By Zachery Schmidt
A new bill would limit how Arizonans can use additional dwelling units on their property.
Senate Majority Leader John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills, recently pre-filed Senate Bill 1105, which allows Arizona counties, cities and towns to restrict ADUs from being used for vacation or short-term rentals.
The state legislation seeks to mandate ADUs be used “to ease the housing crunch and not just become hotel rooms for people on vacation,” Kavanaugh told The Center Square.
These new units “should be used for affordable housing and not hotel profits,” he said.
Kavanaugh added he “respects local zoning” rules and doesn’t think single-family zone areas should have short-term rentals “popping up” around them.
Kavanaugh said he voted in 2024 against House Bill 2720, which allowed people to build accessory dwelling units on single-family homes in cities with more than 75,000 residents.
He said the rationale for HB 2720 was to provide “more affordable housing” to Arizonans, but it failed to specify that the new units can be used only for long-term housing and not as hotel rooms.
Kavanaugh said ways to help alleviate the housing problem in Arizona include eliminating “unnecessary regulatory costs,” such as speeding up permit processing and selling additional “state trust land for housing.”
To get home prices down in Arizona, the housing supply needs to increase, Kavanaugh noted.
“ Letting people use accessory dwelling units for short-term vacation rentals doesn’t increase the supply of housing,” he said.
Common Sense Institute Arizona released a report last year saying the state will always have a housing deficit. The report said it takes more than 300 days for new housing projects to finish their permitting, development and final inspection process.
Despite the lack of housing, Kavanaugh is not optimistic his bill will pass.
SB 1105 will “probably fail because a lot of people don’t have a problem with [ADUs] being used for a hotel instead of solving the housing crisis,” according to Kavanaugh.
“But I could be wrong,” he told The Center Square.
Why? How are you harmed if someone wants to rent out a spare room or guest house? Are you president of an HOA that can’t stand people living in a way you don’t like?
Hey Kavanagh, did you ever hear of private property rights? If you want to restrict the use of private property, you should have to compensate owners for illegal seizure. Go straight to hell.
Does this guy just spend his time worrying about dumb things and wasting everyone’s time instead of serious issues? So far its just riding bikes too fast and people who have air bnb businesses. I hope the other Republicans are not so worthless.
Most Republicans are just Democrats in drag; they support cronyism and protectionism for their buddies and don’t want you peasants having the temerity of making a buck without their permission. To hell with them all!
Absolutely not. Is it the homeowner’s property or the State’s? Mr. Kavanagh can stick to removing red tape that interferes with new construction and renovation, and keep his central planning and big gov ideas to himself.
I’m against companies like Zillow flipping houses to drive up prices, but your house and property is YOUR house, your property. If you want to rent it, that should be your business. This is America and that’s called FREEDOM. You can bet if that bill passes, some politicians with money and property will still find a way around it to their advantage.
I have such a building – we don’t rent it out – but if what did.. no plans to do so … what difference does it make? You going to control “roommates” as well ? With your Hand out – where’s mine? Kids (30’s – 40’s) now get a house and room mate out the BR’s to make the high house payments.. want to control that as well? Keep your foot out of your rear door.
I’m all for it, air-bnb not end all cure all
min. month-to-month(so min 30 day lease)
violate with 50% tax(of lease rate)
Sounds entirely like something some special interest is pushing and no one else cares about. Meanwhile Hobbs and Fontes and Mayes run wild.
Just another bill that helps Arizonan that will be vetoed by veto Kate