Thursday, March 28, 2024

The great debate surrounding Airbnbs & residential rentals

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    Festivals, bored Seattle natives and endless tourist hotspots like wineries and snow sport options bring in an influx of outsiders. No secret and certainly not breaking news - many dread the traffic and most enjoy, either unknowingly or knowingly, the benefits of what the sales tax helps fund within the city. However, the visitors clog up more than the roads and has caused limited accommodations within the Leavenworth city limits.
    While Leavenworth employees and just those who desire to put roots in Leavenworth have a hard time securing housing, during busy surges even tourists struggle with finding a place to lay their head after a long night downtown. There is no shortage of hotels, but ironically there can be a shortage of rooms available.  Despite hotels and resorts scattered throughout town, some Bavarian themed, some newer and some with only 20 or so rooms, there still can be an accommodation deficit.
    With limited availability during popular weekends, some hotels enforce a two night policy for those that only drift into town for 24 hours. The traffic that tends to become overwhelming that is traced back to Wenatchee, is arguably due to Leavenworth visitors having to backtrack to find lodging.
    So some Leavenworth residents had begun converting their cozy home into doubling as an Airbnb or a Bed and Breakfast for those stragglers that need somewhere to crash. Taking the phrase mi casa, su casa to a transaction level.
    However this new business endeavor has caused some rifts amongst neighbors. After flipping through previous minutes of city council meetings and a development service meeting over the last two years, it seems a majority of complaints fall under the same umbrella of frustration.
    One resident complained at an October 23 city council meeting this year that her family friendly nook of her neighborhood suddenly had a bed & breakfast on the block. She voiced concerns regarding the number of cars parked, the number of visitors filtering in and out and the possibility of her neighbor building on a unit solely for rental purposes.
    Intertwining residential neighborhoods and tourists seem to spread concern that the community feel will disintegrate with the loud guests landing place during their vacation being two doors down.
    Some other fears that resonate with rentals would be the lack of housing for those who desire to be residents rather than guests. In a place with limited housing options, using some of those spaces as rentals can cause an issue.
    So both the city and the planning commission have put in measure to dilute any misunderstandings in regard to overnight rentals. Included under section 18.52.120 Conditional use for Bed and Breakfasts (dated in Jan. 2017) states:
    "This is a restricted residential district of low density in which the principal use of land is for single-family dwellings, together with recreational, religious, and educational facilities required to serve the community. The regulations for this district are designed and intended to establish, maintain and protect the essential characteristics of the district, to develop and sustain a suitable environment for family life where children are members of most families, and to prohibit all activities of a commercial nature and those which would tend to be inharmonious with or injurious to the preservation of a residential environment. The “commercial nature” in this instance is residences functioning similar to hotels or other lodging establishments."
    On the flip side of the cons for short term rentals, there is also the element of money that serves the community. Looking at a city council document dated back to Jan. 2017, it states that short term rentals provide greater income than long term rentals due to being subject to lodging taxes.
    However, the city found a happy medium and enforced a policy that overnight rentals, like Airbnbs, are allowed with a conditional use permit in the commercial district, but the residential district is off limits. Bed and breakfasts are allowed within the residential districts and this year there will be an annual inspection and review.
    With tight regulations on overnight rentals, there is still a number of Leavenworth based rentals on sites like Airbnb. However, City Administrator Joel Walinski, confirms these rentals are not within the residential district despite what it may say online. He states that they have patrols that monitor this activity to ensure the rules are followed.
    "Since that time (end of 2016/early 2017) the number of complaints have dropped off and we do have patrols to patrol overnight rental activity. We also have an overnight rental complaint line that residents can use to report activity within the city (509-436-7630)," said Walinski.
    
    
  

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