How to comply

Registering a short-term rental in Western Australia

Every short-term rental premises in Western Australia, hosted or non-hosted, must be on the state STRA Register. It costs $250 to register and $100 a year to renew, and operating or advertising unregistered premises carries fines up to $20,000 per offence. In the 30 Perth metropolitan councils, registration is only half the job: un-hosted letting beyond 90 nights also needs development approval from your council.

Last verified 2026-07-25 against official sources. Every figure below links to where it comes from.

Western Australia is the jurisdiction where hosts most often believe they are compliant and are not, because there are two separate obligations administered by two different bodies. The register is run by the state. The planning approval is run by your council. Being on one does not satisfy the other, and since 1 January 2026 the register has been checking.

The timeline, corrected

This sequence is worth setting out properly because it is widely reported wrongly, including by both competing short-stay databases we have checked.

The register opened for registrations on 1 July 2024, with early registrants getting twelve months free. Registration became mandatory from 1 January 2025: from that date it is illegal for unregistered premises to be advertised.

The 90-night planning trigger is older than most people think. It was created by the Planning and Development (Local Planning Schemes) Amendment (Short-Term Rental Accommodation) Regulations 2024, published on 18 September 2024 and commencing the day after, so it has applied since September 2024, not since 2026.

What happened on 1 January 2026 was enforcement through the register. From that date an STRA property must demonstrate it meets development approval requirements in order to remain registered, and metropolitan un-hosted properties operating beyond 90 nights a year had to have lodged a development application. Hosts who read the widely-repeated 'from 2026' line were exposed for more than a year before that.

Sources: Planning and Development (Local Planning Schemes) Amendment (STRA) Regulations 2024, SL 2024/194, WA Government, short stay register now open for owners

What it costs and who must register

The initial fee is $250 per premises and the renewal is $100 a year. Both hosted and un-hosted premises must register.

Excluded from the scheme entirely: hotels and motels, serviced apartments, tourist developments, farm stays, and premises falling under the Caravan Parks and Camping Grounds Act 1995 s5(1).

Your registration number must be displayed conspicuously on every advertisement and listing, and booking platforms are required to check Western Australian listings against the register. That is what makes the advertising offences so easy to prove.

The 90-night threshold is not a cap

This distinction is worth real money. Exceeding 90 nights of un-hosted letting in the Perth metropolitan area does not make your business unlawful. It means you need development approval from your local government to continue.

The exemption is measured as 90 nights or fewer, non-consecutive, within a 12-month period running from the date of registration. Not the calendar year. A tracker built around 1 January is measuring the wrong window.

Hosted short-term rental accommodation is exempt from planning approval anywhere in Western Australia and has no night threshold at all.

The metropolitan area is a specific list of 30 local governments, from Armadale and Bayswater through to Wanneroo and Vincent. Councils outside that list, including all of Peel and the regional south west, set their own triggers, and several have gone further than the state default. Augusta-Margaret River confines Holiday Houses to defined coastal settlements and mapped precincts and grants approval for limited renewable terms. Busselton requires development approval for un-hosted letting, initially for twelve months.

Sources: Short-Term Rental Accommodation planning reforms, WA

Your strata by-laws can cancel your registration

Under the Short-Term Rental Accommodation Regulations 2024, a registration application must disclose whether the premises sit in a strata or community titles scheme and whether the scheme by-laws prohibit short-term rental use.

If they do, the Commissioner may suspend or cancel the registration on that ground. State registration does not override your scheme, so check the by-laws before you pay the $250.

Order of operations

Check the scheme by-laws first if the property is strata or community title. A prohibition there ends the exercise.
Decide whether the letting will be hosted or un-hosted. Hosted is exempt from planning approval statewide.
If un-hosted and inside the 30 metropolitan councils, decide honestly whether you will exceed 90 nights in a registration year. If you will, lodge the development application before you get there.
Fit compliant mains-powered smoke alarms. Non-compliant alarms carry a $5,000 fine per contravention under the Regulations.
Register on the STRA Register, pay the $250, and put the registration number in every listing.
Diarise the renewal and the 90-night anniversary from your registration date, not from January.

Common questions

How much does the WA STRA Register cost?

$250 to register a premises initially and $100 a year to renew.

When did the WA 90 night rule actually start?

September 2024. It was created by SL 2024/194, published on 18 September 2024 with the substantive regulations commencing the day after. The 1 January 2026 date that circulates is the deadline for demonstrating development approval compliance to stay on the register, not the start of the rule.

Is the 90 nights counted per calendar year?

No. It is 90 nights or fewer, non-consecutive, within a 12-month period measured from the date of registration.

What happens if I go over 90 nights in Perth?

You need development approval from your local government to keep operating. It is a threshold rather than a prohibition, but operating past it without approval means letting without the planning approval your use now requires.

Do I need to register if I host guests in my own home?

Yes. Hosted premises must be registered even though hosted short-term rental accommodation is exempt from planning approval across Western Australia.

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Plain text

Short Stay Rules, "Registering a short-term rental in Western Australia", last verified 25 July 2026. https://shortstayrules.com/guides/register-stra-wa/

Reference list

Short Stay Rules. (2026). Registering a short-term rental in Western Australia. Last verified 25 July 2026. https://shortstayrules.com/guides/register-stra-wa/

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<a href="https://shortstayrules.com/guides/register-stra-wa/">Registering a short-term rental in Western Australia</a>, Short Stay Rules, last verified 25 July 2026

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