DuPage County Board members have approved a proposal to specifically regulate short-term rental properties in unincorporated areas on a yearly basis.

The board on Tuesday adopted an amendment to the county zoning ordinance requiring registration, an annual inspection and a still-to-be-determined annual fee.

Board member Jim Zay said his district in the northwestern chunk of the county is “starting to be inundated with people buying these houses up.”

“Or they have a secondary residence, a small lot in the back that’s being rented out for these Airbnbs every weekend where there’s parties going on,” he added.

By having them licensed with the county, “there would be some control” over short-term rentals, said board member Sam Tornatore, who also chairs the board’s development committee.

Zay agreed, saying, “This helps us know what’s going on.”

Another provision prohibits the occupancy of more than five people who are unrelated by blood or marriage. However, a short-term residential rental property owner would be permitted to seek a special event permit to allow exceptions to the regulations on a temporary basis.

Board member Lucy Chang Evans said she thinks the county’s requirements are “going to be difficult to enforce.” She initially sought to table a decision before withdrawing her motion.

“If there’s enough money generated … it should very well be able to sustain a full-time employee to enforce it,” Tornatore said of the fee. “In the meantime, it’ll be enforced like anything else we enforce, mostly on a complaint basis right now.”

As to their prevalence, Paul Hoss, who heads the county’s planning and zoning administration, estimated last month that there are anywhere from 65 to 300 short-term rentals in unincorporated DuPage County at any one time.

“The only time that we hear about short-term rentals is typically when the property owner who has a short-term rental calls and complains and says that someone is damaging their own property … or if there are parties that just get out of hand,” Hoss said.

Board member Dawn DeSart, though, was a “no” vote Tuesday.

“I think that short-term rentals, historically, only offer angst and complaints from neighbors,” she said.

County board Chair Deb Conroy responded that the amendment “regulates something that’s already happening.”

The board is expected to determine the fee amount at a later date.

“Many of these short-term rentals are operated under, not mom-and-pop-type situations, but Vrbo and places like that. And they would be, from what we understand, more than happy to pay a fee in order to have some kind of regulations, as well as the neighbors happy to have regulations to deal with the people who are renting (in) some of these areas as well,” Tornatore said.

The county plans to put the money collected from the fee into a fund that “would then be used as part of our long-term housing strategies, to loan money out for low-interest loans, construction loans, other things associated with our housing program,” Hoss said.

As part of an initiative to expand affordable housing, the county has eased various zoning requirements. Conroy also has unveiled a 2026 budget plan that would dedicate $5 million from any 2025 surplus funds to launch a down-payment assistance program for first-time homebuyers.

https://www.dailyherald.com/20251014/news/with-parties-going-on-dupage-county-puts-regulations-on-short-term-rentals/