Placer County, CA Short-Term Rentals: Night Caps (2026)

Placer County controls STR density through a hard permit cap rather than a per-home nightly rental limit. Effective March 31, 2022, the total number of residential short-term rental unit permits issued in the Eastern Placer County Short-Term Rental Area is capped at 3,900. Owner-occupied STRs are excluded from this cap, so a resident owner can still obtain a permit even after the 3,900 ceiling is reached, but new non-owner-occupied permits become unavailable once the cap is hit. Rather than limiting how many nights a home can be rented short-term, the ordinance does the opposite once the market is full: once the 3,900 cap is reached, short-term rentals (excluding owner-occupied units) must be rented a minimum of 30 nights per year, and enforcement of that 30-night minimum begins one year after the date the cap is reached. County amendments also clarified that the 30-night minimum begins once the cap is reached and allowed multiple STRs per property under specific conditions. The cap is generally administered as one permit per property. Prospective operators should check current cap status with the county, because permit availability and the timing of the 30-night minimum depend entirely on whether the 3,900 limit has been reached.