Pike & Wayne County, PA

Pennsylvania Short-Term Rental Rules, Charted

Every township in our backyard treats short-term rentals a little differently. Consider this your chart of the water: read it like the markers guiding you into a channel, so you know exactly where you stand before you buy, list, or renew.

A guide from Hook Hospitality · Catskills · Upper Delaware River · Poconos
Photo: Derek Ramsey, CC BY-SA 4.0

Pennsylvania doesn't have one statewide rulebook for short-term rentals. Instead, every township, borough, and HOA writes its own. That means two houses on the same lake can play by completely different rules, depending on which side of a township line they sit on.

We manage properties across this exact patchwork every day, so we built this guide the way we wish someone had handed it to us: organized by township, with the details that actually matter when you're deciding whether a property will work as a rental.

How to use this: read the marker next to each township the way you'd read a buoy coming into a channel. Green means clear passage, yellow means proceed with caution, red means no passage, and gray means the water hasn't been charted yet, so a call to the local zoning office is the move before you commit to anything.

Reading the Markers

Every township below is marked the way you'd read a buoy on the water.
Clear ChannelOrdinance in place, permit path is clear
Proceed with CautionAllowed, but with real conditions attached
No PassageSTR use is currently prohibited
Uncharted WatersNo published ordinance, confirm locally

Before You Read Township-by-Township

Rules that show up almost everywhere

  • Bedroom count for rental use tied to septic approval
  • A local contact person, reachable and required to respond fast
  • On-site parking only, no street or right-of-way parking
  • Quiet hours and a cap on daytime guests
  • Annual, non-transferable permits or licenses

Ask before you buy or list

  • What zoning district is the property in?
  • Does the township allow STR use there?
  • Does the HOA or deed have its own restrictions?
  • Is there enough documented septic capacity?
  • What taxes and insurance does this trigger?

Pike County

Home to Lackawaxen, Palmyra, and the lake communities around Wallenpaupack's north end. This is where a lot of our own managed properties sit, so we know these ordinances well.

Wayne County

Stretching from Honesdale through Hawley and around the south side of Lake Wallenpaupack. Rules here range from tightly written ordinances to townships that haven't addressed STRs at all.

What Pennsylvania Itself Requires

There's no statewide STR license, but a few things apply no matter which township you're in:

Taxes

  • PA Hotel Occupancy Tax, plus the county-level hotel excise tax for Pike or Wayne
  • PA Sales Tax registration
  • Rental income reported for state and federal income tax

Safety & Insurance

  • Working smoke and CO detectors, fire extinguishers, clear egress
  • Bedroom count limited by septic system capacity
  • A standard homeowner's policy almost never covers STR use. Vacation rental or short-term rental-specific coverage is worth the call to your agent

Our Compliance Checklist

This is the exact list we run through with every new STR client before a listing goes live.

  • Zoning district confirmed with the township
  • HOA or deed restrictions reviewed in writing
  • STR permit or license obtained, if required
  • Safety inspection passed and documented
  • Septic system evaluated against bedroom count
  • Smoke and CO detectors installed and tested
  • Insurance updated for short-term rental use
  • State and county tax accounts opened
  • Local contact person assigned and posted
  • House rules drafted and posted on-site

This is exactly the part we handle.

Permits, HOA approvals, septic documentation, tax registration. It's a lot to track for one property, and it's a full-time job across a portfolio. We walk owners through every step, and for buyers still deciding, we offer a paid STR consultation before you're locked into a purchase.

Let's Talk ⟶
Hook Hospitality Catskills · Upper Delaware River · Poconos
hookhospitality.com · hookhosp@gmail.com · (845) 866-4129 · (201) 679-9682
PO Box 92, Lackawaxen, PA 18435
This guide reflects publicly available township ordinances as of publication and is meant as a starting point, not legal advice. Local rules change, and HOA or community-level restrictions can go beyond what's listed here. Always confirm current requirements with the township and any applicable HOA before purchasing or listing a property.