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The following editorial by Bruce Butler was in today's Summit Daily News. It addresses short term rentals.
As the winter tourist season fast approaches and municipal ordinances move toward first and second readings, proposed short-term rental regulations are, once again, a highly contested public debate. There is no question Summit County’s economy is heavily dependent upon visitors to support its resorts and to sustain its many lodging and hospitality businesses. So figuring out how to balance the demand for short-term vacation rentals with the overall cost of real estate and permanent housing availability are important public policy questions.
As emotions rise and tempers flare, it is important to remind ourselves what problems we are trying to solve with new short-term rental rules and regulations. The most prevalent complaints about short-term rentals are threefold: First, noise, parking, and trash problems associated with short-term rentals in predominantly owner-occupied, family-oriented neighborhoods. Second, the sale of properties that were previously long-term rentals, that get converted to short-term rentals, as landlords opt to cash-in on a hot real estate market. Third, the stress on local infrastructure, from traffic, to snow removal, to emergency services.
Of course social and emotional arguments are often injected into the mix as well as the inevitable friction between the self-interest of permanent residents and second-home owners. Sometimes the debate gets skewed by arguments that are based upon false premises, such as the supposition that if owners cannot short-term rent, they will long-term rent. In my opinion, this argument is a logical disconnect, and it fails to understand the reasons why many second-home owners buy into our community.
It seems to me that capping the number of licenses available is begging for lawsuits under constitutional property takings grounds. In fact, it surprises me that national real estate and property rights groups have not been quicker to initiate lawsuits under the argument that limiting the number of licenses is government action that arbitrarily devalues the real estate of private property owners who are not able to obtain a license.
I continue to believe the more prudent course of action is to variably price the cost of short-term rental licenses by zone. So, in zones where short-term rentals should be encouraged, like Keystone and Copper Mountain, the cost of licenses is low, and in places where short-term rentals are less desirable the cost of obtaining a short-term rental license is correspondingly higher. This provides economic incentives and disincentives that each owner can weigh the pros and cons of, rather than arbitrarily limiting what owners can and cannot do with their property. I believe this approach is far more defensible and rates can be easily adjusted on an annual basis to find the correct balance.
