Hawthorne, CA Short-Term Rentals: Repeat Violator Strikes (2026)

Hawthorne Municipal Code § 17.74.020(H) screens out chronically noncompliant properties before they can even apply for a short-term rental permit. The subsection makes a unit ineligible if it is 'subject to an active compliance order,' if it has 'received more than three administration citations from the city within the previous twelve months,' or if it has 'any unpaid fees, fines or penalties as a result of any violation of the Hawthorne Municipal Code.' Any one of the three conditions is enough to block the permit; the applicant does not need to hit all three.

Administrative citations are the enforcement tool authorized generally under Chapter 1.23B and specifically for short-term rental violations under § 17.74.090(B), so a host who racks up citations for noise, unpermitted guests, or other Chapter 17.74 violations is building toward the three-citation threshold that locks the property out of the permit system. The rule works alongside § 17.74.100(D), which separately bars any short-term rental application on a property for a full year after a permit has been revoked, so a property can face two independent obstacles: the pre-application eligibility screen in § 17.74.020(H) and the post-revocation waiting period in § 17.74.100(D).

Because the count of eligible citations runs on a rolling twelve months, a property can become eligible again once enough time passes without a fourth citation, but any unpaid fee or fine from a past violation keeps the disqualification in place until it is paid in full.