Tips on how to be a good short-term rental host, renter ahead of festival season
Visit Greater Palm Springs, together with Vrbo, a part of Expedia Group and Rent Responsibly, launched Hosting Essentials for Coachella & Stagecoach 2023.
This new initiative provides short-term vacation rental hosts in the Coachella Valley with resources to help promote compliance with local regulations and minimize disruptive events heading into festival season, according to a press release from Visit Greater Palm Springs.
“Tourism is the number one industry in the Coachella Valley, providing 1 in every 5 jobs locally. If tourism didn’t exist at the level it does today, each household would have to pay an additional $3,970 a year in taxes,” said Scott White, President and CEO of Visit Greater Palm Springs. “Educating our vacation rental hosts, and providing them resources, is essential to creating balance so that guests visiting our region can continue to support local businesses and help our economy thrive.”
However, opponents of short-term vacation rentals have voiced their concerns over the years over the impact these types of properties have on their communities, which concerns over noise, property theft, and other issues.
These concerns have led to the adoption of new rules that reduce the number of short-term vacation rentals throughout a city, something the Palm Springs City Council voted on in November 2022.
Tourism Economics conducted a study last year that focused on the effects of short-term vacation rental regulations and restrictions along with housing affordability.
"It found that there was really only about a 1% attribution to short-term vacation rentals in the community that contributed to housing affordability and it was even less than that in resort communities, like our, where there are so many second homes. So really the benefit of allowing for shorter-term vacation rentals is that local residents can rent their house out during these festivals and big events, and be able to cover a part of their mortgage or rent for the year," according to Davis Meyer, Senior Director of Community Engagement at Visit Greater Palm Springs.
