Local Taxes Included?

[Richard2038]

Aloha,

Our condo was off market for 2 years after the Lahaina fire.  

During our absence, we understood that Airbnb changed their marketing and the $ showing included the applicable taxes.  For our area, the taxes are a whopping 17.25%!  

We've had 10 bookings since coming back online but today had a guest question our owner remarks vs what Airbnb was advertising.

it appears that Airbnb isn't disclosing the taxes that they are collecting until after a guest begins the booking process.

does anyone know why this has changed?  Or for the past 2 years has Airbnb not been disclosing the local taxes until after the booking was started?

Mahalo for any assistance other owners can offer.

[Elisa]

Hi @Richard2038 😊, 

Thank you for bringing up this conversation here.

I’m sorry about the break you had to take because of the fire. I hope everything is fine now!

Since this is a very specific question, I recommend sharing it in our 👉 Local Host Clubs.

Let me know if you find out anything!

[Joan2709]

@Richard2038 

Taxes are not included in the price displayed to guests when searching. The price shown to guests includes all fees - not taxes. All fees includes the Airbnb Service Fee - it used to be a separate line item. So perhaps this is what your are referring to.

All fees also include the cleaning fee, pet fee, etc. Taxes are only shown to the guest at checkout - not in search. If you click the inderlined price breakdown you'll see the Airbnb service fee and taxes displayed.

 Here are some screen shots from your listing showing that.

[Richard2038]

Thank you!

I had someone wanting to stay 3 months, so the difference in taxes included and not included was huge.  Offered them a further discount since it was a great booking, but they moved on to another host.  

[Joan2709]

@Richard2038 

Most long term stays are exempt from Occupancy taxes. You would have to look at your local regulations on that and see if 30+ stays are exempt.

That said, Airbnb has incorrectly been adding taxes to some long term stays that should have an exemption. You would have to talk to Airbnb about that. Supposedly, if a guest books over 30+ days (or whatever it is in your area) Airbnb should remove the taxes from the booking. If not, there are a bunch of hoops to jump through to get the fixed.

Once you find out if 30+stays are exempt, use incognito mode and test it. If the taxes are still applied, then that is an Airbnb issue.

Also, the service fee should be reduced for 30+ stays. You can always send a special offer to the guest to off-set the taxes if they truly should not be paying for them. Unfortunately, that tax money will still go to the local governmental tax authority - even if it shouldn't.

[Joan2709]

@Richard2038 

The Transient Accomodations Tax applies to all stays less than 180 days. The only way to avoid the tax is for a stay of 180+days. A 3 month stay would still have to pay the tax. 

….rentals in Lahaina (Maui County) and the rest of Hawaii are generally exempt from the state and county transient accommodations tax (TAT) if the stay is for 180 consecutive days or longer. A 30+ night stay is still considered a "transient accommodation" and is therefore subject to the tax unless specific conditions are met. 

https://files.hawaii.gov/tax/legal/taxfacts/tf96-2.pdf