Texas inked an agreement with short-term rental giant Airbnb that required the company to pay a 6 percent state hotel tax starting on May 1 last year.
Well, now that we've been once around the sun and had SXSW and numerous other events that make Texas a destination for global travelers, how much in hotel tax are we talking about?
Airbnb said Wednesday it has delivered more than $15.3 million in home sharing and short-term rental tax revenue on behalf of Texas homeowners who rent out a bedroom or their entire place. That's a lot more than the $8 million Airbnb projected a year ago.
Airbnb hosts in Texas had more than 1.5 million guests last year, the company says. Overall, Airbnb says it has partnered with 370-plus local governments throughout the U.S. to collect taxes.
“The sharing economy is a key component to the dynamic and evolving Texas economy,” Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar said in a news release.
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Austin-based HomeAway, which is owned by Expedia, doesn't appear to have such an agreement with the state. A list of cities where HomeAway collects and remits taxes shows it has agreements in Paris, France; Washington, D.C.; Los Angeles; Portland; and a few other jurisdictions.
Airbnb’s tax news comes as Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and the Texas Public Policy Foundation are locked in a court battle with the City of Austin over a 2016 law. Approved by city council members and opposed by HomeAway, the Austin law phases out Type 2 rentals where the owner doesn’t live on site but mostly rents the home out to short-term renters. A Travis County court ruled in favor of Austin's law, but Paxton and the policy foundation have appealed.
Meanwhile, Texas lawmakers will likely address the issue and vote on a new law that could overrule local short-term rental laws in Austin and other cities. The Texas Tribune published an in-depth piece on the issue in April.
