I wholeheartedly agree. We recently toured On Top of the World in Ocala and they only allow rentals that are a minimum of 6 months and one week and a maximum of one year. They also have real gated, secured roads. Both of these are very attractive to us. I don't think we are interested in moving there in particular but I am sure other communities do the same thing in case we ever decide to move.

The developer here loves the short term rentals because it helps to expose The Villages to a lot more people and thus may result in sales and the fact that they own a very robust rental company where they earn a lot of money in commissions managing those rentals.

Yep...:agree:

From The Viewpoint of a Potential Future Villager
 

As a potential future Villager who has rented several times, how would someone get a taste of what it is like to be a Villager without renting 1, 2 or even 3 times before buying? Sure there is the Lifestyle program (which I did a few years ago), but I don't know if I would contemplate a 1,200 mile move from the Midwest to The Villages based on one Lifestyle visit.

Outside of the Lifestyle program, how do people in their mid to late 50's and up who are still working full time get to experience The Villages' lifestyle unless they rent for 2 or 3 weeks? Even if someone has worked for the same employer for 30 years, most people in the 55 to 62 age group who work in the private sector are getting at most 6 weeks of vacation, unless they are teachers with more extended summer vacation time.

Sorry for the rant, but as someone who can only rent in The Villages on a short term basis as I still hold a full time job with only so much vacation time, just wanted to get another viewpoint across. Maybe I will be a Villager in a few years based on the great rental experiences I have had in TV.

Could you provide a link to this?

Thanks for the input, Schaumburger. I for one hope you do move here some day; you'd be a wonderful addition to the community.

:bigbow:

The developer have their hands in a lot of businesses, but their primary business is selling homes and they do it very well. To sell homes, they need to have a wide possible pool of potential buyers. Many Villages residents own multiple homes and live in one home and purchase others as investments and rent the others. Other investors just buy homes to rent with the hope of income to cover expenses and price appreciation. While some homeowners can not afford their Villages home unless they rent it out when they are not using it. If rentals were eliminated, a huge pool of potential home buyers would be eliminated. As also noted in this thread, many potential home buyers come here for several years as renters and fall in love with the Villages before finally buying their Villages home. I have no problem with homeowners renting their homes, especially when the rentals are for a minimum of a month or more. The problem I have is with short-term transient rentals (AIRBNB) by homeowners who are living in their homes. These people are effectively running a bed and breakfast business out of their homes, with none of the regulations that real bed and breakfast operators are burdened with. This violates two deed restrictions. First, homes are to be used as single family residential, which does not include renting out a room in your home while living in it. Second, one can not run a home business. When you live in your home and rent out a room (where the income needs to be reported as taxable income), you are running a home business.

The major problem with this (besides what the unfortunate neighbors have to live with), is that it is a difficult deed restriction to enforce. External deed restrictions, like a bunch of pink flamingos or white crosses on the front lawn, are easy to identify and notify the homeowner that they are violating. Internal deed restriction violations occurring inside of a home are much more difficult to identify, verify, and enforce. It requires knocking on doors and getting cooperation from the homeowner and having them admit that they are in violation. So enforcement of internal deed restrictions is the big problem with eliminating AIRBNB operators that are clearly in violation of deed restrictions.

Maybe a "sting" operation by the tax collector would work.

This is not the owner who is advertising it as an AIRBNB. This is the tenant doing it. Renting from the owner is fine but when a tenant is renting it out, not fine.

You are absolutely correct. As a homeowner, you have every right to rent out your home (as long as you are not living in it also). You would be in violation of deed restrictions if you were living in your home and renting out a room, which you are not.

On the other hand, your tenant is violating YOUR DEED RESTRICTION and probably also the RENTAL AGREEMENT that you had them sign. My understanding of the way things work is that as the homeowner of your property, you are responsible for insuring that your property is in compliance with the deed restrictions, not your tenant. Therefore, you need to either evict your tenant or make sure that they stop running a AIRBNB out of your property.