The City of Sonoma did NOT adopt a hosted-rental or 'home share' carve-out when it passed Ordinance 12-2017. Any rental of 29 consecutive days or less falls within the definition of a 'vacation rental' under SMC § 19.50.110(A)(2) and is barred unless grandfathered. Renting a single room while you live in the home is not a separately permitted use inside City limits.
SMC § 19.50.110(A)(2) sets the maximum length of stay at '29 consecutive days,' which is the operative line between a short-term/vacation rental (regulated and now banned) and a longer-term tenancy. The City's ordinance, unlike unincorporated Sonoma County (Sonoma County Code § 26-88-118 Hosted Rentals) and the City of Sebastopol (SMC 17.260.060, which allows hosted rentals as a separate category), contains no home-share, B&B-style, or owner-occupied carve-out. A room rental of 30+ days is a long-term residential tenancy and is governed instead by California Civil Code § 1940 et seq., California's just-cause and rent-cap law AB 1482 (Cal. Civil Code §§ 1946.2 and 1947.12) for qualifying multi-unit and corporate-owned single-family rentals, and the federal Fair Housing Act. The City Council, at its Nov. 20, 2017 meeting, did authorize a narrow temporary-housing allowance permitting a grandfathered vacation rental to be rented long-term without losing legal non-conforming status, but that allowance expired January 31, 2018 and has not been re-extended. Bed and Breakfast Inns are regulated as a separate use under Title 19 and are not equivalent to home-share.
An unpermitted short-term room rental is treated as an illegal vacation rental and abated through the City Code Enforcement / City Prosecutor process. The platform-listing requirement of § 19.50.110(A)(6) (license or TOT # must appear in every ad) gives the City a clear enforcement target: a listing without a license number signals an unpermitted operation. Repeated violations are typically prosecuted as infractions with per-day continuing-violation accrual under SMC Title 1. For 30+ day room rentals, tenant protections under AB 1482 apply if the unit qualifies, and the housing provider must comply with disclosure and just-cause requirements.
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See how Sonoma's extended home share rules stack up against other locations.
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