Online short-term accommodation rental services – data collection and sharing

KEY POINTS

The regulation:

• applies to online platforms that offer short-term accommodation and to hosts¹ that advertise properties directly;
• does not apply to hotels, suites, apartment hotels, motels, hostels, campsites or recreational vehicle and trailer parks;
• does not affect:
  • national, regional or local rules on short-term rental accommodation, land use, town and country planning, building standards, housing and tenancies,
  • EU or national law on criminal offences and the use of European and national statistics,
  • separate EU legislation on taxation and digital and information society services.

Registration procedure

EU Member States must:

• apply the regulation if they operate a national, regional or local registration system for short-term furnished rental accommodation (known as units) on their territory;
• ensure the registration procedure, which relies on declarations from the accommodation’s hosts, is available online, is free of charge where possible and meets certain technical requirements;
• provide a public and easily accessible register for the registration numbers that are issued and enable accommodation hosts to submit all their documentation digitally;
• ensure all the information and documentation they receive is stored securely, kept for only as long as is necessary and removed at the latest 18 months after the host decides to delist the property from the register.

Hosts must provide:

• accurate information on each rental accommodation, such as its address, the number of beds and whether, if required, it has the necessary authorisation;
• their name, postal and email address, contact phone number and national ID number, if a natural person;
• their name, registered and email address, national business registration number and legal representative with contact phone details, if a legal person.

Verification

Competent authorities:

• check the declarations hosts have submitted and may request further details if they consider the information or documentation to be incomplete or incorrect;
• may suspend the host’s registration number and temporarily remove any listing from online platforms, if, in the case of incomplete or incorrect documentation – and when requested to rectify it – the host fails to do so, or when they have serious doubts about its authenticity or validity;
• can cancel the registration and require the property to be removed from online platforms if the host, through willful misconduct or gross negligence, fails to rectify their details or provides unauthentic or invalid information;
• must provide reasons for any action they take and information to enable the property and host to be identified.

Online platforms:

• design their websites so hosts can declare whether a registration procedure is in use and, if so, users can identify the property through its registration number;
• make random checks on whether hosts have provided a correct declaration and on the validity of the registration number declared;
• inform the competent authorities and hosts immediately of any incorrect declarations or misused or invalid registration numbers;
• let hosts know whether they need to register and the obligations that entails.

Data reporting

Online platforms for short-term rentals where the authorities require certain data collect and send the information for each property to the national competent authorities monthly, or quarterly if they have fewer than 4,250 listings.

Member States:

• establish a single national digital entry point to receive and handle the data generated by the online platforms;
• ensure the entry point:
  • can handle machine-to-machine and manual transmission of activity data,
  • facilitates random checks and information sharing,
  • enables the relevant authorities to access the data,
  • contains a freely accessible and machine-readable online database,
  • guarantees the confidentiality, integrity and security of all the data;
• appoint a national coordinator as a contact point for their country, to liaise with the European Commission and, as a member of the single digital entry points coordination group, to help implement the regulation;
• draw up a list of the authorities responsible for areas implementing a registration procedure and eligible to access the data;
• designate an authority to monitor national implementation of the regulation and report their observations to the Commission every two years;
• determine, by 20 May 2026, penalties for online platforms and hosts that break the rules.

The regulation amends Regulation (EU) 2018/1724.

The Commission evaluates the legislation and presents its main findings by 20 May 2031 to the European Parliament, the Council of the European Union, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions.