California Landlords with Short Term Rentals Must Be More Transparent with Cleaning Fees
In California, a property is considered a “short-term rental” if it is a residential property or part of a residential property that is rented to an individual or a group for 30 consecutive days or less. According to this definition, “short-term rentals” do not include commercially operated hotels, motels, bed-and-breakfast inns and timeshares.
Since July 1, 2024, all short- term rentals have been required to include in the total rental price all the taxes and fees imposed by a government before the consumer reserved the rental. In California, short term rentals are subject to, among other fees, the Transient Occupancy Tax (TOT) which is determined by the local governments and usually range anywhere from 6% to 15% depending on the location of the rental. Most listing platforms such as Airbnb and Vrbo automatically collect TOT tax and payment on behalf of the hosts. Most consumers understood and accepted these government fees and there was little confusion over them.
However, if you have used an Airbnb or other short term rental service, you may have been asked to do some cleaning at the conclusion of your stay. If you failed to do the cleaning, if the cleaning you did was not sufficient, or if you broke an item during your stay, you were likely hit with additional fees or charges. Many consumers claimed these additional fees or charges caught them by surprise or were not properly disclosed prior to their booking of the property. The legislature has now taken action to make these additional fees and charges less confusing for consumers.
A new law that went into effect on July 1, 2025, now makes it mandatory for all short term rental hosts, platforms, advertisers, owners, etc. to disclose in a written notice all extra charges or penalties that will apply to guests if they fail to complete all their end of stay chores. In particular, all short term rentals must give notice of -
all additional fees or charges that will be added to the total price if the consumer fails to perform certain cleaning tasks
and an explicit description of the cleaning tasks the consumer must perform
This notice can be given in written form (including electronically) and must be provided to the consumer before the consumer reserves the stay at the short-term rental.
For owners, hosts, platforms, and advertisers, the penalty is huge because a violator can be fined up to $10,000 for each violation. Yes, that means the owner could be fined up to $10,000 for each time he or she failed to disclose the fees prior to the consumer reserving the stay. This could be disastrous for an owner who has failed to disclose the fees for an entire tourist season. To make matters worse, this penalty can be imposed on any person that knew or even should have known that it has advertised, displayed, or offered a short-term rental without proper notice of these fees. It is important for all owners and landlords to keep this new law in mind when making short term rentals available for rent.