommodation activity, given the standard of evidence required to prove a use was unlawful.
The taskforce consulted stakeholders including major short stay platforms such as Airbnb, body corporates and tenancy groups.
It also studied other jurisdictions locally, nationally, and internationally, including Noosa, Cairns, Melbourne, Mornington Peninsula in Victoria, Vancouver, London, Berlin and Edinburgh.
The process to introduce the new local law would involve community consultation, details of which were yet to be released.
TOP SUBURBS PAYING TRANSITORY ACCOMMODATION RATES (as of June ’24)
Brisbane City – 280
Fortitude Valley – 201
South Brisbane – 185
Bowen Hills – 164
Hamilton – 100
Milton – 83
New Farm – 53
Spring Hill – 52
Kangaroo Point – 50
Teneriffe – 39
Strata Community Association Queensland (SCAQ) general manager Laura Bos backed
calls from Council to let body corporate committees make their own rulings to ban or allow short-stay accommodation.
She said there needed to be a management framework to balance the needs and rights of property owners with those of their neighbours.
The Australian Apartment Advocacy (AAA), which represents 6000 Queensland unit owners, also welcomed the changes.
“We have had instances where a bucks party has caused damage to a lift with a repair bill of
$100,000 and it’s the body corporate that has had to pay for this damage,” CEO Samantha Reece said.
“These proposed laws will set a code of conduct for guests, which the property manager will have to enforce and the short stay license will be reviewed annually.
“Furthermore, the City will enforce offences relating to non-compliance.’’
But an Airbnb Australia and NZ said cautious reform was needed to protect the importance of the sector ot the Brisbane economy and so property owners’ ability to generate extra income was not harmed.
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