Quote:
Originally Posted by DUFF821
Living next to a STR is very unsettling to say the least. You have no idea who is living next to you and virtual vetting is no way to ensure the safety of your neighbors or your property. While most people are very nice, others are not so nice.
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One of my co-workers who also lived in my neighborhood had three AirBnBs on his street - two across the street and one next door. All three were used more like party houses, many times with 20+ people partying to all hours (and sleeping there as well). At the time our noise ordinance didn't have much in the way of teeth and all the police could do is ask the partyers to quiet down which sometimes drove them to become even noisier.
The town really had little recourse because we had little in the way of town or zoning ordinances to cover such problems. That's why the Gilford changed some existing town ordinances and created its STR ordinance to give the town the ability to deal with chronic problems and unresponsive owners. They also were crafted to require safety inspections - we used the "STRs are actually distributed hotels" argument to require such inspections and to limit occupancy. (Some of this came from the NH Supreme Court case of Working Stiffs LLC v Portsmouth where Portsmouth was regulating STRs just like hotels since they defined them as "distributed hotels".
It took us almost 3 years but it was worth every moment to get something that was palatable to everyone...for the most part.