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Queensland short-stay letting: no state register, and the councils that made their own

Sergej Sitki · founder of ReceptionGO and host
Published 29 October 2026 · 7 min read

General information, not legal, tax or insurance advice. Check your own case with your council, the ATO or the state revenue office, or an accountant. Rates and dates below were checked on the date shown — recheck the linked official page before you lodge, register or set a price from them.

Queensland has no statewide short-stay register and no night cap. Noosa requires a yearly local-law approval and a 24/7 contact within 20 kilometres. On the Gold Coast the use must be lawful under the City Plan. Brisbane’s permit scheme was reported dropped in May 2026. Confirm that with the council.

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Queensland is where a lot of the country’s holiday beds actually are: the Gold Coast, the Sunshine Coast, the reef, the islands. It is also the large state that did not build a NSW-style register. That is not the same thing as “unregulated”. It means the rule that matters is the one in the planning scheme, the local law, the pool certificate and the body corporate, and those do not match from Noosa to Coolangatta.

Noosa: an approval, not a suggestion

Noosa’s short-stay local law has been in place since February 2022. Short-stay letting is making premises available for less than three consecutive months. It does not include a hotel, a motel, backpacker accommodation, shared-facility accommodation, or home-hosted accommodation — and home-hosted is regulated beside it, not ignored.

You need a lawful planning right before the local-law approval means anything. That right might be a development approval, an accepted-development pathway, existing-use rights from before Noosa Plan 2020, or a superseded-scheme approval in the year after that plan started. The accepted-development path people ask about is narrow: in the Low Density Residential zone, short-stay letting of not more than four times and 60 days in a calendar year. It is not a shire-wide cap, and it is not a free pass to list every weekend.

The approval itself is a one-off application plus an annual renewal. Council’s list of what you attach is practical and strict: a site plan and a floor plan with the maximum people per bedroom; a statement the place will not be a party house; a certifier’s confirmation the building classification allows the use; a current pool safety certificate; a current electrical safety certificate for the smoke alarms; and a contact person who is available all day, every day, within 20 kilometres, and whose job is complaints and guest queries. Fees sit on the council’s applications page and move with the budget. We are not copying a dollar figure that will be stale by the next renewal. Open that page when you apply.

Noosa also rates short-stay properties in their own category. A lawful approval and a residential rates notice are not the same assumption. Ask the rates team which category the property is in once the use is real.

Gold Coast and Brisbane

Gold Coast

The City of Gold Coast points operators to the Planning Regulation definition: premises used to provide accommodation of less than three consecutive months to tourists or travellers. Its compliance page separates that use from a home-based bed and breakfast and from a party house, and it publishes a fact sheet for short-term accommodation in dwellings. The fact sheet is the document to read for a house at Burleigh or a duplex at Merrimac. A high-rise that was approved as tourist accommodation is a different file from a dwelling that was approved as a home. Letting the second as if it were the first is how people collect show-cause notices in January.

How the season actually behaves — school holidays, schoolies, the theme parks — is in Gold Coast holiday rentals. Pool certificates, which Noosa and the state both care about, are in fire safety, pools and insurance.

Brisbane

Brisbane spent several years threatening a permit and a map of banned areas. On 12 May 2026 the Sydney Morning Herald reported that the lord mayor had shelved that scheme. Until Brisbane City Council’s own page says a permit is required, do not pay a consultant to prepare one. Do ask the council whether a short-stay house is still rated as a home. A dropped permit is not a promise about rates, noise complaints or a body corporate.

The rest of the state

Cairns, the Whitsundays, the Sunshine Coast outside Noosa, and the regional councils each have a planning scheme. Some tourist zones expect short stays. Some residential zones do not. There is no honest one-line answer, which is why “Queensland is fine” is how people get a compliance letter in a small council that does enforce. For the reef end of the state, start with Cairns and the Whitsundays and then ring the council about the lot.

Body corporate is the other gate, and Queensland is not NSW. A by-law under the BCCM Act cannot simply prohibit residential use, and short-term letting has been held to be residential use. A building under the older Building Units and Group Titles Act can be different. Read the strata guide before you tell an owner the committee cannot stop them, or that it already has.

What to have ready wherever the council sits

• The approval or existing-use evidence for this lot, not for “places like this”.
• A pool safety certificate if there is a pool. Shared pools and house pools have different certificate lengths — one year and two years in QBCC’s current note.
• Smoke alarms a licensed electrician will sign, where the council asks for that.
• A person who answers the phone. Noosa measures the distance. Other councils measure it in complaints.
• A count of nights if you are on a limited accepted-development path. Direct bookings and OTA bookings are the same nights — see channel management.

The national picture, including the states that did build a register, is in short-term rental laws by state.