Advice for hosts in LA regarding registration

[Pete69]

The city of LA just started this new "Home-Sharing Registration". My advice for hosts in Los Angeles is DO NOT register until the last few days. Wait until late October. I registered and at the very end it said if you are not "accepted" then you will have to immediately cease operations. Well I've got guests booked a month out! Why did I fill out my registration so soon!??? Who knows what sort of ticky tacky issues the city of LA might have with your registration. They might even erroneously reject your submission. Then you have to cancel all of your reservations, lose money, lose your superhost status, etc.

[Helen427]

@Pete69 

Have you used keywords in the search box re these worldwide issues?

There's a fair bit in there that many have contributed to.

Do they provide an Appeal type of proceedure to challenge legalities?

You may like to exercise those options as there's many "Grey areas" in Law.

See my other posts re these issues.

All the best

[Pete69]

Worldwide issues??? This is a local thing. Los Angeles passed a bunch of laws regarding Airbnb. All hosts in LA now have to register with the city between July 1 and October 31. I'm saying don't be in any rush to register.

[Joy236]

I’m absolutely waiting until the last few days.  Hoping this ridiculous ordinance is repealed by October.  It’s infuriating me to think that I would need the consent of all of my neighbors to get permission to exceed the 120 day cap plus pay $850.  LA is going to regret the loss of tax revenue and hotel prices will skyrocket.  Fingers crossed someone challenges this in court ASAP 

[Pete69]

This "registration period" is a total injustice on hosts and people need to call and complain until they fix this. 213-202-5464 Office of Planning / Home Sharing. People in LA need to know that if you pay early this year then you will have to pay early next year, etc. Do you like paying for stuff that you don't HAVE to pay for? The "registration period" from July 1 to Oct 31 is essentially 4 months that you DON'T HAVE to pay for, but the city of LA will GLADLY register you early so that they can require you to pay 4 months early next year, etc!

[Shy1]

Does anyone understand the alternative route to not register? It says that if we post our rooms or houses for 30 minimum stay then we don’t have to register? Would that be worth it, just to skip the $850 fee. I have a mix of people who stay here. Long term and short term, so I guess I wouldn’t mind putting a 30 day minimum,

would rather it be 15 day minimum, but just not really sure about any of this. Any one know or have information regarding this either way? 

[Christianna1]

I just registered and then I contacted the planning department because I wanted to let them know I had my TOTC and they were super helpful. They were like, “Cool, we forward all registered people to the tax office on November 1.”  They answered right away and it seemed like my paperwork was in so I was good. The end. So I don’t think they are going to shut anyone down for registering. I’m pretty sure there are only like, 20 people who qualify based on the new rules and will register anyway. Don’t worry, Pete.

However, the tax office is a bigger issue. Apparently we have to file monthly even though we don’t pay the taxes. I also think it’s retroactive. So that’s something to tackle. It’s just a one page form each month, but it’s still a little unclear because we can’t see what Air BnB has paid in taxes any more. That changed a few months back. Also, now that we are all registered businesses, we’ll need bank accounts. No co-mingling of funds. So that’s something I just found out today and need to take my TOTC to the bank. Although, turns out you don’t put your listing name as the TOTC business name unless you do a DBA. There’s a LOT to unravel here and I think Air BnB needs to have some special joint meetings with the city with all hands on deck to help people. They could have a DBA person and a tax office person and a city planning person all there at once ready to help us file so we can do it together.

[Shy1]

Hey guys. Here’s my main issue. I spoke with the woman yesterday at the city and she told me that if you rent out separate rooms in your home you can’t do that anymore. You can only rent one room at at time. Or you can rent your entire house out. So if you have a guest unit, and different rooms in your house you can’t rent them out at the same time. Also, I’m concerned about once you go past the 120 days, it says we have to update our neighbors? Does this mean our neighbors have to give permission? This is insane. We are just thinking that we will move out of our house and rent the whole thing out at this point? Does anyone have any better ideas?