Airbnb renters may be trying to get around new Vancouver licensing rules

CTV National News: B.C.'s new Airbnb rules Nearly half of all of Vancouver's Airbnb rentals will become invalid as new licensing rules come into effect. Ben Miljure reports.

People renting out their homes on Airbnb in Vancouver must now have a licence to do so.

In April, the city reached a deal with Airbnb requiring all short-term rentals on the site to display a valid business licence number by September 1. Anyone found breaking the bylaw can now be fined up to $1,000 a day.

Airbnb says it removed close to 2,500 listings that didn't comply with the city's bylaw, but it looks like some people are already trying to get around the new rules.

After the deadline, software engineer Jens von Bergmann noticed listings without a licence number could no longer be booked for less than 30 days. He also noticed listings with information other than a valid number in the licence field.

"I took data from Airbnb, the website. I looked at all the listings that they have and I compared that to the city licensing data,” said von Bergmann. "Some people just said 'Oh, I will get a licence at some point,' and just wrote that in the text. Or some people claimed to be exempt. They just wrote ‘exempt’ there."

For one home with exempt written in the licence field, the site allowed for bookings of just one night -- a clear violation of the new bylaws.

People can only list their primary residence as a short-term rental -- but CTV News found people with multiple active listings with the same licence number on each listing.

The new bylaws are intended to increase the city's rental stock by preventing people from renting to tourists instead of locals.

With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Ben Miljure.