"There is no special "business property tax" for AirBnB/VRBO type rentals"
There's no extra property tax, but most places require sales tax to be paid on all short term rentals and many charge lodging tax on top of that.
In my case in Virgina, I pay 10.3% combined sales and lodging tax on every dollar of rent.
There is also much more wear and tear on a vacation rental than a long term property, so it's not just increased business for local maids but all construction trades, local handymen etc.
Many places do in theory require sales or lodging tax to be paid, but that's different than successfully collecting it. Compliance among AirBnB hosts with such taxes is especially low. That is a major reason for the amount of money spent, on both sides, on lawsuits over data. Many jurisdictions want AirBnB to turn over data about large renters, and AirBnB does not want to turn it over. Governments like NYC's have managed to collect a substantial amount of back taxes by suing AirBnB for data, prevailing, and then pursuing tax dodgers they're able to identify from the data. But that approach only really works for municipalities with legal departments as well funded as NYC's.
Municipalities are lazy. Instead of doing their research and suing individual owners, which they should be doing as those are the folks not paying taxes, they look for the aggregators like AirBnb which are a big target and sue them instead.
As someone who pays my taxes it is very annoying to have another body step in and muck it all up. AirBnb is notorious for collecting the wrong taxes and poorly reporting the taxes they do collect.
> There is also much more wear and tear on a vacation rental than a long term property, so it's not just increased business for local maids but all construction trades, local handymen etc.
That is a good point, it is no doubt especially true for transient renters versus someone who is renting a place to live in full time.
Yes I pay transient occupancy tax of about 13% which nets my mountain city about 8k extra per year that they wouldn't have gotten from one property. I still pay the property tax too of course. So these cities are benefiting greatly and you can see them making upgrades everywhere with more jobs.
I see why some people would not welcome growth but nobody owes you a lifetime guarantee on living in a desirable place for a low amount. It's real estate and has always been subject to change, many times severe fluctuation.
There's no extra property tax, but most places require sales tax to be paid on all short term rentals and many charge lodging tax on top of that.
In my case in Virgina, I pay 10.3% combined sales and lodging tax on every dollar of rent.
There is also much more wear and tear on a vacation rental than a long term property, so it's not just increased business for local maids but all construction trades, local handymen etc.