Short-term rentals in La Quinta, explained properly.

Sec. 3.25.030 defines the three permit types. An estate home is a single-family detached dwelling with five or more bedrooms and is evaluated and inspected under Sec. 3.25.060(D)(1); it must have an operable noise monitoring device (Sec. 3.25.070(A)(2)). A Village Hospitality Home is a sub-type subject to a General permit.

Sec. 3.25.057 applies only if no other exemption applies. Criteria: one parcel of at least 25,000 square feet with an existing dwelling; no subdivision, lot line adjustment or merger; HOA CC&Rs authorize the use; no conflicting recorded instruments; and adequate on-site parking. The Council must find the parcel is in a residential zone, a legal non-conforming use or a zone allowing residential uses, that the applicant owns it, that the exemption is required, and that approval will not create materially detrimental conditions, including a concentration of exemptions in one location. The Council's decision is final; the City may impose conditions, including a recorded land use covenant. Application fees are set by resolution and haven't been reviewed yet.

Sec. 3.25.050(B)(2). On a change of ownership the owner must notify the City immediately, the existing permit is terminated unless the exceptions apply, and the property must stop operating at once; failure to comply may bring a fine of $1,000 per day (Sec. 3.25.060(F)). Because new General and Primary permits are generally not issued (see the new permit rule), a buyer can't count on getting one.

Secs. 3.25.050(C) and 3.25.060(C). The City may set the maximum bedrooms using public records. Only existing rooms may be repurposed as additional bedrooms, they must meet building codes, and the remainder of the indoor habitable space must be no less than 1,000 square feet. Advertising more than the approved bedroom count may bring an administrative citation, and a repeat violation may bring revocation.

Sec. 3.25.070(S). The definition in Sec. 9.280.030 is in the zoning code, which we haven't reviewed yet.

Sec. 3.25.060(A)(7), listed among the items the application form may include. The chapter also says it doesn't give an owner the right to violate private CC&Rs that prohibit short-term rental use (Sec. 3.25.020(B)).

Secs. 3.25.050(D)-(F), 3.25.060(D)(2) and 3.25.065. A permit may also be suspended or revoked on these grounds. The City may inspect before issuance or renewal and bill code compliance inspections for full cost recovery. The City may limit permits in high-concentration areas after a resolution and maintain a waiting list (Sec. 3.25.060(D)(2), (H)); we haven't confirmed whether such a resolution has been adopted.

Sec. 3.25.050(G). Use of the property as a short-term vacation rental after the City files the request or declaration is a violation. New permits are also subject to the ban on new permits (see that rule).

Sec. 3.25.070(B) table. Children of any age count. Other examples: 1 bedroom, 2 to 4 overnight and 2 to 8 daytime; 5 bedrooms, 10 to 12 overnight and 10 to 18 daytime. The City Council may restrict occupancy by resolution within the table's ranges, and the City may count occupants in response to a complaint.

Secs. 3.25.050(F) and 3.25.070(R). Example in the code: a 5-bedroom dwelling hosting 10 to 12 overnight occupants needs 3 on-site spaces.

Secs. 3.25.030 and 3.25.070(C), (G). The local contact must hold the business license required by Secs. 3.24.060 and 3.28.020. Failure to respond within 30 minutes to complaints is subject to all remedies available to the City.

Sec. 3.25.070(E); occupants must also follow the noise standards in Secs. 9.100.210 and 11.08.040, which we haven't reviewed. Estate homes must run a noise monitoring device at all times.

Sec. 3.25.070(N). A hosting platform field for bedrooms and permit number satisfies the requirement; audio-only ads read the same information aloud.

Sec. 3.25.070(F). The responsible person must be at least 21 and cannot sub-rent the unit (Secs. 3.25.030, 3.25.070(B)).

Secs. 3.25.070(L) and 3.25.080(A). The tax rate is in Chapter 3.24, which hasn't been reviewed yet, so no rate is shown here.

Secs. 3.25.070(B) and (T).

Sec. 3.25.070(M).

Sec. 3.25.080(B). The duty doesn't apply if the City determines it would violate or be preempted by state or federal law.

Sec. 3.25.090(E). Advertising without a valid permit is $1,000, $2,000, $3,000 for an individual and $1,500, $3,000, $5,000 for a management company. Operating without a permit also bars the owner from any future permit or business license for short-term rental use. A management company with three or more violations of the advertising rule can be barred permanently. The amounts are maximums allowed by state law or the code.

Sec. 3.25.090(B) and (D). A written minor violation reprieve request can keep a minor violation from counting; the owner can request a hearing to lift a suspension. Appeals go to a hearing before the City Manager, whose decision is final except for citations, which follow Chapter 1.09 (Sec. 3.25.100).

California Revenue and Taxation Code section 7280 lets the legislative body of any city, county, or city and county levy a tax on the privilege of occupying a room or other living space in a hotel, inn, tourist home or house, motel or other lodging, unless the stay is longer than 30 days. A county's tax applies only in its unincorporated areas. The rate, registration and filing rules are set by each city or county, so the local tax is shown in the city's own section of this page.

Government Code sections 50990 to 50996 (Senate Bill 346, 2025) apply only in a city or county that adopts an ordinance making them apply. Where they apply, a booking platform must, on the local agency's request, report the physical address with nine-digit ZIP code of each short-term rental it facilitated (no more often than every 3 months, or monthly if the local tax is remitted monthly), and must include in each listing any applicable local license number and any transient occupancy tax certification issued by the local agency. The local agency may fine a platform that does not report. The act does not stop a city or county from regulating short-term rentals, platforms or tax collection in other ways.

Government Code section 66333(g) requires a city's junior accessory dwelling unit ordinance to require that a rental of a junior ADU be for a term longer than 30 days (as amended by Assembly Bill 1154, in force January 1, 2026). Section 66323(e) requires a city to require that a rental of an ADU created under that section (the ministerial, by-right approvals) be for a term longer than 30 days. For other ADUs on a lot with a single-family home, section 66315 bars standards beyond section 66314, including owner occupancy, except that a city may require that the property be used for rentals of terms 30 days or longer. Cities can be stricter in their own codes; see the city section.

Civil Code section 4741 says an owner in a common interest development is not subject to a governing-document provision that prohibits, has the effect of prohibiting, or unreasonably restricts renting or leasing a separate interest, ADU or junior ADU, and an association may not cap rentals below 25 percent of the separate interests. The same section says it does not prohibit an association from adopting and enforcing a provision that prohibits transient or short-term rental of a separate property interest for 30 days or less. Check your association's governing documents.

Civil Code section 1940 applies the chapter on hiring of real property (Civil Code sections 1940 to 1954.071) to tenants, lessees, boarders, lodgers and others who hire dwelling units, but excludes a person in transient occupancy in a hotel, motel, residence club or other facility when the stay is or would be subject to a transient occupancy tax under Revenue and Taxation Code section 7280 (stays of 30 days or less). Stays longer than that are not covered by this exclusion.

In a December 6, 2016 letter to coastal cities and counties, the California Coastal Commission said that regulating short-term or vacation rentals in the coastal zone must happen within the local coastal program or under a coastal development permit, because it changes the intensity of use and access to the shoreline and so counts as development under the Coastal Act. The Commission said it does not believe outright bans adopted outside that process are legally enforceable in the coastal zone, that it has not historically supported blanket bans, and that it has supported limits such as caps on numbers by area, limits on days, occupancy limits, 24-hour response, parking, noise and signage rules and payment of transient occupancy tax. This applies only to places inside the coastal zone.