Tourist tax is municipal: France's 2027 national scale keeps the 2026 limits, Paris caps unclassified rentals at EUR 15.93/person/night in 2026 and 2027 (surtaxes included), Barcelona charges EUR 9.50/night for tourist flats since April 2026, Amsterdam 12.5%, Florida 6% sales tax plus county taxes. Airbnb collects-and-remits in agreement-cities; for direct bookings the host is responsible, and on Booking.com or VRBO it depends on the country (in France, platforms that handle payment for non-professional hosts must collect it). This guide covers rates by jurisdiction, OTA collection patterns, the failure modes that get hosts in trouble, and the 5 components of full tax automation.
Sign up free. Set each property's tourist tax as a percentage or a fixed amount, per stay, per night or per guest per night, with children exempt and a cap per person. Direct bookings collect it through Stripe; platform bookings keep the platform's tax as a separate amount.
Start free trialUpdated October 2026: France’s 2027 national scale is published and keeps the 2026 limits (see the 2027 section below), Paris has confirmed an unchanged grid for 2027, Vienna’s rate rose to 5% on 1 July 2026 (8% from 1 July 2027), and Barcelona’s higher Catalan rates apply since 1 April 2026.
Tourist tax used to be an end-of-year cleanup task. In 2025 it became an operational priority across every major European market and a growing set of US destinations. Berlin raised its rate to 7.5% in January 2025 and dropped its exemption for stays of more than 21 nights. Barcelona doubled its regional tax from April 2026. Amsterdam charges 12.5% of the overnight price, and the city plans 16% for 2027. France’s Loi Le Meur (November 2024) made a registration number compulsory for every furnished tourist rental, through a national online service now planned for the fourth quarter of 2026 (until then, in communes that run their own procedure), with fines for non-registration. Italy’s CIN regime, mandatory since January 2025, fines €800-€8,000 for operating without the code and €500-€5,000 for not displaying it. The host who treated tourist tax as something to figure out later is now exposed across multiple jurisdictions at once.
The mechanics are the same everywhere: know the rate per property, calculate per booking, collect at the right moment, file on the city’s schedule, retain records for the audit window. The complication is that all five steps vary by city and by OTA. This guide covers the 2026 rates in the cities most vacation rental hosts operate in, France’s 2027 scale, the three OTA collection patterns to know (Airbnb collects-and-remits, host collects-and-remits, OTA includes-in-displayed-rate), and what end-to-end automation looks like.
Tourist tax (taxe de séjour in France, imposta di soggiorno in Italy, impuesto sobre estancias turísticas in Spain) is municipal, set by each city or region, not at the national level. The rates vary widely and changed materially in 2025-2026. Rates as published by the cities (confirm the current figure on the municipal portal before configuring it):
For an Amsterdam two-bedroom at €200/night hosting four guests for 5 nights, the 12.5% tax alone is €125 per booking. For a Paris unclassified property at the same price with four adults, the 5% base rate comes to €50 per booking, and about €160 once the 225% surtaxes are added (at €50 per person per night, the €15.93 cap does not apply). Across 50 bookings a year, that is about €6,000 to €8,000 in tax per property, a real line item that has to be calculated, collected, and remitted accurately.
The scale of automated collection is significant: Airbnb remitted €210M in taxe de séjour to 26,000+ French municipalities in 2025, per Airbnb’s own newsroom announcements.
The national scale for 2027 is published (DGCL, barème applicable pour 2027). Its limits are revalued every year by the inflation of the year before last (consumer prices excluding tobacco, +0.9% in 2025) and rounded to ten cents, so the 2027 figures are the same as in 2026. Per person per night, before additional taxes:
For an unclassified rental, the price per person is the nightly price divided by all occupants, minors included, and only the guests who are not exempt pay. The commune’s share is capped first, then the additional taxes are added on top: 10% where the département has voted it; in Île-de-France, 15% (Société des grands projets, since 2019) and 200% (Île-de-France Mobilités, since 1 January 2024); and 34% for high-speed rail projects in Bouches-du-Rhône, Var and Alpes-Maritimes (since 2023) and in 14 départements of the South-West and Occitanie (since 2024). Paris charges the maximum, €15.93 per person per night with all additional taxes, for palaces and as the cap for unclassified rentals, and has confirmed the same grid for 2027. A star rating moves a rental from the percentage to a fixed rate.
Exempt by law (CGCT article L2333-31): minors, holders of a seasonal work contract employed in the commune, people in emergency accommodation or temporary rehousing and, where the council has set a rent threshold, occupants paying less than it. Guests domiciled in the commune do not pay it either.
Who collects: the platform must collect it when it handles the payment for a non-professional host, and pays it over twice a year (by 30 June and 31 December); otherwise, and on every direct booking, the host collects it before the guest leaves and pays it to the commune. Communes had to vote their 2027 rates before 1 July 2026 (a decision taken later applies from 2028), and every commune’s rates are published on impots.gouv.fr before 15 October. The rate due is the one in force on the dates of the stay, not on the booking date: a January 2027 stay booked in October 2026 owes the 2027 rate.
A critical detail many hosts miss: who collects the tax depends on the city and the OTA. Three patterns:
In many EU cities (Paris, Barcelona, Lisbon, Vienna, dozens of others) Airbnb collects tourist tax automatically from the guest at booking and remits it directly to the city. The host doesn’t see the money and doesn’t have to file. This is the simplest case, but only applies to Airbnb bookings in cities where Airbnb has a tax-collection agreement.
In cities where Airbnb has no tax-collection agreement, for direct bookings, and on Booking.com or VRBO wherever the platform does not collect, the host is responsible for collecting the tax from the guest and remitting it to the authority. In France, platforms that handle payment on behalf of non-professional hosts are legally required to collect and remit taxe de séjour (article L.2333-34 of the CGCT). Booking.com does so, although how it classifies hosts has been disputed, so check your payout statements rather than assume. This is where most compliance failures happen.
Some OTAs (notably Booking.com in some markets) let hosts include the tax in the displayed rate as “taxes and fees included.” The collection still flows through the host’s bank account and the host still files. Only the display changes.
Three failure modes that show up in regulator publications:
Charging guests less than the rate set by the city. Common when hosts use round numbers (EUR 2 per guest per night when the actual rate is EUR 2.31). The shortfall is the host’s liability, back-taxes plus interest plus fines.
Not collecting at all. Many hosts assume Airbnb handles everything everywhere and don’t realize that direct bookings, and platform bookings the platform does not collect on, are their responsibility. French law (CGCT) provides fines for failing to collect or remit taxe de séjour, on top of back-taxes. In Italy, operating without a CIN (Codice Identificativo Nazionale) under Decreto-Legge 145/2023 is a fine of €800-€8,000; not displaying it is €500-€5,000.
The tax rate depends on the property’s classification (number of stars, hotel-equivalent rating). Hosts who self-classify too low pay the deficit when audited.
For one property in one city, this is manageable. For 10 properties across 3 cities, the spreadsheet gets messy, the rates change, and audit risk compounds.
The default. Free. Manual. Error-prone above 1-2 properties.
Most full PMS include some form of tax calculation. The depth varies widely, verify whether the system supports per-property rates, multiple calculation modes (per night vs per guest vs percentage), and exemptions (under-18 guests, long-stay reductions). Direct bookings need automatic tax collection at the booking step.
Specialist tax-filing services handle calculating, collecting, and filing tourist tax across jurisdictions. Cost: USD 30-100/property/month. Useful for portfolios across multiple jurisdictions.
Some hosts outsource tax filing to a local accountant who handles 10+ vacation rental clients. Cost: EUR 100-300/property/year. Solid for compliance, weak on real-time collection.
Free, automatic for the cities where Airbnb has agreements. Doesn’t help with Booking.com, VRBO, or direct bookings. Doesn’t help in cities without agreements.
A reliable target combines these properties:
In Nowistay, taxes are set per property under Integrations, Direct Booking, Taxes. Each tax has a “Calculation” (“Percentage (%)” or “Fixed amount”) and an “Applies” setting (“Per stay”, “Per night” or “Per guest per night”), and the “City tax” category marks it as tourist tax. A per-guest tax can be “Children exempt” (guests under the age you set, 18 by default); a percentage per guest per night accepts a “Cap per person per night” and splits the nightly price between all guests, children included, as French rules require for unclassified rentals; “Max. taxed nights (optional)” covers cities that only tax the first nights. For an unclassified Paris rental in 2027, that is one city tax of 16.25% (5% plus 225% of additional taxes) per guest per night, children exempt, capped at €15.93. On a direct booking the tax is added to what the guest pays through Stripe and shows on the invoice as its own line, outside the VAT base, and bookings you create by hand get it pre-filled from the same settings. On platform bookings, the tourist tax the platform reports is stored as a separate amount on each booking, and the bookings CSV export lists it with the dates, adults, children and channel; your payout statements still tell you whether the platform paid it over. A tax setting has no start date, so update it when your commune’s rate changes. Take last quarter’s bookings, sort them by channel and mark who collected the tax on each one: the platform, according to its payout statement, or you. Every stay where neither did is a shortfall you remain liable for, even though the guest never paid it. Then compare the rate you apply with the one on the municipal portal, because a rounded EUR 2 charged against an actual EUR 2.31 is exactly the under-collection described above.
Register your property with the local mairie (mairie de Paris, etc.). Get the tax classification confirmed (gîte, meublé de tourisme classé, etc.). Set up automatic calculation per night per guest. File on your commune’s schedule (monthly in Paris) and keep your records.
Register with the local SUAP (Sportello Unico). Confirm imposta di soggiorno rate with the municipality. Track per-booking collection. File quarterly via the comune portal. Keep records 5 years.
Register your activity with Hacienda. Apply for the regional tourism license (CAT in Catalonia, VFT in Andalusia, etc.). Set up the impuesto sobre estancias turísticas calculation. File quarterly.
Most states require sales tax registration. Many counties add a transient occupancy tax (TOT) or bed tax. Florida, Hawaii, and California have specific vacation-rental rules. File monthly or quarterly depending on volume.
Three scenarios where outsourcing tax compliance is worth the cost:
Sign up free. Every booking keeps its tourist tax as a separate amount, and the bookings CSV export lists it with dates, guests and channel for your filing. EUR 12 (USD 15) per property per month after your free first month.
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Over 25 years of experience in real estate investing and a recognized expert in short-term rental automation. Bassel helps property managers increase revenue, cut operating costs, and deliver 5-star guest experiences using AI-powered tools he built from firsthand hosting experience.
