| Two separate tests | Whether the local rules allow the rental term, and whether the counted rent supports the loan |
| Purchase, in the modeled rules | Qualified on the appraiser's market rent, not on nightly projections |
| Refinance | The lower of market rent and a verified twelve-month average |
| Program limits | Short-term rental loans cap at $1,500,000 and the ratio must be at least 1.00 |
| Florida preemption | Local regulation of duration and frequency is preempted, with ordinances adopted on or before June 1, 2011 grandfathered |
| Insurance | Citizens generally will not write a short-term rental as personal residential multiperil coverage |
Short answer: a short-term rental deal has to pass two tests that have nothing to do with each other. The first is legal: whether the jurisdiction the property actually sits in allows the rental term you are planning. The second is financial: whether the rent a lender will count supports the loan. A property can be perfectly legal and still fail the ratio, and a property with excellent nightly revenue can be an unlawful use. Neither test rescues the other.
The second point catches more investors than the first. In the rules modeled in Stonehaven's calculator, a short-term rental is qualified on market rent on a purchase, not on your projected nightly income. A strong pro forma does not raise the number.
The legal test around Tampa Bay
Florida is unusual here, and the detail matters because the rules differ block to block.
The state preemption, and what it leaves to cities
Florida law preempts local governments from regulating the duration or frequency of vacation rentals, but it grandfathers local ordinances adopted on or before June 1, 2011. That is Fla. Stat. 509.032(7), and it has not changed since 2016. A 2024 bill that would have rewritten the framework was vetoed and never took effect.
The practical result is a patchwork. Cities with a pre-June 2011 ordinance can still enforce duration rules. Cities without one generally cannot, and regulate through zoning definitions instead.
The state licence, and a 2025 change to the definition
A property rented out often enough is a vacation rental requiring a licence from the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation. The statutory definition was rewritten by Senate Bill 606, chapter 2025-113, effective July 1, 2025, and now turns on renting more than three times in a calendar year for periods of less than 30 consecutive days. Older published guidance, including some of the department's own materials, still uses the previous phrasing. If you are relying on a definition you read somewhere, check its date.
City of Tampa
Tampa has no vacation rental ordinance. It regulates through its zoning definition of a dwelling unit, which contemplates occupancy on a weekly or longer basis, and it repealed its rental registration requirement effective May 4, 2023. That combination is easy to misread in both directions. There is no registration to obtain, and there is also no ordinance granting permission. The zoning definition is the constraint, and it should be checked against the specific parcel and district before you rely on a nightly-rental model.
City of St. Petersburg
St. Petersburg does have a duration rule, at Land Development Regulations section 16.90.020.3. Rentals of a term less than monthly are limited to more than three times in any consecutive 365-day period, and the city takes the position that its ordinance is grandfathered under the June 1, 2011 date in the state preemption. An investor planning true nightly turnover in St. Petersburg needs to understand this rule before making an offer, not after.
Unincorporated Pinellas County
Pinellas County adopted a Short Term Rental Certificate of Use program by Ordinance 25-9 on March 25, 2025. This is recent, it applies in the unincorporated county rather than in the cities, and it is exactly the kind of change that older investor guidance has not caught up with.
The practical instruction: confirm the parcel's actual jurisdiction first. Tampa Bay is not a regulatory unit. Tampa, St. Petersburg, unincorporated Hillsborough, unincorporated Pinellas, Clearwater and the beach municipalities each answer this question differently.
The financial test, which is where most deals break
In the rules Stonehaven's calculator models, a one-to-four unit short-term rental qualifies on the appraiser's market rent on a purchase. Nightly-rate projections do not enter the formula. On a refinance, the qualifying figure is the lower of market rent and the verified twelve-month average from a third-party management provider.
Read that carefully. Verified short-term revenue can pull the qualifying number down if it is weak, but it cannot lift the number above market rent. That is a deliberate conservatism in this program, and it means a property whose entire investment case rests on nightly income being far above long-term rent will not qualify on that basis here.
Two program limits ride along in this rule set: short-term rental loans cap at $1,500,000, and the ratio must be at least 1.00, with no-ratio treatment unavailable.
Other lenders treat this differently. Some short-term rental programs do credit documented platform revenue above market rent, often with a haircut. This is one of the clearest examples of a place where program rules genuinely diverge, and it is a reason to have the conversation before you pay for an appraisal. What is described here is the model in our calculator, not an industry standard.
A hypothetical worked example
Assumptions, all hypothetical: a single-unit short-term rental in the Tampa Bay area, purchase, price and value $420,000, market rent from the appraiser's rent schedule $2,700 a month, a verified twelve-month short-term average of $4,100 a month, real-estate taxes $525 a month, hazard insurance $290 a month, no association dues. Illustrative rate of 7.25 percent, 30-year fixed, which is not a quote and not available.
Swipe the table to see all columns.
| Structure | Loan | LTV | Qualifying rent | PITIA | DSCR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| As proposed | $315,000 | 75% | $2,700.00 | $2,963.86 | 0.91x, below the 1.00 floor |
| Same loan, 10-year interest-only | $315,000 | 75% | $2,700.00 | $2,718.13 | 0.99x, still short |
| Lower leverage | $273,000 | 65% | $2,700.00 | $2,677.34 | 1.01x |
| Lower still | $252,000 | 60% | $2,700.00 | $2,534.08 | 1.07x |
The $4,100 verified average never appears in the arithmetic. On a purchase the program uses market rent, and on a refinance it would use the lower of the two, which is still $2,700.
Note the second row. Interest-only lifts the ratio by about 0.08 and still does not clear 1.00, so the structure alone does not solve it. Clearing the floor here takes real equity. Whether that is a good use of $147,000 rather than $105,000 of cash is an investment question, not a mortgage question. More options are in what to do when the DSCR comes in short.
Florida costs that move the denominator
Property taxes reset when you buy
Florida caps annual assessment increases on non-homestead residential property of nine units or fewer at 10 percent, for all levies other than school district levies, under Article VII, section 4 of the state constitution and Fla. Stat. 193.1554.
But the cap does not travel with the property. On a change of ownership or control, the property is reassessed at just value as of January 1 of the following year. You do not inherit the seller's accumulated savings, which means the seller's current tax bill can badly understate your year-two expense. Underwrite forward.
There is also an affirmative duty most buyers have never heard of. Under Fla. Stat. 193.1556, an owner must promptly notify the property appraiser of a change of ownership or control. A recorded deed does this. An unrecorded transfer, including a transfer of more than half the membership interests in an owning LLC, does not, and the penalty for failing to notify is the taxes avoided plus interest and a 50 percent penalty.
One item to watch rather than rely on: a constitutional amendment on the November 2026 ballot would reduce that 10 percent cap to 5 percent effective January 1, 2027. It is not law today, and the statutes still read 10 percent.
Insurance, and a specific problem for short-term rentals
Insurance is a large share of Florida PITIA and it has to be quoted rather than assumed. The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation publishes county average homeowners premiums in its semi-annual property insurance stability report, dated July 1, 2026, which reports an average of $3,525 for Hillsborough County on data as of March 31, 2026. Treat that as context, not as your number: it reflects traditional homeowners policies including wind, and a short-term rental is a different policy form on a different risk.
The more important point is availability. Citizens Property Insurance generally does not cover short-term rentals. Citizens' own guidance, last updated February 25, 2026, states that a property is ineligible for its personal residential multiperil coverage if it is rented to guests more than three times in a calendar year for periods of less than 30 days or one calendar month, whichever is less, or if it is advertised or held out to the public as a place regularly rented to guests. A wind-only policy may still be possible in eligible areas, which leaves the owner to source everything else separately.
That matters for financing, not just for operations. If a lender requires full perils coverage and the state-backed insurer of last resort will not write the risk as a short-term rental, the coverage has to come from the private or surplus lines market. Get that quote early. It is a real reason files stall.
Mistakes to watch for
- Treating Tampa Bay as one jurisdiction. The rules differ by city and by unincorporated area.
- Underwriting to nightly projections when the program qualifies on market rent.
- Relying on a definition of vacation rental that predates the July 1, 2025 statutory change.
- Using the seller’s property tax bill, which does not survive the change of ownership.
- Assuming Citizens is the insurance backstop for a short-term rental.
- Buying on the assumption that a use currently operating is a lawful use. Confirm it.
And the largest one: believing a strong ratio cures an unlawful rental use. It does not, and an appraisal or underwriter may flag the intended use.
Frequently asked questions
Can I use my Airbnb income to qualify? It depends on the program. In the rules our calculator models, a purchase qualifies on the appraiser's market rent and a refinance uses the lower of market rent and the verified twelve-month average. Some other lenders credit documented platform revenue differently.
Are short-term rentals legal in Tampa? Tampa has no vacation rental ordinance and repealed rental registration effective May 4, 2023, but its zoning definition of a dwelling unit contemplates weekly or longer occupancy. Verify the specific parcel and district before relying on nightly rentals.
What about St. Petersburg? St. Petersburg limits rentals of a term less than monthly to more than three times in any consecutive 365-day period under its land development regulations, and treats its ordinance as grandfathered under the state preemption's June 1, 2011 date.
Do I need a state licence? A property rented more than three times a year for periods of less than 30 consecutive days generally falls within the state's vacation rental definition, which carries a licensing requirement. Confirm with the Department of Business and Professional Regulation.
Will my taxes go up after closing? Very likely. Florida reassesses at just value following a change of ownership, so the seller's capped assessment does not carry over to you.
Next step
Run the property in the DSCR Program Calculator with the short-term rental property type selected, using the appraiser's market rent rather than your nightly pro forma, then send us the purchase price, the market rent, any verified twelve-month history, the loan amount you want and the parcel's jurisdiction so we can review both tests together. A deal review comes back from a specialist and does not require a credit pull. Product background is at short-term rental financing.