Key Takeaways

  • A New York town says an Airbnb-listed RV with 10 beds qualifies as a hotel under its zoning code
  • The owner can seek a special use permit, request a zoning variance or replace the RV with a smaller unit
  • The dispute shows how something as simple as bed count can push a short-term rental into an entirely different regulatory category

How many beds does it take before a short-term rental becomes a hotel?

In one small New York town, the answer appears to be 10.

Officials in Herkimer say an RV being rented on Airbnb has enough sleeping capacity to qualify as a hotel under the town’s zoning code, creating an unusual permitting fight over what looks more like a backyard short-term rental than a traditional lodging business.

Herkimer sits in central New York’s Mohawk Valley, about 13 miles east of Utica and roughly halfway between Syracuse and Albany. It’s about a four-hour drive from Manhattan.

According to a Rome Sentinel report, property owner Terri Buckley has been renting an RV on her property and spent months trying to work through the town’s approval process.

The problem isn’t Airbnb. It’s the number of beds

Town Supervisor Dominic Frank said information provided to officials showed the RV had 10 beds.

That detail changed everything.

Under the town’s interpretation of its zoning rules, that sleeping capacity moves the property into the hotel category rather than allowing it to operate under a less intensive lodging use.

Town Attorney Christopher Bray also pushed back on the idea that the classification could be avoided simply by promising not to fill every available bed. The issue, according to the town, is how many people the property is capable of accommodating.

Buckley now has several options. She can seek a special use permit from the Planning Board, ask the Zoning Board of Appeals for a variance or replace the RV with a smaller unit.

Related: New York coastal town’s short-term rental rewrite draws pushback

It’s a zoning lesson hosts may want to remember

The dispute is hyperlocal, but the lesson isn’t.

Hosts tend to think about occupancy limits as a rule governing how many guests can actually stay in a property. Herkimer’s dispute shows why sleeping capacity itself can matter just as much.

Add enough beds, bedrooms or sleeping spaces and a property can stumble into definitions written for hotels, boarding houses or other lodging businesses, bringing an entirely different set of zoning requirements with it.

Herkimer is already facing another Airbnb zoning question.

A separate owner wants to operate a short-term rental on an agriculturally zoned area, and the town’s codes officer is still determining whether that use is permitted there.

For Buckley, though, the immediate question is simpler. She can either keep the 10-bed RV and fight for approval, or make the rental sleep fewer people so the town no longer considers it a hotel.

We can probably all agree that its hard to compare an RV (regardless of bed size) to a hotel in any way.

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