Short term lets new licensing scheme

[Markedforsl]

Can I ask whether anyone is having to deal with this? We have a spare room we advertise on AirBnb (occupied for a few months a year at most) and are considering using it for a lodger at some stage to provide a little retirement income. We're caught by these rules. If you have a lodger, rent a room out on AirBnb, or want to save money by doing a house swop for your holiday, you now have to comply with a large number of onerous and expensive rules to apply for a licence (the application is expected to cost a few £100s, not refundable if it's rejected). Gas safety checks, electrical checks and improvements, environmental inspection report, a check and certificate for every electrical device the lodger can access, taking photos of all fire safety labels on all furniture they can access, even more fire safety stuff than the new fire safety rules brought in recently, having to inform the neighbours and give them the chance to object, house inspections including potentially unannounced visits and even forcible entry, lots of paperwork. And then having to apply for renewals. Plus my area is considering making obtaining planning consent a requirement for everyone caught by the new rules.
This is surely the end of the road for people who just want to make use of a room in their house, and will mean higher prices and less availability for visitors? Scotland is very full this summer, with people complaining about accommodation prices. What will it be like when the rules kick in? Everyone is skint and getting skinter. This has to be seriously bad news for the tourism industry and for Scottish people who like holidaying in Scotland.

This legislation isn't supposed to be about crushing Scotland's tourism into the dust. It's supposed to be about making the holiday home market less of a burden on Edinburgh residents, primarily. And freeing up some housing for Scottish people, in Edinburgh and to some extent in the Highlands. There is no need to go in with a sledgehammer when dealing with people's own homes. It doesn't matter to anybody if you rent your own permanent home out for a week (because you are on holiday but can't find a suitable house swap). People who are not from Scotland staying in Scotland isn't the work of the devil. If one or two slip through the net and pay for their stay, so what? The real issue is with people who buy up houses in nice places to rent them out on Airbnb. Those houses are then not available for local people to buy, and there is of course far less control over how the guests behave if they are not staying in somebody's home.
And guess what - those people who could really do with a bit of income to help them in this recession, to the extent that they are prepared to have strangers staying in their own home, are the ones who will be hit by this legislation. They won't be able to afford to get a licence. But the professional Airbnb owners, who buy up property in nice places to rent out over the summer, will pay for a licence. And they are the people who are causing the problems. They will in fact be able to charge more, because the cheap places to stay will have disappeared.

Apologies for the short notice - I only saw this today but Edinburgh are consulting on their Short Term Lets policy.

consultationhub.edinburgh.gov.uk/sfc/short-term-lets-2022-consultation-2/

No indication of fees.

Guess what? You can apply for an exemption is you are renting a room for 6 weeks or less during the Festival or a major sporting or music event so not actually tackling antisocial behaviour from such activities, and TBF, who is going to apply for an exemption when you can just do it "under the radar" anyway.

I've yet to find out how the Council knows I rent out my spare room and I'm in no rush to tell them.

I did however say in the consultation their ought to be some kind of exemption for key workers.

This consultation must have closed at midnight. The draft policy is now in your link. Wow it's really strict. I'm not a STL owner just an interested former resident. It effectively sounds like a full ban on STLs in Edinburgh's tenements. From other threads I've read on here recently this could be a godsend for uni student accommodation as surely many will switch to LTLs?

Why would anyone switch to a long-term let with the announcements today?

Might well be a time for FTBs?

The rent freeze?

Scottish Government really hates private landlords.

BBC article states 14% of the population are in private rents, and this gem:

Ross Greer, a Scottish Greens MSP for West Scotland who helped draft the rent freeze rules, said landlords had been "warning for more than 20 years" that new regulations and protection for tenants would "result in some catastrophic shortage in the market - and that hasn't happened".

uh hello? What's driving up prices if it's not lack
of supply?

we're honestly governed by idiots.

This is typical of the short term thinking that resulted in this ridiculous legislation.

How much do you think a lodger would have to pay to justify this licensing regime? My friend rents out a room in his Victorian property, a lovely large room, but to make it compliant with the legislation would cost £2500. Say you average that over the cost of the rent for 2 years - thats an extra £104 per month onto the rent.

Why does Scotland always have to safer than any other country? We are at risk of not being able to do anything, in this case, simply rent a room away from our family home in order to work just because some people think every little thing in our daily lives should be inspected, regulated and controlled. No other country does this. People are not regularly dying because of a lack of EPCs at a "C" or higher in their rented rooms.

Who on earth rents a room that is impeccable? Maybe in a luxury 5 star hotel, but everywhere else in the world "acceptable" is the standard and that varies according to cost. If you want impeccable you must pay extremely high prices. Its basic economics. No-one can afford to pay more for people to rent their room than the rental income will bring in.

I've just had to turn down a lodger for my spare room due to this new legislation. I've decided just to leave the room empty, because the costs and effort involved in complying don't add up.

Ironically, when I told the potential lodger of the reason for my decision not to go ahead, he said that he supported the policy because in the town he lived in, people were buying up houses and then renting them out for profit, and that was wrong. I felt like saying "but you are looking to rent a room in order to work for profit in another city while keeping a nice house in a town in the Highlands where there are few jobs". He was even more nonplussed that I told him the solution was for him to either pay to stay in a hotel or declare the room he lodges in as his own home, pay council tax on it and have his main home classified as his second home, and pay double council tax on it as a result.

There are now so many rules in Scotland regarding licensing and tax on renting out and using your own property that its paralysing owners and potential landlords into doing nothing and leaving their property empty. So thanks Nicola - empty room due to your ludicrous policies, doing nothing and a potential lodger has to pay for a hotel. Which crony has shares in all the cheap hotels going up?

The rest of Europe doesn't seem to have this hatred of holiday lettings, I use Air BnB all the time when I'm on holiday. I honestly wondered whether its ever occurred to some people that successful cities are meant to be busy.

They are starting to restrict Airbnbs in some EU cities though, I believe Barcelona is one.

I don't usually stay in cities though. I stay in rural locations, ski resorts, country towns, although if I'm visiting a city for a conference or a work related reason, I prefer to book an AirBnB rather than a hotel. In future in Scotland, this idiotic licensing scheme will make self catering prohibitively expensive and rare and it will only be realistic to use hotels if you are a single person. Theres quite a big difference between a studio room with a separate entrance to a person's main home and a Holiday Inn...

This will certainly make it much more difficult for Scottish people to go away for the weekend, for example. Cheap rooms in people's houses, cheap little annexes, etc, will become rare or just cease to exist. And lots of people who want to visit Scotland in the summer will be priced out. Why stay in an expensive hotel room in Scotland when you could stay in a much nicer and cheaper Airbnb place down the road in the north of England? Or in Ireland, if it's the scenery you're after?
It's ordinary people in Scotland, people who want to rent a room out because they're struggling with rising prices and low wages, who will be the main victims of this. And Scottish people who want to holiday close to home. Other holidaymakers will simply go elsewhere. Restaurants etc will obviously be affected.
Barcelona is a very touristy city. It's completely different from everywhere in
Scotland, with the arguable exception of the centre of Edinburgh.
The SNP have so blatantly gone against everyone else on this, ignoring all arguments. Why?

But people believe anything the government/SNP tell them. So they have presented this as a very nice, left wing, protecting the neighbours from excessive noise type of issue, when in reality it appears to be a move which will boost the profits of hotel chains and large luxury holiday let accommodation, while creating some non-jobs in local authorities to administer it.

The fact that its now criminalised to have a holiday sitter or lodger or do a house swap without a license is absolutely farcical. Any other parliament (well, other than the Welsh one, which is an even more abject failure of local democracy) would have properly debated this issue and ironed out the problems. But not so in Scotland.

The most restricted wee country in the world. What an accolade!

Seriously, what is the point of living here? You pretty much have to live in the central belt if you want a living wage, you have awful roads and public transport, and now its going to be prohibitively expensive to holiday in your own country. Even camping is discouraged because there are barely any public toilets. Rule out buying a little holiday home somewhere your ancestors came from, because thats discouraged as well. All those things that people take as standard in other countries, will cost you more or be financially unattainable in Scotland. Except for the wealthy. Estate owners get public funds to put in access or to "rewild" or for all sorts of things the likes you and me would never imagine. They can just use their property management team to sort out licensing for their holiday cottages.

I'm trying to understand this legislation...
It looks like you have to meet several criteria to be classified as an SLT (and therefore be subject to the legislation) including the let not being someone's principal home and there being a financial element to the rental.
If (and it's a big if) I've understood correctly, it means a permanent lodger (who didn't have a home elsewhere) would be exempt from this legislation and you could carry on as normal under the Government's Rent a Room Scheme.
Similarly, house swaps, with no money exchanging hands would also be exempt.
Have I completely misunderstood? I'd really appreciate some clarification.
Thanks in advance.
P.S. I did try to read the draft legislation on Edinburgh Council's website but it was like patting your head and rubbing your tummy at the same time!!!

House swaps are covered because the owner of the property gets something in return - being allowed to stay in the other family's home.
My DC wants to do a language course abroad. We have a friend in the foreign city, and they've offered to rent my DC their spare room (for a modest rent). I feel so angry and humiliated, realising that if in the future they ask us to have one of their family to stay on the same basis I'll have to apologise and tell them that I am literally NOT ALLOWED to. That having someone to stay for a month for modest rent or just a contribution to the cost of food and utilities would be a criminal offence which could land me in prison. WTF? What kind of country do we live in?

And actually organising a language exchange for your child is likely to be a criminal offence.

I've been chatting to a potential lodger on SpareRoom, who sounds ideal, a man who wants to avoid having to pay for a hotel because he is working on a contract for a couple of months. I've just had to tell him, sorry, I can't go ahead after all, its illegal now. How can it benefit anyone that my spare room is empty when theres supposed to be a housing crisis?

What a damned shame. I honestly think this will herald the collapse of the NHS, because where will nurses, doctors, locums, specialists, etc stay when doing placements or short term infills? Not everyone wants to stay in hospital provided accommodation, and there isn't always any available.

There are now so many things we cannot do in Scotland that people in other countries can.

How on earth did this idiocy get through parliament?

I suspect that not being allowed to use your own home for things like renting to a temporary visitor, or a house swop, or a child's language exchange may be contrary to the Human Rights Act:

"Protocol 1, Article 1 protects your right to enjoy your property peacefully
Property can include things like land, houses, objects you own, shares, licences, leases, patents, money, pensions and certain types of welfare benefits. A public authority cannot take away your property, or place restrictions on its use, without very good reason.
This right applies to companies as well as individuals.
Are there any restrictions to this right?
There are some situations in which public authorities can take things you own or restrict the way you use them. This is only possible where the authority can show that its action is lawful and necessary for the public interest. If your property is taken away, you should be entitled to compensation.

The government must strike a fair balance between your interests as a property owner and the general interests of society as a whole."

This is actually very close to the right of the owner of the property in Scots law to the "fruits" of the property. Its not surprising that they are similar because both Scots law and the notion of European human rights stem from Roman law originally via the continental law systems.

How ironic that the Scottish Government is removing rights that have been ingrained in Scots law for hundreds of years!

How many times will members of the public have to take the Scottish Ministers to court regarding potential or actual breaches of their human rights? This is parliament's job to scrutinise legislation properly, not individual citizens. And until someone with limitless funds or a GoFundMe or similar devotes a couple of years of their time to doing so, we will be stuck with this ridiculously restrictive, badly thought out legislation.

I'm torn between registering myself/my property as a law abiding citizen, and thinking "how will the Council ever find out I'm renting out my spare room?"

It’s not illegal if you are already using the room as a STL. You just need to get your application for a license in by end March .

They might find out if a neighbour reports you.

You won’t be able to advertise on any platforms such as booking.com or Airbnb.

And if you had to make an insurance claim, you might not be be covered.

The rent freeze and the free bus passes in addition to this sum up the SNP for me.

None of them are bad ideas but all badly implemented.

Buses good but there should have been restrictions on under 16s so that there is a time limit of say 8pm to avoid the anti social behaviour or to limit their use on certain services. I now have to drive to work again because the bus sails past me as it's full of school kids going a few stops when they used to walk or get the earlier school bus and not the service bus.

Restrictions on air b and b lets is necessary but bringing in rooms to rent is daft.

Rent freeze have a look at the comments from Wales about dozens of people in small towns being given notice because private landlords are giving up. Same with evictions giving over right to basically not pay for six months. Surely it would be better to establish a better method of what is reasonable. Massive hikes should of course not be permitted but if you haven't increased the rent for years and it's below market value it seems silly to be in the same category as those already charging excessive amounts

The free busses, whilst a great "green" idea is going to contribute to the obesity crisis.
Plenty kids who used to walk 20 minutes to school just jumping on the bus. So a loss of 40 minutes exercise each day.

My student DD now taking bus instead of walking too and as a result the buses are rammed 🤷🏼‍♀️

We should not be enabling young people to jump on a bus for short journey so there going much further or less mobile can't get on

www.bbc.co.uk/news/scotland
The deadline for applying is being extended - will this be another SG policy which quietly disappears ?

Unfortunately I don't think so but I'm glad I'd not officially started my application and paid my fee.