Travelers looking for South Beach accommodations for more than a week often enjoy the cost savings associated with extended stay facilities. Two types of arrangements are available for an aparthotel in Miami Beach: licensed operators and unlicensed operators. Dealing with a licensed operator provides a number of protections for travelers, while dealing with unlicensed operators has many disadvantages.
An extended stay properties or aparthotel in Miami Beach offered by unlicensed operators may be structurally unsafe. Unlicensed facilities are not regularly inspected by the local health and fire departments. These buildings also have no requirements to meet handicapped accessibility rules, have marked fire escape routes or adhere to public lodging building codes.
South Beach accommodations run by unlicensed operators must pay all applicable taxes directly to the state, county and city. If the operators fail to pay all of the required taxes, they are considered to be evading taxation, which is a criminal offense. Operators who skirt tax laws are often under the radar of regulating authorities and at any point in time and could be banned from doing short-term rentals. When such bans occur, all current rental agreements and future rental agreements are suspended. Guests who reserved with unlicensed operators run the risk of their rental agreements being voided and losing their down payments.
Local municipalities are fighting hard to stop illegal rentals and are actively monitoring for illegal activities. Neighbors of illegal short-term rentals have complained for years and will alert the authorities when they suspect any illegal activities occurring. Unfortunately, enforcing local laws can come at the expense of unsuspecting travelers who could lose out on their dream Miami getaways due to unscrupulous unlicensed operators.