Regulated by San Luis Obispo County (unincorporated). Los Osos is unincorporated but has its own community rule: vacation rentals are capped at 50 across the community, with a 500-foot buffer between them. A residential vacation rental may only be established in an existing single-family dwelling — not in a multi-family structure and not in a mobile home.
9% county Transient Occupancy Tax plus 1.5% Tourism Marketing District, and a further 2% Tourism Business Improvement District in some areas.
Worth knowing: a stay of 31 nights or longer is not a short-term rental, so permit caps and freezes do not reach it. We do not take on 31+ night rentals yet — that is licensed activity in California and we will offer it when ours issues. We would still rather you knew the option exists, so ask and we will point you the right way.
In Los Osos an existing permit is genuinely valuable — it cannot currently be replaced, so the job is running it well and never missing a renewal. Your permit stays in your name either way. How switching works.
Fifty permits for the whole community means a new one is genuinely hard to come by — but if you already hold one, or you are not sure which category your property falls into, that is worth a conversation. We would rather look at it with you than guess from a distance.
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Permit rules and tax rates change. Confirm current requirements with San Luis Obispo County (unincorporated).