Full-Service Vacation Rental Management in Seattle

Seattle's two licenses and two-unit cap: the rules your operation has to fit

Two licenses, both in your name. Seattle requires short-term rental operators to hold a City of Seattle business license tax certificate and a short-term rental operator license (per-unit, renewed annually) under SMC 6.600. The operator license belongs to the property owner-operator personally: hiring a management company does not transfer it, and it cannot be held in the manager's name instead. Owners who assume a manager "takes care of the license" in their own name are the ones who end up non-compliant. Our setup is built the correct way: the licenses stay yours; we operate under them, display the license number on your listings as the city requires, and track your renewals so nothing lapses mid-season.

The two-unit limit shapes your strategy. In general, a Seattle operator may run at most two dwelling units as short-term rentals, and one of them must be the operator's primary residence (limited exceptions exist for some units that were operating before September 30, 2017). That cap makes each legal unit precious: an underpriced, poorly reviewed unit isn't just leaving money on the table, it's wasting one of only two slots the city allows you. It also means portfolio math is different here — before you buy or convert a second property, the licensing position needs checking first. We verify your unit count and primary-residence position during onboarding and flag any issue before your listing takes a booking.

Compliance is ongoing, not one-time. Seattle's rules sit alongside platform data-sharing and city enforcement: listings must show the operator license number, records must be kept, and renewals come due every year. We keep the operational paper trail — bookings, license display, renewal dates — as part of standard management, so an inquiry from the city is a file we hand over, not a scramble.