The purpose of the Act is to:
- Give local governments stronger tools to enforce short-term rental bylaws
- Return short-term rental units to the long-term housing market
- Establish a new Provincial role in the regulation of short-term rentals
The Act applies to short-term rentals being offered to the public including:
- Offers hosted by a platform, where people reserve and pay for the rental service (which may include for example, Airbnb, VRBO, Expedia, and FlipKey)
- Offers on other web listing forums (which may include for example, Facebook Marketplace, Kijiji, and Craigslist)
- Listings in classified ads in newspapers
As of May 1, 2024, the Province is implementing:
1) a provincial principal residence requirement which will limit short-term rentals to:
- The host’s principal residence
- Plus one secondary suite or accessory dwelling unit
2) Changes to legal non-conforming use protections
Protections for non-conforming use of property will no longer apply to short term rentals. In some areas, these protections have allowed short-term rental hosts to continue to use their property for short-term rentals even when it was against the bylaws set by the local government.
Here is an approximate timeline of The regulations and responsibilities under the proposed Act are expected to come into effect at different times over the next two years through a phased approach. Highlights include:
- Effective October 26, 2023 (with Royal Assent): Increased fines and business licensing authority for regional districts
- May 1, 2024: Principal residence requirement comes into effect (including exempt areas and accommodations), changes to legal non-conforming use protections, and requirement to display valid business licences, where these are required
- Summer 2024: Data sharing and enabling provincial support for local governments where platforms fail to remove listings without valid business licences, where these are required
- Late 2024: Provincial registry launch and requiring platforms to remove listings without valid provincial registry numbers
There are many types of accommodation and properties that are exempt from the principal residence requirement and the new rules will not apply, therefore still allowing Short term rentals.