Published
Can you Airbnb a property you rent in NSW?
It is asked far more often than it is answered properly, usually by someone who has already taken the first booking.
Can a tenant put a rented property on Airbnb in NSW?
Not without the landlord's written permission. NSW Fair Trading is explicit: a tenant must get a landlord's written permission to sub-let or transfer any part of the property. For part of the property the landlord cannot refuse unreasonably; for the whole property they can refuse for any reason at all, reasonable or not. And consent from the landlord is only the first of three approvals — the strata by-laws and the STRA registration still apply.
What the tenancy rules actually say
NSW Fair Trading states the requirement plainly: a tenant must get a landlord's written permission to sub-let or transfer any part of the property. Written is the operative word. A landlord who said yes in a phone call remembers it differently when a neighbour complains.
The two halves of the rule are not symmetrical, and this is the part most people get wrong. A landlord cannot unreasonably refuse a request to sub-let part of the property or to add a co-tenant — they can refuse for specific reasons such as overcrowding, exceeding the permitted number of occupants, or a breach of council rules. But for sub-letting the whole property, or transferring the whole tenancy, the landlord can refuse regardless of whether the refusal is reasonable.
Letting a whole apartment nightly on Airbnb is the second kind. The landlord does not have to justify a no.
The two approvals people forget
Permission from the landlord does not make the letting lawful on its own. The strata scheme can have a by-law prohibiting short-term rental accommodation where the lot is not the occupier's principal place of residence, and that by-law binds the property regardless of what the landlord agreed to.
And the property still has to be registered on the NSW STRA Register through the NSW Planning Portal before it is advertised or offered. The obligation attaches to the letting, not to who owns the title.
What usually goes wrong
The common sequence is: tenant lists the apartment, takes bookings for a few months, a neighbour complains to the strata manager, the strata manager writes to the owner, and the owner discovers it from a breach notice. The tenant is then in breach of the tenancy agreement, and the owner may be exposed on the by-law and the registration whether or not they knew.
Insurance is the quieter risk. A standard landlord policy is generally written for a residential tenancy, not for paying guests, and a claim is the wrong moment to discover the difference.
If you are the owner, and a tenant has asked
It can be a reasonable thing to say yes to, with conditions in writing: which parts of the property, a cap on nights, who holds the STRA registration, whose insurance responds, and who is accountable to the strata scheme. Rent-to-rent arrangements do work, and they work when the paperwork is done first.
If the property is going to be let short-term anyway, it is usually worth asking whether it should be let short-term by you rather than by your tenant. That is an arithmetic question, and it is what a rental estimate answers.
This is general information, not legal advice. For a specific tenancy or by-law, talk to a lawyer or to NSW Fair Trading.