The first booking arrives before the first inspection. This is a list of the things new hosts skip most often — and, for each one, what it can cost.
When I listed my first apartment on Airbnb years ago, I felt ready. Photos, description, pricing, keys in a key box. It took me a long time to realize that part of what the state, the municipality and the police required of me, I simply wasn't doing. Nobody told me, and it wasn't written down anywhere in one place.
This list is what I wish someone had handed me back then. Seven items that get skipped most often in practice. It isn't a complete list of obligations — that one is in Help as a map — but these are the ones people forget.
1. Registration with the Foreign Police (and it's the first thing, not the last)
Every foreign guest, including Slovaks, Germans and Austrians, must be reported to the cizinecká policie (Foreign Police) within 3 working days of check-in. You report through UbyPort (the Foreign Police reporting system) — and the police first have to register you in it. Under the Czech Administrative Procedure Code, they have up to 30 days to do so.
This is the only item on the list with an official deadline measured in weeks. That's why you should deal with it first, before you accept your first foreign booking. Until you get access, you report on paper at the Foreign Police department. The fine for an unreported guest is up to CZK 50,000.
2. Tourist tax — Airbnb doesn't collect it for you
In many countries, platforms collect and pay tourist tax themselves. Not in the Czech Republic. You collect the poplatek z pobytu (local tourist tax) from your guests and pay it to the municipality — in Prague, to the office of the city district. The cap is CZK 50 per person per night, the day of arrival doesn't count, and people under 18 are exempt.
And watch out for two deadlines: first you have to register with the municipality as the payer (in Prague within 30 days of starting the activity, elsewhere most often within 15 days), then you pay on the dates set by the local ordinance. Failing to register can mean a fine of up to CZK 500,000, and the municipality can increase unpaid tax up to threefold.
3. Two registers, not one
This confuses almost everyone. You keep an evidenční kniha (guest register) for the municipality (all guests, including Czechs, with the amount of tax or the reason for exemption) and a domovní kniha (house book) for the Foreign Police (foreigners only, covering the fields of the registration form). They are two separate obligations, even though they're filled in from the same data. Both are kept for 6 years from the last entry.
Entries are made continuously, not once a month. During an inspection, you have to show a register with the guests who are staying with you right now.
4. Trade license and marking the premises
Short-term accommodation is not a lease, it's an accommodation service. You need an unregulated trade license, field no. 55, and the apartment is your provozovna (business premises): you notify the živnostenský úřad (Trade Licensing Office) before you start operating there, and you mark it on the outside with your name or company name and IČO (business ID number). The sign is the first thing an inspector looks for. Unmarked premises can cost up to CZK 100,000, doing business without a trade license up to CZK 500,000.
If you don't own the apartment, you need the owner's consent to do business in it.
5. VAT on platform commissions — even if you're not a VAT payer
Both Airbnb and Booking invoice you their commission from abroad. That turns a Czech non-VAT payer into a so-called identifikovaná osoba (identified person), from the very day the first commission is received. You register within 15 days, declare 21% DPH (Czech VAT) on every commission, and file the return within 25 days after the end of the month. With no right to deduct — it's a pure cost.
There's no turnover threshold here. It applies even to a single apartment with a handful of bookings a year. I've written about it in detail in the article on the identified person.
6. A waste contract
The building's bins, paid for from the residents' fee, aren't yours. As a business, you are the producer of waste and must have a written contract for its collection — with the municipality or with a waste collection company — before any waste is produced. In Prague's municipal system, a legal set of bins costs roughly CZK 4,400 to 6,700 a year excluding VAT. A missing contract can mean a fine of up to CZK 1,000,000.
7. Property tax on a business apartment
An apartment offered for accommodation is used for business, so it's taxed at CZK 18/m² instead of the residential rate. You report the change in a partial return by 31 January. For a typical apartment the difference is a few hundred crowns a year, but it's one of the things the finanční úřad (tax office) can find easily — the listing on the platform is public.
What to do if you haven't been doing some of this for years
It can be fixed, and fixing it is cheaper than waiting for an inspection. You can register the trade license and the premises at any time, sort out UbyPort registration retroactively, pay any unpaid tourist tax, and file supplementary tax returns. Putting things right step by step is the normal way. The worse option is when an authority finds out for you.
How I handle it today: bookings are pulled from the platforms, the guest fills in their details in advance via a link, the UbyPort report goes out automatically, both registers are kept automatically and the tax is calculated according to the municipality's settings. Ubyo was created precisely because of these seven points.
Marco, founder of Ubyo — He has been running apartments in Prague for over seven years and wrote Ubyo because he didn’t want to do any of this by hand.
For information only, not legal or tax advice — always discuss your specific situation with a professional. This article is a translation of the Czech original.
