Real Estate Broker · Staunton, VA · Member since 2019 · 194 posts · 216 votes
Palm Beach County Airbnb-ers: I checked my Airbnb listings this morning and under "Automatic Tax Collection" I now see "Accommodations Tax (Palm Beach)". Before, it only showed "Sales & Use Tax (Florida)" and "Sales & Use Tax (Palm Beach)".
Obviously we have been responsible for collecting and remitting TDT tax monthly on our gross earnings. I called the TDT office and asked if TDT collection and remittance was now being done by Airbnb because it says this on their platform and they laughed at me.
I chatted Airbnb customer support (since you can no longer get anyone on the phone there), and after a 45 minute conversation still couldn't get a straight answer. Literally, two back to back messages from them read:
Accommodation Tax and Tourism Development Tax is the same.
TDT Tax is not a collected tax by Airbnb.
I'm pulling my hair out and have already thrown my phone across the room. Does anyone have any idea what's going on? I don't want to keep forking over 6% month after month if it's already being collected and remitted by Airbnb.
Rental Property Investor · Boca Raton, FL · Member since 2014 · 104 posts · 55 votes
6y
Hey Chase. You should be able to verify what Airbnb is withholding by checking what the guest is being charged for tax and confirming it's the full 13%. I do know that Airbnb has been collecting it for our units down in Boca but since we do a lot of direct bookings on our site most months we do end up paying on each listing but if you are only using Airbnb you should be fine.
Real Estate Broker · Staunton, VA · Member since 2019 · 194 posts · 216 votes
6y
@Emanuele Pani the TDT office told me "unless Airbnb has your login information, there is no way they would be able to pay TDT taxes on your behalf." Looking at the total taxes collected on the Airbnb gross earnings page they do not add up to 13%, but of course they do not give me any sort of breakdown. I'm waiting on calls back from "supervisors" from both Airbnb and TDT, so we'll see what they have to say.