21, 24 or 28 Days: Where Short-Term Law Stops

Three numbers circulate in host groups as if they were law. Two of them are habit, and the third depends entirely on where the flat is.

Last updated: November 1, 2026

Every host group has a number. Ask how long you can let before a booking turns into something else, and someone will answer with a figure, confidently, and someone else will answer with a different one. Both answers are useful and neither is law. The question worth asking isn't which figure is right. It's what kind of line the figure describes.

Key Takeaways

• A number in a group is a pointer, not a rule. It tells you what hosts in your market are worried about. It tells you nothing about your unit.
• Three kinds of line look identical in a chat. A habit you set, a term you signed, and a rule an authority set. Only the last one is law.
• A contract can be stricter than the law and still be fine. That's a commercial choice, and quoting it as a legal threshold misleads the next host.
• The statutory line is set for a unit and a date. Different authorities, different tests, and a line that moves when the rules move.
• Only a dated written answer counts. Anything else is a recollection, and recollections are what get repeated in groups.

Why three numbers circulate

A group is a bad place to hold a complicated rule and an excellent place to hold a number. Numbers are portable. They fit in one line, they survive being forwarded, and they sound like something an authority decided. When someone asks a genuinely difficult question — when does a long stay stop being a short let — a number is the most satisfying answer available, which is exactly why it spreads.

What doesn't spread is the condition attached to it. Which city. Which kind of unit. Whether the host was present. Whether the figure described a licensing rule, a tax treatment, a tenancy question or a building's own policy. Whether it was true when it was posted. By the third forwarding, the number has outlived all of it.

That's not a reason to ignore the group. It's a decent early-warning system, and it's often how a host first hears that something is changing. As reported in host groups on 19 October 2026, the figures of 21, 24 and 28 days were being repeated as though each one marked the point where short-term letting stopped. Read that as three markets' worth of worry, not as three thresholds.

The reason there are three and not one is partly real and partly an artefact. Real, because different places do treat a long stay differently from a short one, and they don't agree on where the difference starts. An artefact, because hosts also mix up the length they choose to sell with the length something else decides, and the two get repeated as if they were the same claim.

Habit, contract and statute

Sort every number you hear into one of three boxes, and most of the confusion disappears.

Habit is the line you set. A minimum stay of two nights because one-night bookings cost more in cleaning than they return. A maximum of a week because your cleaner only comes on Mondays. A rule that long stays get a mid-stay clean. None of this is law. It binds nobody but you, and you can change it tomorrow, which is the tell: if you can change it without asking anyone, it's habit.

Contract is the line you signed. Your own booking terms. The platform's terms. A lease, a co-host agreement, a building's rules. These bind you because you agreed to them, and they can be stricter than the law without being unlawful. A building that caps stays at a fortnight is making a commercial and practical choice, not announcing a legal threshold, and the difference matters the moment you quote it to someone else.

Statute is the line an authority set. Licences, planning rules, housing rules, tax treatment, registration schemes. This is the only category where getting it wrong has consequences decided by someone other than a guest or a platform. It's also the only category where the answer depends on where the flat is, what kind of unit it is, and how the stay is counted.

The confusion is almost always between the last two. A host reads a term in a contract, repeats it as a rule, and the next host hears a legal threshold that doesn't exist. Nothing in the group is lying. The category just got dropped in transit.

Where the line is actually set

Not in a group, not in a guide, and not in this article. It's set by the authority with jurisdiction over the unit, and there's often more than one: planning, housing, tax and tourism can each have their own test, and they don't have to agree with each other.

The counting is where it gets properly difficult. A rule might count consecutive nights in a single booking, or total nights across a year, or nights per guest, or the number of separate bookings, or something about the nature of the stay rather than its length at all. Two hosts on the same street can be measuring different things and both be right about their own flat.

Then add movement. A rule announced isn't a rule in force. Commencement dates slip. Transitional provisions treat existing listings differently from new ones. Enforcement practice can differ from the text. Any number you learned before those changes is a number about a different situation.

Which leaves one useful question, and it isn't "what's the number". It's "for this unit, on these dates, which authority decides, and what does its current text say". That answer exists. It just doesn't fit in a group post.

Counting the nights you've actually sold is the part you can control, and it's a calendar job rather than a research job. localsbnb.com holds Airbnb, Booking.com, Agoda and Trip.com in one calendar and shows each connected channel's source price and status, so the nights that are booked sit in one view. When an authority asks what you've been selling, a view beats a reconstruction from four dashboards.

What to check before you rely on it

Five checks, in this order.

Which authority. Ask the one that regulates the unit at that address, and ask whether any other body has a separate test. If two authorities are involved, you need two answers.

Which unit. An answer given for a whole flat may not apply to a room in your own home, and it often doesn't apply across a building, a street or a municipal boundary. Give the address, not the neighbourhood.

What's being counted. Nights in one booking, nights in a year, guests, bookings, or the nature of the stay. Ask how the authority counts, and write the wording down as they say it.

From when. The date the rule starts applying, the date it was published, and whether anything changes for bookings already accepted. Three dates, often different.

What you already signed. Read your lease and the building's rules before you accept a long booking, because those can stop you whatever the authority permits.

Then keep the answer. A dated reply from the authority, with a name or a department on it, is the only version that travels. Screenshot the page you relied on along with its date. When a guest, a platform or a neighbour asks, you're quoting a document rather than a group post.

And until the answer arrives, set your own line conservatively. If you don't know where the statutory line sits for your flat, sell shorter stays, or ask before you accept a long one. That's an operating choice, not a legal position, and it's the one that keeps you out of an argument you can't win with a screenshot.

FAQ

Is it against the rules to accept a booking longer than the number in my group?

That's a question for the authority that regulates your unit, and a group post can't answer it. Ask in writing, name the address, and ask how the stay is counted. Until you have that reply, don't price a long stay as though the number in the chat were settled.

Which of the three numbers is the legal one?

None of them is a legal threshold on its own. Each one is a figure someone repeated, and the conditions that made it meaningful — the place, the unit, the kind of rule — got left behind. The legal line, where one exists, is set for your unit and your dates, and it's found by asking rather than by comparing figures.

Do I need a lawyer to work this out?

Not always. A written answer from the competent authority settles most of it, and a local adviser helps when the answer is ambiguous or when two authorities disagree. What doesn't help is a figure you can't trace to a source with a date on it.

Three numbers, three kinds of line, and one answer that counts. localsbnb.com isn't a source of legal advice and doesn't act for you with any authority. It's where the four connected channels sit in one calendar, so the nights you've sold can be counted when someone qualified asks about them.

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This article is general guidance for hosts and isn't legal, tax or insurance advice. Whether a stay of any length is permitted, licensed or treated differently is decided by the authority with jurisdiction over your unit, and the position changes. Nothing here replaces a dated answer from the competent authority or advice from a qualified local professional. Confirm the current rules for your address, and the current terms of each platform you use, before you rely on any figure.