Wellington, FL Short-Term Rentals: Host Presence Rule (2026)

The Village of Wellington's Land Development Regulations set the default rule for vacation rentals at Sec. 6.2.2.A.5.b.xi: a vacation rental must be rented as a whole unit to a single transient occupant or occupant party. Renting out individual rooms while other rooms stay occupied by someone else is not allowed under the ordinary rule. The code carves out one narrow exception: an individual sleeping room may be offered separately only if the dwelling is the property owner's own primary residence and the owner is on-site while the room is rented.

A rental that does not meet both conditions, an owner who does not live there and is not present, cannot legally split the unit into separate room rentals; it must be booked as a single whole-unit reservation. This standard sits alongside Sec. 6.2.2.A.5.b.xiv, which limits use of a vacation rental to the registered guests within the maximum occupancy stated on the special use permit and bars parties or events that exceed that occupancy. Both provisions are enforced the same way as the rest of the vacation rental article: a violation is a Class III civil infraction under Chapter 2 of Wellington's Code of Ordinances, citable by a code compliance officer or a law enforcement officer without a prior written warning, and repeat violations move the property up the ordinance's suspension ladder toward permit revocation.