Frederick County, VA Short-Term Rentals: Short-Term Rental Parking Rules (2026)

Frederick County ties its short-term rental parking requirement to the same use-standards list that governs guest safety and occupancy for short-term lodging. C(3)(e) requires a dwelling or manufactured home used for short-term lodging to provide at least two designated off-street parking spaces for lodgers, and specifies that the operator must hold the authority to reserve those spaces for short-term lodging purposes, a bar an operator with only a shared driveway, an unassigned lot space, or on-street parking cannot clear. The parking condition sits alongside the rest of subsection C(3): the unit must be available for County inspection during reasonable hours, must meet the applicable Virginia Uniform Statewide Building Code or Manufactured Home Safety Regulations, must carry a fire extinguisher, smoke detectors and, where applicable, carbon monoxide detectors, and must post an exit-pathway plan inside every sleeping room used for lodging.

All of this sits under the broader short-term lodging permit requirement in subsection A, which the Department of Planning and Development issues, paired with a Commissioner of the Revenue business license, before any lodging activity can begin, and the occupancy and guest-room caps in subsections B and C(1) apply on top of the parking condition. Because the parking requirement is a permit condition rather than a freestanding zoning-district parking table, the Zoning Administrator can review it case by case at the time the administrative permit is issued and again on inspection or complaint, and a host who later loses the right to reserve those spaces, for example if a shared driveway arrangement changes, is expected to bring the permit back into compliance.