Why South West WA Airbnb hosts need to act now — not later

Perth metro hosts get a 90-night exemption — you can rent your property for up to 90 nights a year without development approval. That exemption does not exist in Busselton, Dunsborough, Margaret River, Prevelly, Gracetown, Cowaramup, Augusta or any suburb in the City of Busselton or Shire of Augusta Margaret River.

In the South West, every single unhosted short-term rental requires development approval — regardless of whether you rent for one week or fifty weeks a year. This has been the rule in Busselton for over a decade. It is not new. It has simply become harder to ignore now that the state register feeds booking data directly to councils.

The retrospective penalty is the minimum downside. The real risk is that a retrospective application — lodged after you have already been operating without approval — is harder to get through. If complaints have been made about your property, if you are in a non-preferred area, or if the council is taking a harder line, your application may be refused.

A refused application means you cannot operate at all. Your listing is removed from Airbnb, Stayz and every other platform. You pay the penalty fee and you still lose the income.

The City of Busselton is finalising a Special Control Area — an Unhosted Short-Term Rental Accommodation Exclusion Area — that will permanently prohibit new STRA approvals in certain parts of Busselton, Dunsborough and Vasse.

In Margaret River, bushfire zone classifications determine whether approval is even possible. Properties in BAL-40 or Flame Zone areas face a presumption against approval. If your property falls in one of these zones, getting an application in before the policy tightens further is critical.

The Shire of AMR has twice defended its policies before the State Administrative Tribunal. These are not soft guidelines — they are actively enforced planning instruments with real consequences for non-compliance.

Since January 2025, every booking made on Airbnb, Stayz, Vrbo and Booking.com is reported to the WA government on a daily basis. The state STRA register collects the property address, the dates booked, the total nights, and the registration status of the property.

Busselton and Margaret River councils can request this data to identify properties operating in their area without development approval. They have a list of every approved property. They can cross-reference. The properties that are active on Airbnb but have no DA on record stand out clearly.

This is not a hypothetical future risk. The data infrastructure is live. Councils have the tools. The question is how aggressively they use them — and that will only increase as the regulatory framework matures.

The WA registration and approval requirements apply to every short-term rental booking platform — not just Airbnb. If you are listed on any of the following, the same rules apply and the same data is being reported to the government.

If you manage direct bookings through your own website or via email, those nights must be manually entered into the STRA register. The platform-reported data plus your manual entries gives the government a complete picture of how many nights your property has been booked.

From 2026, properties are required to demonstrate they meet development approval requirements in order to remain registered on the state STRA register. Without a valid state registration, it is illegal to advertise or take bookings on any platform. The chain is: missing DA → state registration cancelled → delisted from Airbnb, Stayz, Vrbo and Booking.com. Your income disappears across all platforms at once.

Unlike Perth metro where approvals tend to be ongoing once granted, both Busselton and Margaret River issue approvals for a limited period — initially 24 months in Busselton and one year in Margaret River — that must be actively renewed.

In Margaret River, the policy is explicit: if complaints have been received during the approval period, renewal may be refused. One neighbour complaint during your approval period goes on your record and follows you into every renewal application.

This makes a strong management plan — covering noise, parking, guest conduct, waste and emergency procedures — more than a paperwork exercise. It is the document that shows the council you are operating responsibly. A well-prepared management plan reduces the likelihood of complaints and strengthens your renewal position.

Urban Approval Group prepares management plans as part of every application. We do not treat it as a box-ticking exercise — we write it to actually do its job.