The Audit Services Division is the auditing branch of the elected City Auditor’s Office. The Division’s mission is to conduct performance and financial audits of City operations, and to make recommendations to improve efficiency, effectiveness and equity of City bureaus, offices and functions.
Our 2018 audit of Portland’s short-term rental regulation found that only about 22 percent of units were registered, and the effect on housing availability and affordability was unknown. We made recommendations to improve data collection and enforcement and monitor the effect of short-term rentals on the housing market.
In 2019 the City reported that it reached a data-sharing and registration agreement with a key rental agent and passed an ordinance requiring compliance from all agents. In 2020, the City made progress using publicly available rental data to enforce restrictions on hosts with multiple listings and hosts in commercial areas. However, the Bureau of Development Services was still developing software that will be used to analyze the data and enforce the rental registrations. The bureau did not prioritize enforcement during the pandemic. The Housing Bureau started reporting on short-term rental activity but still needs to work on measuring its impact on the housing market.