Lodging tax collection
On September 15, Airbnb stops collecting local lodging tax across most of Alabama. Nine jurisdictions keep it. The rest of the state finds out from a penalty notice.
A collection agreement no destination ever signed, ending on a schedule no destination set
Airbnb’s Alabama occupancy tax page now reads: “Effective September 15th, 2026, Airbnb will only collect the following taxes.” What follows is a list of nine jurisdictions. Everywhere else, the local lodging tax on an Airbnb booking stops being collected by the platform and becomes the host’s personal obligation.
Most of those hosts have never filed a lodging tax return. Many do not know the return exists. They will keep taking bookings at the same nightly rate, unaware that the tax is now coming out of money they have already spent.
Still collected
- Lee County
- Auburn
- Opelika
- Birmingham
- Montgomery
- Mobile
- Tuscaloosa
- Gulf Shores
- Orange Beach
Named on the platform’s page. These destinations are unaffected, by a decision they did not make and cannot renew.
Off the list
- Huntsville
- Madison County
- Decatur
- Morgan County
- Florence
- Lauderdale County
- Cullman
- Guntersville
- Fort Payne
- Scottsboro
- Gadsden
- Athens
- Dothan
- every other self-administered city and county
Why North Alabama carries this
Two details turn a statewide change into a regional problem.
Alabama levies a 5% state lodging rate rather than 4% in sixteen counties: Blount, Cherokee, Colbert, Cullman, DeKalb, Etowah, Franklin, Jackson, Lauderdale, Lawrence, Limestone, Madison, Marion, Marshall, Morgan and Winston. That is, almost exactly, the Mountain Lakes footprint. The counties with the most lodging tax at stake are the counties with the least platform coverage remaining.
And on October 1, Huntsville’s lodging tax rises to 10% plus a $2 per room night surcharge. Two weeks after the collector leaves. A higher rate, no collection mechanism, and a host base that has never filed.
A destination cannot notify hosts it cannot name.
What this is really measuring
The tax change is the visible part. What it tests is whether a destination has a relationship with its short-term rental operators or only a view of them.
Every affected DMO is about to learn the real size of its host list, in public, with a deadline attached. The ones holding email addresses will send a notice this week. The ones holding a dashboard number will send nothing, and book an unexplained lodging revenue variance in the first quarter.
That is the Host Gap with a dollar figure attached. It has been a structural argument for three years. On September 15 it becomes a line item. We have written before about what it costs a destination to let a platform hold the only relationship with its hosts. This is that cost, arriving.
Before September 15
Four things a destination can still do in the time remaining.
- Confirm your status. If your city or county is not among the nine, assume local collection ends. Check the platform’s page directly and screenshot it with the date visible.
- Count who you can actually reach. Not listings. Email addresses you own. The gap between those two numbers is the size of the problem.
- Send a host notice this week. Registration, who administers your lodging tax, how to file, and what to do about bookings already on the books. Plain language, no jargon, sent before the deadline rather than after the penalty.
- Tell your finance office and your board now. A revenue variance explained in advance is a policy change. The same variance explained in January is a failure.
One open question
The platform’s page does not state whether the Alabama state lodging tax and state-administered local taxes continue after the 15th. Alabama obligates accommodations intermediaries on state-administered taxes, so in all likelihood they do. We have not confirmed it and are not asserting it.
Confirm with the Department of Revenue’s Sales and Use Tax Division before you brief anyone. Ask three things: whether state and ONE SPOT local collection continues, whether the department was notified of the change or learned of it from hosts, and what guidance exists for a host registering mid-quarter.
If you need the room
We are briefing Alabama destinations and their hosts this week. Host briefings, board and finance briefings, and host identification work for destinations that need to know who is operating in their market before they can reach them. The brief above is free and stays free. Start a conversation if you need more than a notice.