Madeleine Ross
·4 min read
Are you a Scottish short-term let owner affected by the licensing scheme? Email money@telegraph.co.uk.
A crackdown on short-term lets in Edinburgh has led to the “exponential growth” of a black market for Fringe accommodation.
The cost of accommodation during the festival has traditionally been much higher than at other times of the year, with comedians including Jason Manford expressing concern that prices were an “absolute joke”.
Spare rooms are being rented for more than £100 a night on social media, and the average Airbnb booking in the Scottish capital during the festival stands at £281, according to Edinburgh Live.
But a scheme for short-term lets introduced last October means anyone who wants to take bookings and receive guests now needs a licence, and includes self-catered accommodation and B&Bs. This presents an additional barrier to those just looking to rent out a spare room.
Since the scheme launched last year, the City of Edinburgh Council has granted just 168 temporary exemptions for these sorts of lettings, which last up to six weeks, according to the Association of Scotland’s Self-Caterers (ASSC).
In 2023, nearly 2.5 million tickets were sold during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, which takes place between August 2 and August 26, with hundreds of thousands of visitors travelling to the city to see new and established comedians, musicians and other performers.
Comedian Jason Manford wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that: “Edinburgh Festival prices especially for accommodation are an absolute joke! No idea how anyone starting out is managing to get up there and showcase their talents.”
One Facebook group, which has more than 10,000 members, features spare rooms for £100 a night, alongside three-bedroom houses for £250 a night. Many of the posts advertising rooms do not state whether the owner has a licence.
For those who rent out properties which aren’t their main home, the picture is even more difficult. There have been 290 full secondary letting licences granted since the start of the scheme.
Paul Phillips, who owns a short-term let in central Edinburgh, said that he’s seen an increase in the number of unlicensed rooms being offered on social media sites as visitors flock to the city for the Fringe.
He said: “It [the black market] has grown, it’s grown exponentially, and the more that people shut down, the less available accommodation will be and the more and more will go to the black market.”
Mr Phillips said that he has been waiting for more than ten months for a licence to be granted. He said he has been told by Edinburgh Council that he must get planning permission for his property.
He said: “If I was unscrupulous, I would pull the plug on what I am doing. Forget about paying the licensing fees, and the planning fees, I also pay quite a lot of non-domestic rates as well. Just stop all of that and go into the black market like everybody else.”
Fiona Campbell, chief executive of the ASSC, said: “What is unfolding in Edinburgh is an all too predictable mess, one which could have been avoided if the conflation of licensing and planning regimes had been suitably dealt with.
She said: “While legitimate professional businesses are threatened with closure, the capital is awash with unlicensed properties in a flourishing black market.”
The short-term let licences are granted by local authorities, which are allowed to set their own pricing for the permissions.
The average application fee for a three-year licence varies from around £260 for a double room up to £520 for a short-term rental house with a maximum occupancy of 10, according to official government figures.
Some local authorities have made their regions “control areas”, meaning that planning permission can be required before a licence is granted.
The City of Edinburgh has designated its whole area as requiring planning permission since September 2022, whereas the Highland Council has implemented a control area covering Badenoch and Strathspey.
Councillor Neil Ross, of the City of Edinburgh Council, said that regulating short-term accommodation was important to ensure properties are safe, and urged anyone with evidence of unlicensed rooms to contact the council.
A consultation by the council into how the licensing scheme is working in the city closes on October 14 this year.
Councillor Ross added: “We’re currently asking residents, the industry and anyone else with an interest in short-term lets in Edinburgh to give us their views on how the licensing scheme is working in the city. This will help us to better understand how people are finding its regulation to help us inform any future decision making.”
