In response to 'right of establishment' reforms, the rules regulating short-term rentals of private properties on platforms such as AirBnB and Booking.com will soon become much stricter.

New regulations on short-term rentals have been in effect in Luxembourg since 1 September 2023. However, no checks were permitted as another EU regulation was in the works. As soon as the new EU regulation is approved, authorities will be permitted to conduct checks on private properties listed on short-term rental platforms.

Since 1 September, hosts who want to list a private property or a private room on a platform for more than 90 days a year must take the same courses that café, restaurant or hotel owners also take in Luxembourg.

Attendees of these courses have doubled, according to Gilles Scholtus working for the General Directorate for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises. Course facilitators concluded that people had more specific questions regarding short-term rental platforms such as AirBnB, stating that "we want to improve the level of knowledge and expertise among all hosts."

On the one hand, Scholtus argues that 'sharing economy' businesses should be supported, but on the other hand rules are necessary as well:

"At some point, if hosts are renting out their homes for an extended amount of time – in our case, 90 days – it becomes a commercial activity, and then there are other commercial operators who may have to deal with different constraints, which is not fair. We want to balance this out so that if it is in fact a commercial activity, hosts are aware of the other regulations in place."

In the future, anyone renting out their private properties on a platform like AirBnB will receive a reference number which they will also have to declare, Scholtus explains. Through this reference number, authorities will be able to receive feedback on how many nights have been booked for the property in question:

"The reference number is issued by the Ministry. On the platform, hosts have to indicate the correct reference number with each property. Then we will receive the number of bookings that have been made across platforms for that respective property."

The European Parliament approved the regulatory bill last week. Now all that remains is an approval by EU Member States, which is looking highly likely according to official outlooks.