Homeowners in State College Borough who operate short-term rentals such as Airbnb and VRBO will soon be required to have safety inspections of their properties.
Borough council on Monday voted unanimously to approve a property maintenance code amendment requiring all owners who acquire a short-term rental license to also pass the same housing inspection as long-term rentals and receive a standard rental permit from the Centre Region Code Administration.
The requirement will go into effect for short-term rental licenses issued beginning Dec. 1. Any property currently licensed as a short-term rental will not be required to obtain the permit until the license expires.
In 2022, State College enacted a short-term rental ordinance that, among other regulations, requires an annual $300 license for properties rented out for 29 or fewer days a month and no more than 120 days a year. But, per the building safety and property maintenance code, only properties rented out for seven consecutive days or more are required to pass a safety inspection and receive a rental permit from the code administration.
The amendment lowers the borough’s number of days triggering the requirement of a permit issued by a code officer to one, effectively requiring all rental properties to pass a safety inspection. Bellefonte, College Township and Ferguson Township also require the permit for rentals of one or more days. Patton Township’s minimum is seven days and Harris Township’s is 30.
Centre Region Code safety inspections are done every three years and for State College rental properties currently cost $69 (a $47 code administration fee and a $22 borough fee), Walter Schneider, agency director for the Centre Region Code Administration, said at a borough council meeting on Nov. 6.
Inspections include a review of the interior and exterior of the home for items such as heating, electrical, sanitation, smoke detectors, fire extinguishers, handrails, mold and mildew, to name a few.
State College currently has 96 licensed short-term rentals and approximately 60 more are in process, Ed LeClear, borough planning director, said earlier this month. Of those that are licensed, 15 already have a standard rental permit.
Council member Peter Marshall raised the idea of requiring safety inspections for short-term rentals at an Oct. 16 meeting, and staff determined the most effective way to implement an inspection requirement would be through a revision to the property maintenance code.
“The council is responsible for the health, welfare and safety of its residents and visitors. That’s our function,” Marshall said. “Whether it’s for one day or 30 days or a year, if a place is not safe and you have an incident, you’re going to wish you had done this. There’s no reason why someone renting for a weekend shouldn’t have the same safety as somebody renting for seven days or eight days.”
Schneider said that while homeowners decide what level of safety they will have for themselves, and code officials have little say in that, the inspections for rentals are intended to ensure the safety of those who have no control over the property.
“…Unless the house was built today and we gave it a certificate of occupancy today, once we leave that house I can’t tell you how to maintain your house,” Schneider said. “This program was designed to provide a minimum level of safety for those who do not have control over the property, to have that minimum level of safety and the expectation of safety in the property.”
