The Supreme Court has recently found that tenants who let out their St Kilda Apartment through the Airbnb website were in breach of their lease. This meant that the landlord was entitled to issue the tenants with a notice to vacate.
Tenants of residential leases are prohibited from sub-letting the property without the landlord’s consent, which cannot be unreasonably withheld. In this case a short term stay for the whole of the apartment was found to be a lease because the guests had exclusive possession.
If you are a landlord then you may want to insert a condition in your residential lease that the prohibition against subletting is to extend to Airbnb arrangements and other similar ‘licence’ type arrangements. You should also obtain advice if you discover your tenant is listing your property on Airbnb and want to evict them.
If you are a tenant then you need to obtain the landlord’s prior written consent to any Airbnb or similar arrangement.
For more information please contact Clare at Oakhill Lawyers.