Could a short-term rental ban be in Kelowna’s future? It's one option
The first major review of Kelowna’s short-term rental rules could lead to a total ban.
While that’s not likely since it’s the most extreme of three options City of Kelowna staff will present to city council on Monday, July 10, there's plenty of evidence there are serious problems with the whole system.
The rules regulating the industry were adopted in April 2019. Since then, the number of legal units has almost doubled from 630 in 2020 to 1,139 as of June 2023.
Despite the fact the program has a key goal of not harming the long-term rental market, 70 rental units have been decommissioned and switched to short-term rentals through agencies like Airbnb. Also during that time, city staff have found 796 short-term rentals operating illegally that have since obtained licences. Another 200 illegal suits have yet to get their licences.
“Business licensing staff only have capacity to enforce on a small number of non-compliant short-term rentals at one time,” the report to council says.
There have also been 294 complaints against 146 properties for things like noise, nuisances, parking and garbage.
The report says short-term rentals help people finance their homes but it also cited a 2020 Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation study which found the majority of the units in Canada were owned by large-scale commercial operators.
A 2021 joint Union of BC Municipalities-provincial government study found “short-term rentals offer some benefits to communities and travellers, which include interim worker housing, tourism and economic activity.”
It also found they’re causing concerns about “housing availability and affordability, land use, public impacts and local government capacity.”
READ MORE: Airbnb may be good for tourists but at a cost to Okanagan residents
Despite all those problems, the recommended course of action for city council to take is a moderate one. That would prohibit short-term rentals from rental-only subzones and require owners to live on site for more than 240 days a year, even though it says elsewhere in the report that residency rules are hard to enforce.
A stricter option would be to ban the rentals from townhouses and apartment buildings as well. The third option would be to ban them from all housing.
The report it set up as a workshop for council on Monday, with staff to take direction and come back with bylaw changes some time in the future.
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