SACRAMENTO, Calif — It's no secret Sacramento is going through a growing boom. Everywhere you look you can see apartment buildings going up. But with growth comes growing pains.
Sacramento Councilman Steve Hansen said an investor approached him with the idea of turning a new apartment building into short-term rentals or a hotel. But Hansen said no, noting that it would be an unacceptable substitution, especially during a housing shortage.
"We are very supportive of short-term rentals for people who are renting a room in their home or maybe a second unit," Hansen said. "And that is what our ordinance currently covers, and we are not changing what those folks can do."
Hansen is now proposing an ordinance that would prohibit converting apartment buildings into short-term rentals without the city's permission. On Tuesday, the city's Law and Legislation Committee approved putting the proposed ordinance in front of the City Council, which could happen as soon as the next six weeks.
Hansen said the ordinance would not affect single-family home rentals, but instead apartment buildings.
"What we want to do is stop this bait and switch, where some investors want to come in and buy apartment buildings and turn them into short term rentals, which removes those building from our available housing," Hansen said. "If they want to build a hotel, that's great. But we shouldn't be turning housing and turning it into hotels."
Restricting rentals is not a new thing. In Placer County, homeowners must maintain a residence as a vacation rental property. Rules under that ordinance include having quiet hours and limiting two adults per bedroom.
In San Francisco, a room in a residential unit can be rented out if the owner lives on site.
The Sacramento Housing Alliance agrees with Hansen in not allowing short-term rental units because the market threatens the current housing crisis.
"Allowing any multifamily units to become short-term rentals takes away permanent homes at a time they are desperately needed," the organization said in a statement to ABC10. "Across Sacramento County, we have a deficit of more than 63,000 rental units affordable and available for lower income renters.
"Legislators locally and statewide have recognized that we are in a housing crisis and worked to give tenants more protections and make it easier to build more housing. Losing rental units to the short-term rental market threatens our progress on both fronts."
The California Apartment Association, however, said I would not comment on a proposed law that has yet to be drafted.
The CAA said in a more general statement, however, that it wants any law "to ensure any new law or regulations give the housing provider latitude to manage their units without needing to jump through hoops at City Hall while providing stability to the families who rent these homes.”
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