Vacation Rental Management in Lincoln City, OR

Lodging and occupancy taxes

A Lincoln City stay is taxed twice, by the state and by the city. The Oregon Department of Revenue administers the state transient lodging tax. Lincoln City levies its own transient room tax, and the city's finance director is the tax administrator: an operator registers with the Finance Department, receives a transient occupancy registration certificate, then files a return and remits by the fifteenth of the month following each calendar quarter. Lincoln County's room tax reaches only the unincorporated county, so it does not apply inside city limits. Outside them it replaces the city's tax: the Lincoln County Treasurer collects 12% on stays under 30 days, filed quarterly.

Registering your rental

Short-term rentals are permitted in Lincoln City, and inside the city limits approval runs in two steps. Land use approval comes first, from Planning & Community Development. The annual short-term rental operating license follows, issued in the owner's name and tied to one of four quarterly renewal dates the planning director assigns; renewal turns on current room-tax filings, a reviewed complaint log, and an inspection within the last three years. A licensee also holds a business occupation tax permit, with no second application fee. Approval is not transferable and ends when the property is sold, so a buyer applies as a new applicant rather than inheriting a license.

Outside the city limits

Some homes with a Lincoln City address sit outside the city limits in unincorporated Lincoln County, Lincoln Beach among them, and the city's zoning, license and room tax do not reach them. Short-term rentals are legal there under a license from the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office, which caps licenses in each of seven regions and keeps a waitlist for every region that is full; the Sheriff's Office publishes how many remain. Our Waldport page explains the county program in more detail.

Local rules that affect operating

Zoning decides eligibility. Short-term rentals are allowed with no limit on how many along the Highway 101 commercial frontage that runs most of the length of the city (General Commercial), on the oceanfront resort land around Chinook Winds between NW 39th and NW 50th Streets (Recreation Commercial), in Oceanlake from NW 21st Street south past the D River, in Nelscott, in Taft Village where Highway 101 meets Siletz Bay, and in the Vacation Rental zone, the neighborhood around SW Anemone and SW Barnacle Avenues just south of SW Bard Road. Two residential areas allow them under council-set caps: 194 in the single-family neighborhoods zoned R1-5, mainly the grid west of Highway 101 from NW 21st to NW 39th Street, most of the SW Coast Avenue oceanfront, and Cutler City; and 91 in Roads End, the beach neighborhood from NW 50th Street to the north city limit (R1-RE). Both caps are currently full, so no new license issues in either until an existing one is given up; a complete application is date- and time-stamped, and the oldest in line is approved when one opens. An owner may hold only one residential-zone short-term rental. Every licensed home provides one off-street parking space per bedroom and at least two, posts an occupancy limit of three per bedroom plus one and never more than sixteen, and names a local representative reachable during and after business hours.

How Fairly handles it

Fairly is that local representative. The code recognizes a management office staffed inside the urban growth boundary, and your caretaker lives nearby. We collect and remit the state lodging tax and the city or county tax on every booking, and assist with the fire and life-safety inspection and each quarterly renewal.