rules Archives - Charleston FYI

Featured Image Credit: Meet Charleston

It seems like the discussion of short-term rentals in Charleston has been long and drawn-out. Well, that’s because it has.

It was four years ago when short-term rentals were introduced to the Charleston area, with online platforms like Airbnb and HomeAway becoming available to the general public. Since then, Charleston just hasn’t had the resources to keep up with or deal with the influx of 2,000 short-term properties across the Charleston area.

Over the last year, the city has been figuring out a strategy on how to deal with the issue. And this past Tuesday, a new set of rules that allows short-term rentals throughout the Charleston area, but with strict rules, guidelines, and requirements was finalized.

According to the Post and Courier, some of the short-term rental rules that would apply in all cases include the following:

Operators must obtain a special license from the city’s Department of Planning, Preservation and Sustainability and list the registration number on all online advertisements. They will have to present site plans to identify where guests would stay and park their cars.
To be eligible, operators must own and live on the property full time, determined by the 4 percent owner-occupied property tax assessment.
The short-term rental cannot host more than four adults at a time.
Operators must pay business license fees and accommodations taxes.

It creates separate sets of rules for three different areas:

Category 1 includes the Old & Historic Districts on the lower peninsula, but only properties listed on the National Register of Historic Places are eligible for a short-term rental permit.
Category 2 is for the rest of the peninsula, where properties have to be at least 50 years old. The class does not include the Cannonborough-Elliottborough neighborhood because it already has short-term rental rules in place.
Category 3 spans the rest of the city beyond the peninsula, where there will not be an age limit on properties.

There will be a 90-day grace period before these rules fully go into effect.

So what’s our take on it?

We’ve covered the short-term rental topic frequently, discussing how they rid our community of that “close-knit” feeling and create issues with traffic, parking, and noise. As a local, you also have the concern of tourists integrating into residential areas.

Effectively, it makes whole-house short-term rentals illegal. Which is why we are in favor of this decision.

The only way this is now an allowable use is when the property is owner-occupied (with the property tax assessment of 4%) and the owner is physically present on-site. It returns this type of rental to its original intent, which was being able to rent out a spare bedroom to generate some extra income.

The challenge became that people were buying up houses and condos in order to rent them on a nightly basis, which meant they were operating de facto hotels. This negatively affects the availability of housing stock and drives prices even higher, meaning fewer housing options for residents (and also much higher prices to lease or buy a place to live). With these new rules, people can no longer buy houses while living elsewhere just with the intention of renting them out.

Hopefully, these stricter rules can help alleviate the issues associated with tourist congestion, traffic, noise, etc.

Featured Image Credit: The Cassina Group

Short-term rentals have been a hot topic of debate in Charleston in the last couple years. Progress has been slow from the group tasked with crafting a new set of rules to govern the short-term rentals across Charleston. But now the 18 member group has been working on a proposal of what they’d like to see in a new ordinance that they will present to the city’s Planning Commission later this year.

Many of the short-term rentals in Charleston have been operating illegally under the current rules, therefore the Short-Term Rental Task Force needs to decide who should and who should not be allowed to rent under their new proposal. They are on a time crunch and hope to get the new recommendations for the proposal straightened out and ready to send to Planning Commission by September of this year. City Planner Jacob Lindsey told the task force that it might not be sent until October as they have to process the new proposals and make an ordinance draft.

Right now, short-term rentals in Charleston are allowed only in commercially zoned portions of the Cannonborough-Elliotborough neighborhood. However, this restriction has not stopped property owners in other sections of the city from participating in short-term rentals. The task force arrived at an agreement that those hoping to receive a short-term rental allowance should call the rental property their primary residence. However, they are still in disagreement on what a primary residence constitutes.

Image Credit: Airbnb

One of the members of the task force, Ann Hester Willis, suggested that a person is only allowed to rent out a portion of their home after residing in their property for at least 275 days. Another suggestion to verify owner occupation would require the rented property to be listed as a primary residence on the resident’s tax forms. The task force members also proposed that the owners must be at their home during short-term rentals. They were also able to reach an agreement on setting a limit on the number of guests allowed in a short-term rental. However, debate over what constitutes a unit and parking requirements followed.

The task force is set to meet again on August 8th and an additional meeting is in the works to focus solely on the feedback from the community. A major concern of local Charlestonians with short-term rentals is that the sense of community and neighborhoods will be lost with so many different people coming in and out, losing consistency.

Image Credit: Claire Haines via Charleston City Paper

The final topic of debate on Tuesday was how old a home can be to serve as a short-term rental? According to Kristopher King, the executive director of the Preservation Society of Charleston, federal guidelines state that a property must be 50 years or older to be considered historic. A task force member suggested that a three-year timeframe be used before short-term rentals are allowed on the property. While no specific age was decided, concerns were raised that the higher the age requirement, the more rentals that would be sidelined in the city. Locations like James Island and Johns Island would not meet these age requirements and some of the most supportive areas of short-term rental would be excluded.

The big increase in short-term rentals in Charleston has most definitely had a big impact and effect on the city and the community. It will be interesting to see what the task force comes out with after their meeting on August 8th and how the public will react.

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