Shohola Township, Pennsylvania Short-Term Rental Regulations: A 2026 Guide For Airbnb Hosts

Do you own a place in Shohola Township, Pennsylvania and you're weighing whether to put it on Airbnb or Vrbo? Well, the good news is that you can, at least in principle, since this stretch of Pike County along the Delaware River near Milford has never passed an ordinance that bans short-term rentals outright. The catch, and it's a real one, is that Shohola hasn't passed anything that specifically permits them either. Your listing gets folded instead into a zoning category that predates Airbnb by decades: Bed and Breakfast or Boarding and Tourist Home, and which of those applies, and whether your parcel even qualifies, depends heavily on the district your property sits in.

Shohola's approach is a meaningfully different setup from several of its Pike County neighbors, places like Delaware Township and Greene Township, which have each adopted a dedicated short-term rental ordinance with its own permit and fee schedule. Shohola hasn't done that, at least not as of my research in mid-2026, so hosts here work through the township's general Zoning Ordinance No. 80 instead. That means a Conditional Use application, a Planning Commission review, and a public hearing before the Board of Supervisors rather than a simple form and a check, and it puts more discretion in officials' hands than a purpose-built STR ordinance typically leaves.

So let's walk through what that actually means in practice: how the zoning code treats a rental, what the application and hearing process costs and involves, the tax layers that stack on top from Pike County and the state, how seriously the township polices any of it, and exactly who picks up the phone when you call. Every figure below comes from Shohola Township's or Pike County's own ordinances and pages, checked in July 2026, and where something genuinely isn't published, I've said so rather than guessed. If you're weighing this property against other Poconos townships or other Pennsylvania counties entirely, it's worth running the numbers through BNBCalc first.

Starting a Short-Term Rental Business in Shohola Township

Before those numbers mean much, though, you need to know exactly what you're allowed to build them around, and that starts with how Shohola Township's Zoning Ordinance No. 80 talks about rentals at all. Adopted November 12, 2020, it's the township's general zoning code, and it's what governs a short-term rental here since Shohola has no separate ordinance for one. The township's own ordinance list runs from fire and building codes to nuisance and subdivision rules, and nothing on it is titled anything like "short-term rental" or "vacation rental."

Two defined terms in Ordinance No. 80 end up doing the actual work, starting with a Bed and Breakfast. That's any dwelling where more than three people are housed or lodged for hire "with meals normally included as a part of the services rendered." A Boarding or Tourist Home covers the same headcount, but meals aren't necessarily part of it, and the stay can't be offered as a permanent residency, typically running month-to-month and capped around 180 days. Since a typical Airbnb weekend doesn't come with breakfast service, Boarding or Tourist Home is the closer fit for most listings, though the ordinance never uses the phrase "short-term rental" anywhere, so applying either definition to a two-night Airbnb booking is an inference rather than something spelled out by name. Worth sitting with, too: both definitions only kick in once "more than three persons" are being housed for hire. Whether a couple booking your guest cottage for a weekend even triggers this classification is genuinely unclear from the ordinance text, and it's exactly the kind of question you'll want the Zoning Office to answer before you assume either way.

Assuming the classification applies to you, Section 619 puts "Hotels, Motels, Boarding/Tourist Homes, and Other Lodging Facilities" in the conditional use column, not the permitted-by-right column, in whichever of Shohola's seven zoning districts allow it: Rural Development, Residential, Neighborhood Commercial, General Commercial, Open Space, and the Flood Plain and Upper Delaware overlays. Exactly which districts allow the use sits in the ordinance's Appendix A Schedule of Uses, and I wasn't able to read that table's district-by-district permissions cleanly out of the scanned PDF text, so do check directly with the Zoning Office at (570) 559-7592 before you assume your parcel qualifies. There's an added wrinkle if your property falls inside the Upper Delaware Overlay, which covers a good share of land near the river corridor. Lodging uses there must also meet the "Small Hotel" criteria set out in the Upper Delaware River Management Plan. The ordinance is also explicit that a Boarding or Tourist Home is a legally separate use from a Hotel or Motel, and that neither can be converted into permanent housing once it's approved.

One more detail is worth knowing if you're buying rather than starting fresh. The township's fee schedule lists a separate charge for "Non-Conforming Registration," which suggests a property already operating this way before it needed conditional approval may be able to register rather than apply from scratch. I couldn't confirm the exact eligibility criteria for that path from the ordinance text I read, so treat it as a lead worth asking the Zoning Office about rather than a confirmed shortcut.

Short-Term Rental Licensing Requirement in Shohola Township

Since the district question has to get settled before anything else, the next hurdle is process, and it's a genuinely different process from a typical STR license application. Shohola doesn't have a short-term rental permit form the way Greene Township does; instead, you're filing a Conditional Use application, and Section 602.1 requires it to contain "all relevant information and documents relative to the proposed change of use," which is deliberately broad rather than a fixed checklist.

Here's how the application actually moves once you file it. The Zoning Officer forwards your application and supporting materials to the Township Planning Commission, which reviews it at a publicly advertised meeting and reports findings and a recommendation. The Board of Supervisors then holds its own public hearing, for which you cover the cost of the required public notice, and either grants the application (possibly with conditions attached) or denies it in writing, with reasons, sent by certified and first-class mail. If it's granted, the Board directs the Zoning Officer to issue the permit.

The 2025 fee schedule, revised March 13, 2025 and still the current version as of July 2026, sets what that costs:

Fee	Amount
Basic Conditional Use	$500
Conditional Use or Land Development Hearing	$1,500
Change of Use or Ownership	$150
Non-Conforming Registration	$100

So budget for at least the $500 Basic Conditional Use fee, and be aware the full Conditional Use or Land Development Hearing charge can add another $1,500 if your application needs the fuller hearing track. Getting approved isn't the finish line either. Section 705 requires a Certificate of Compliance before any structure or land use can legally begin, and the township won't issue one until you've installed an E-911 address sign meeting its specs: block numbers at least three inches tall, mounted four to eight feet above road level, right where your driveway meets the road. I found no stated renewal term or expiration date for a Bed and Breakfast or Boarding/Tourist Home conditional use once it's granted, unlike some neighboring townships that run STR permits on a one-year cycle, so confirm directly with the Zoning Office whether Shohola expects periodic renewal. Just keep in mind that office keeps limited hours: Monday and Wednesday, 8 a.m. to noon, at (570) 559-7592.

Required Documents for Shohola Township Short-Term Rentals

Because that fee doesn't come back if your application gets denied, it's worth assembling the right paperwork before you file rather than after. Shohola doesn't publish a document checklist specific to short-term rentals the way some neighboring townships do, and Section 602.1's "all relevant information and documents" language means the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors largely decide case by case what they need to see.

In practice, expect to bring proof of ownership or your deed, a site or plot plan showing the structure, parking layout and any septic or well infrastructure, your completed Conditional Use application and fee, and a plan for the required E-911 signage. Two more documents aren't Shohola-specific at all, but you'll need both regardless of which Pike County township you're in: a current Pike County Hotel Room Excise Tax Certificate from the County Treasurer, and either a Pennsylvania Sales, Use and Hotel Occupancy Tax License through myPATH or written confirmation that your booking platform already collects and pays that tax on your behalf. Remember that the township's own checklist isn't published anywhere online, so the safest move is calling the Zoning Office before you assemble a packet, rather than guessing at what the Planning Commission wants to see and finding out at the public meeting that something's missing.

Shohola Township Short-Term Rental Taxes

Assuming you clear the application and the paperwork, there's still tax to work out, and in Shohola that's two layers rather than three, since I found no separate township-level lodging tax on top of the county and state charges.

Tax	Rate	Collected by
Pennsylvania Hotel Occupancy Tax	6%	PA Department of Revenue
Pike County Hotel Room Rental Excise Tax	3%	Pike County Treasurer

Stack those two together and you get roughly 9% in combined hotel-type tax on top of your nightly rate, before any township fee even enters the picture. The state's 6% is the more automated of the two, since under Act 109 of 2018 platforms like Airbnb and Vrbo are required to collect and hand over that share as "booking agents." Hosts who book exclusively through a collecting platform generally don't file it themselves. The county's 3% is a different story, since Pike County's own Room Tax Initial Packet describes the operator or owner collecting it from the guest and sending it in quarterly to the Pike County Treasurer, due the 25th of the month following each quarter (April 25, July 25, October 25, and January 25), with a 1.5% monthly penalty on late payments. I found nothing on an official Pike County page confirming whether Airbnb or Vrbo also collects that county tax automatically the way they do the state's 6%, so don't assume it's handled for you. Confirm directly with the Treasurer's Office before your first booking. Guests staying more than 30 consecutive days count as permanent residents and are exempt from the tax entirely. One thing that doesn't apply in Shohola: Pike County isn't one of the two counties, Allegheny and Philadelphia, where the state collects an extra local sales tax add-on alongside the 6%, so there's no additional layer on that front.

Possible Write-offs and Deductions

Ordinary rental-business deductions still apply once you're paying these taxes, and they're worth discussing with a CPA who knows short-term rentals specifically rather than assuming a standard landlord return covers you. Mortgage interest, property depreciation, homeowner's insurance, repairs and maintenance, a share of utilities if you also use the property personally, and the fees you paid to get the Conditional Use approval itself are all commonly deductible against your rental income. Keep in mind the county excise tax and state hotel tax you collect and pass along aren't your income to begin with, so don't count them twice by both reporting them as revenue and deducting them as an expense.

Pennsylvania Wide Short-Term Rental Rules

All of those taxes, the ones you deduct and the ones you collect and pass along, sit inside a much bigger picture, and Shohola's zoning-only approach makes more sense once you see it. Pennsylvania itself imposes almost no statewide short-term rental framework at all. The state's own Joint State Government Commission staff study from March 2025 describes regulation across the Commonwealth as "a patchwork of primarily county and municipal zoning ordinances," and even the definition of "short-term rental" varies from one municipality to the next. That's why a township right next door, like Bucks County's various municipalities, can end up with a purpose-built STR ordinance while Shohola works through general zoning instead. Neither approach is more or less legal; they're just different tools aimed at the same underlying gap in state law.

Three bills that would change this, House Bill 2303, House Bill 1256, and Senate Bill 1105, are all sitting in committee as of the most recent legislative session, and none has passed. So don't plan around a statewide registry or a standardized operator tier system; none of that exists in Pennsylvania yet, no matter what a blog post written for a different state's rules might imply. Beyond the patchwork itself, the state layer that does apply everywhere, including Shohola, is the Pennsylvania short-term rental guide's territory: the 6% Hotel Occupancy Tax under 61 Pa. Code Chapter 38, the Act 109 booking-agent collection requirement, and the myPATH registration path for hosts a platform doesn't fully cover.

Does Shohola Township Strictly Enforce STR Rules?

Given how much of this runs through Board of Supervisors discretion rather than a fixed rulebook, it's fair to ask how seriously any of it actually gets enforced. Honestly, I found no news coverage, lawsuits, or public enforcement actions specifically tied to short-term rentals in Shohola Township, so I can't point you to a track record the way I could for a bigger city. What the ordinance itself does say is that violations get handled under Section 617 of the Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code. The Zoning Officer enforces that by written notice first, appeals run to the Zoning Hearing Board, and continued violations eventually land before a magisterial district judge. The ordinance doesn't set its own dollar penalty for a zoning violation; it defers entirely to the state code, so I can't give you a specific fine figure here, and neither can the ordinance text itself.

My own read, and this is a judgment call rather than something documented anywhere, is that a township this size, with a Zoning Office open only two mornings a week, is set up for complaint-driven enforcement rather than the kind of proactive sweep a place like New York City runs. That doesn't mean the rules go unenforced. It means a neighbor calling the township, or an HOA in one of the area's private communities objecting, is probably the realistic trigger here, not a routine inspection.

How to Start a Short-Term Rental Business in Shohola Township

Assuming Shohola still looks workable after all of that, the order below matters, since the early steps decide whether the later ones are worth the money.

1. Confirm your zoning district and whether lodging is a conditional use there. Call the Zoning Office at (570) 559-7592, Monday or Wednesday morning, before you spend anything.
2. Check whether you actually trigger the "more than three persons" threshold, and don't assume either way without asking, since the ordinance text alone doesn't settle it.
3. Check for HOA or deed restrictions if your property sits inside a private community, since a zoning approval doesn't override a covenant.
4. Assemble your Conditional Use application: proof of ownership, a site plan, and anything else the Planning Commission is likely to ask for.
5. Submit to the Zoning Officer and pay the Basic Conditional Use fee of $500, budgeting for the $1,500 hearing fee if your application needs the fuller track.
6. Attend the Planning Commission's review meeting, then the Board of Supervisors' public hearing, which you pay to have publicly noticed.
7. Install your E-911 sign and schedule your final inspection once approved, so you can get the Certificate of Compliance the ordinance requires before you host anyone.
8. Register for the Pike County Hotel Room Excise Tax Certificate with the County Treasurer, and set up your myPATH account if your booking platform doesn't fully cover the state's hotel tax.
9. Diarize your quarterly county tax due dates, April 25, July 25, October 25, and January 25, and don't forget to ask the Zoning Office whether your approval needs periodic renewal.

Who to Contact in Shohola Township about Short-Term Rental Regulations and Zoning?

Whichever step trips you up, a short list of offices handles nearly everything here.

Shohola Township, general and zoning

• Address: 159 Twin Lakes Road, Shohola, PA 18458
• Phone: (570) 559-7394, fax (570) 559-7523
• Email: [email protected]
• Website: shoholatwp.org
• Main office hours: Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
• Zoning Office: (570) 559-7592, Monday and Wednesday, 8 a.m. to noon; Zoning Officer Ron Tussel
• Board of Supervisors: meets the second Thursday of the month at 6:30 p.m. at the Township Building

Building and inspections

• Code Inspections, Inc. (contracted Building Inspector), Joe Cutri: PO Box 375, Hawley, PA 18428, (888) 264-2633

County hotel tax

• Pike County Treasurer's Office: 506 Broad Street, Milford, PA 18337, (570) 296-3441; John Gilpin, Treasurer; hotel-tax questions to Sherry Wolf, [email protected]

State tax and registration

• Pennsylvania Department of Revenue: register and file through myPATH; general information line (717) 787-1064

What Do Airbnb Hosts in Shohola Township on Reddit and Bigger Pockets Think about Local Regulations?

With that many separate offices in play, it helps to know what other hosts and investors actually say about navigating them. I didn't pull from Reddit for this. Its terms restrict the kind of commercial use this guide would need to quote its threads directly, so what follows leans on BiggerPockets instead, which I read myself, plus my own read of the pattern.

On a BiggerPockets thread asking which Poconos towns allow short-term rentals, Shohola itself never comes up by name, but Lehman Township, another Pike County municipality, gets flagged as a place that doesn't permit stays under 30 days at all. The advice that does generalize is worth repeating: check the specific township's website and don't assume "Poconos" means one rulebook, because it plainly doesn't, even within a single county. Shohola's position along the Delaware River also sets it apart a bit from the lake-community townships that dominate a lot of that discussion. Its market leans more toward river recreation and the Upper Delaware corridor than the private lake associations you'll find further south in Pike County, and that's one more reason a covenant search matters in Shohola even when the zoning question is settled.

If you're comparing Shohola against a market with a fuller STR ordinance already in place, Montgomery County's guide is a useful contrast, since its municipalities have generally moved faster on purpose-built rules than Pike County's smaller townships have. And if the numbers are what ultimately decide this for you, Pennsylvania's short-term rental market data is worth checking before you commit real money to a Conditional Use application whose outcome the Board of Supervisors still gets to decide.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you legally run an Airbnb in Shohola Township in 2026?

Yes, but only after Conditional Use approval, not by simply listing your property. Shohola Township has no dedicated short-term rental ordinance, so a rental gets classified under the general Zoning Ordinance's Bed and Breakfast or Boarding and Tourist Home definitions, which require Planning Commission review and a Board of Supervisors public hearing before you can legally begin. Confirm your zoning district allows the use before applying, since it isn't permitted by right anywhere in the township.

Does Shohola Township require a permit for a short-term rental?

There's no permit called a "short-term rental permit," but you do need a Conditional Use approval and, after that's granted, a Certificate of Compliance before you can host anyone. The 2025 fee schedule sets the Basic Conditional Use fee at $500, with an additional $1,500 possible if your application needs a full Conditional Use or Land Development Hearing. The township doesn't publish a stated renewal cycle, so confirm that directly with the Zoning Office.

What taxes apply to a Shohola Township short-term rental?

Two layers apply: Pennsylvania's 6% Hotel Occupancy Tax, which booking platforms generally collect and remit automatically under state law, and Pike County's 3% Hotel Room Rental Excise Tax, which the host typically remits directly to the County Treasurer each quarter. That's roughly 9% combined. No separate Shohola Township lodging tax was found on top of those two.

How much does it cost to get short-term rental approval in Shohola Township?

Budget at least $500 for the Basic Conditional Use fee under the township's 2025 zoning fee schedule, and potentially $1,500 more if the Board of Supervisors requires the fuller Conditional Use or Land Development Hearing track. That doesn't include the cost of publicly noticing your hearing, which the applicant also covers, or any documents like a Pike County Hotel Room Excise Tax Certificate you'll need separately.

Is there an occupancy limit for a Shohola Township short-term rental?

The zoning code's Bed and Breakfast and Boarding or Tourist Home definitions both apply once "more than three persons" are housed for hire, but the ordinance doesn't spell out a maximum guest count beyond that threshold. Rather than guess, ask the Zoning Office to confirm how the Board of Supervisors has interpreted occupancy limits for a specific property, since conditions attached at approval can vary case by case.

Last verified: July 2026. Every ordinance, tax rate, state law, and contact detail in this guide links to or comes from its official source.