Category: Fact Checks

After decades of actively allowing short term rentals, in March of 2022 Park Township set revisionist history in motion with a press release aimed at property owners and Realtors.

The press release proclaimed that, “Short Term rentals are currently illegal in Park Township, and have been since the Zoning Ordinance was adopted on February 7, 1974.”

(See have short term rentals always been illegal for more on that assertion.)

Naturally the public believed what the township said in the press release, concluding that short-term rental owners must be lawbreakers, or perhaps assuming the owners did not check the ordinances themselves.

But that is not the case.

The truth is that vacation home owners were told that there were no restrictions or requirements on renting in Park Township.

Claim:

If the issue of short term rentals was on a ballot, then overwhelmingly, the residents of Park Township would vote it down.

Facts:

While there’s no way to know for sure without actually putting short term rentals on the ballot, this claim seems unlikely.

Why do we say that?

It’s simple. The input from residents township-wide strongly suggests otherwise. Multiple recent surveys show that the majority of Park Township residents do not want a short term rental ban.

• 88 of the comments listed in Park Township’s Master Plan survey results related to the short term rental ban, with at least 80 responses directly mentioning short term rentals. 55% were in favor of short term rentals, 19% were neutral or unclear, and only 26% against.

• In an independent, township-wide survey conducted this past summer, 58% of respondents opposed the Board’s decision to ban residential property owners from renting out their property as vacation rentals for short-term stays.

• When the township asked Ottawa Beach neighborhood residents, “Restrict short-term rentals?” 70% said no, do not restrict them.

Claim:

Short term rentals are largely owned by out of state people and corporations.

Facts:

According to data provided to PTN by Park Township through a July 2023 FOIA request, short term rentals are largely owned by Michiganders.

• 41.5% are owned by Park Township residents
• 54% are owned by greater Holland residents
• 68% are owned by West Michigan residents
• 75% are owned by Michigan residents

In other words, over half of the short term rentals in Park Township are owned by hyper-local residents of greater Holland. And 41.5% of the vacation rental owners live directly in Park Township itself. Sometimes right next door to their rental! (Or to someone else’s.)

3 out of 4 vacation rentals here are owned by Michigan families and property owners. This means that Michigan owners are disproportionately and negatively impacted by the township’s decision to create an outright ban rather than enforce reasonable regulations – most of which already exist in the current code.

Claim:

Short term rentals have been illegal in Park Township since 1974. The 1974 ordinance prohibits them in residential zones.

Facts:

There are no mentions of short, medium, or long term rental properties in the zoning ordinances at all.

And there is nothing in the zoning ordinances that says any of those types of rentals are prohibited.

Rentals are simply not mentioned at all.

While we can’t speak for the drafters of the 1974 zoning ordinances, it’s likely this is because the right to rent out one’s home was assumed to be part of the bundle of rights that are granted when someone purchases real estate in the United States.