Quebec short-term rental law in effect, with big fines for uncertified listings

MONTREAL — Quebec’s new tourist accommodation law is now in effect, with hefty fines of up to $100,000 for short-term rental platforms listing properties without a proper government certificate.

Under a provincial law adopted in June, as of today rental platforms like Airbnb are prohibited from displaying listings that don’t have a registration number and certificate issued by the province.

“It is nice to see the government finally actually enforcing the rules that are in place because all that we’re talking about now is actually having an effective mechanism in place to enforce the rules where before there absolutely was none that existed,” said Alain Deschamps, community organizer for the Comité Logement Du Plateau Mont-Royal, a group that defends the rights of tenants in the Plateau Mont-Royal neighbourhood of Montreal. 

“We see every week people who are being evicted or landlords trying to evict people to convert the rental units illegally into AirBnBs. And so we’ve seen many people that have been kicked out of their houses who have had affordable rent and are now or have had to move out of the neighborhood and move out of the city or become homeless,” stressed Deschamps.

People who want to rent their properties for stays of 31 days or fewer have to acquire registration numbers from Quebec’s tourism industry regulator and display them in their online listings.

Rental platforms had until Sept. 1 to start verifying the validity of those registration numbers, which the government issues in the form of PDF certificates.

Operators of rentals who display false or inaccurate registration information face fines of up to $50,000, and platforms must now have a representative in Quebec or face a fine of up to $20,000.

“We think it’s a big step in the right direction and we hope that these new regulations will have a direct and rapid impact on illegal tourist accommodation,” said Aurélie De Blois, a spokesperson for Tourisme Montréal, adding, “I think we’ll be happy when we’ll have the proof that those regulations are respected, but we’re confident.”

The City of Montreal announced last month that due to numerous illegal tourist accommodations with falsified registrations, it would deploy a squad of inspectors in three central boroughs to identify illegal short-term rentals and dole out fines.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 1, 2023.

The Canadian Press

<!– Photo: 20230901110916-64f2003ee34873b95f0a5ff1jpeg.jpg, Caption:

–>