Space & Treasure Coast property management — Airbnb, short-term & long-term rentals

Cocoa Beach and Fort Pierce regulate vacation rentals with registration programs. Cocoa Beach requires city registration, annual renewal, an inspection after each renewal and an occupancy cap of two per bedroom plus two or eight in total, whichever is less. Fort Pierce requires an annual rental unit registration from the city clerk, a named manager who answers calls within one hour and listings that show the registration number, occupancy and parking.

Daytona Beach, Ormond Beach, New Smyrna Beach and Vero Beach use zoning instead. Daytona Beach permits rentals to transient persons for less than six months by right only in its Tourist and certain redevelopment districts, and Ormond Beach prohibits transient lodging in every residential district. New Smyrna Beach allows stays under 30 days only in districts it lists by name, and Vero Beach lists transient quarters only in certain commercial districts, Downtown and the Cardinal Drive/Ocean Drive overlay.

In Melbourne and Stuart we did not find a local vacation rental ordinance, so the Florida DBPR license and the state and county taxes are the baseline, with HOA and condo covenants deciding the rest.

Every rental of six months or less owes Florida’s 6% sales tax under §212.03, plus any county discretionary sales surtax. On top of that, the Department of Revenue’s DR-15TDT chart lists Volusia County at 6% and Brevard, Indian River, Martin and St. Lucie counties at 5% each, and all five collect their local tax themselves rather than through the state.

Volusia’s 6% is made up of a 3% tourist development tax and a 3% convention development tax. Indian River’s tax is filed with the Clerk of Court; Brevard, Martin and St. Lucie owners register with the county.

Daytona International Speedway’s 2027 calendar runs from the Rolex 24 At DAYTONA in late January and the DAYTONA 500 on February 21 to Bike Week At DAYTONA in March and the Coke Zero Sugar 400 in late August. Port Canaveral is home to seven cruise lines, and Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex on Merritt Island sells launch-viewing tickets.

Further south, the draws are slower: Ocean Drive and the museums in Vero Beach, the Navy UDT-SEAL Museum and Fort Pierce Inlet State Park on North Hutchinson Island, and boating on the St. Lucie River in Stuart. Universities and hospitals, from Embry-Riddle in Daytona Beach to Florida Tech in Melbourne, add visitors, some of whom need furnished stays of a month or more.