Hawaii Transient Accommodations Tax: Rates, Filing, and Penalties

Hawaii’s Transient Accommodations Tax is an 11% state tax on the gross rental proceeds from any lodging rented for fewer than 180 consecutive days, effective January 1, 2026.¹ On top of that, every county adds a 3% surcharge collected on the same return, and Hawaii’s 4% General Excise Tax (plus a small county GET surcharge) applies to the same income. Stack them and each booking dollar carries roughly 18% to 18.5% in state and county tax before you touch federal income tax.

Which Rentals the Tax Applies To

A transient accommodation is any room, apartment, suite, condo, or similar space rented for fewer than 180 consecutive days, whether the guest books directly or through Airbnb, VRBO, or another platform.² Hotels, motels, bed and breakfasts, vacation rentals, and rooming houses are all covered.

The 180-day threshold measures each individual letting, not your total rented days in the year. Rent a condo to one guest for four months and the next for two, and both stays are taxable. A “transient” is anyone staying for a short and temporary period, and the definition applies to Hawaii residents the same as to out-of-state visitors.³

There is one narrow carve-out. A person who moves from place to place on month-to-month leases with no other permanent home, treating each rental as their principal residence, is not a transient. Someone renting temporarily while their permanent home is being repaired does not qualify.³

The Full Tax Stack on Each Booking

State TAT at 11%

Act 96, passed in the 2025 legislative session, raised the TAT from 10.25% to 11% on gross rental proceeds. Rental income received (or, on the accrual method, earned) on or after January 1, 2026 is taxed at the new rate.¹

County Surcharge at 3%

All four counties (Oahu, Maui, Hawaii County, and Kauai) impose an additional 3% surcharge on the same gross rental proceeds.⁴ You report and pay it on the same TA-1 return with the state TAT, not separately to the county.

General Excise Tax

Hawaii has no traditional sales tax. Instead, GET applies to nearly all business activity, including rental income, at 4% plus an applicable county surcharge. GET is on top of the TAT, not instead of it.⁵

Gross Rental Proceeds Include More Than Rent

TAT is calculated on “gross rental proceeds,” and that term reaches past the nightly rate. Mandatory cleaning fees, maintenance fees, management fees, and mandatory resort fees are part of gross rental proceeds and are taxable.⁶ Refundable security deposits are generally not taxable if you actually return them; any portion you keep becomes taxable income. Optional fees a guest can decline are treated differently from mandatory ones, so pricing structure matters.

Registering Before You Rent

Before you collect a dollar, you need two separate registrations with the Hawaii Department of Taxation.

The GET license is a one-time $20 fee, available through Hawaii Tax Online or by filing Form BB-1.⁷

The TAT registration is a separate one-time payment: $5 for one to five units, or $15 for six or more. The certificate must be conspicuously displayed at the rental, or you must post a notice stating where it can be inspected, along with the name, phone, and email of a local contact person.⁸

Every listing, online or otherwise, must include the TAT registration number or an electronic link to it, and the local contact’s name, phone, and email must be provided either in the listing or to the guest before the stay begins. Missing this information triggers the same escalating fines as failing to display the certificate.⁸

Filing and Paying

Periodic TAT returns are filed on Form TA-1. How often depends on your annual TAT liability:

Monthly if your annual TAT exceeds $4,000.
Quarterly if your annual TAT is between $2,001 and $4,000.
Semiannually if your annual TAT is $2,000 or less.

Monthly TA-1 returns are due by the 20th of the following month; the January return is due February 20.⁹ Payment is due on the same date as the return.¹⁰

You also file an annual reconciliation on Form TA-2. For a calendar year ending December 31, the TA-2 is due the following April.⁹ Both forms can be filed through Hawaii Tax Online.¹¹

GET has its own separate returns (Form G-45 periodically and Form G-49 annually) on their own schedule. Filing the TAT on time and forgetting the GET is a common and expensive mistake.

Penalties

Filing late costs 5% of the unpaid tax per month or partial month, capped at 25%. Interest accrues at two-thirds of 1% per month from the original due date. These apply to both TAT and GET.¹²

Operating without registration, failing to display the certificate, or omitting the required information from an advertisement carries escalating daily fines, assessed per unit in violation:

First violation: at least $500 per day.
Second violation: at least $1,000 per day.
Third and subsequent violations: at least $5,000 per day.

Filing a return you know to be materially false is a class C felony, punishable by a fine of up to $100,000 for an individual (up to $500,000 for a corporation), up to three years in prison, probation, or any combination. The same penalties reach anyone who helps prepare a fraudulent return, even without the owner’s knowledge.¹³

Exemptions

The following categories are exempt from the TAT under Hawaii law:

Health care facilities covered under HRS section 321-11(10).
Dormitories at public or private K-12 schools and institutions of higher education.
Accommodations provided by nonprofit religious, charitable, or educational organizations for their core mission, but not rentals primarily intended to generate income, even where the profits fund the mission.
Living accommodations for military personnel on permanent duty in Hawaii, including temporary lodging while seeking permanent housing or awaiting reassignment out of state.
Government-subsidized low-income renters with stays shorter than 60 days.
Full-time post-secondary students, including during summer employment periods.
Complimentary accommodations, including lodging for contract personnel like physicians or instructors who receive no salary, and employee housing provided as compensation.
Foreign diplomats and consular officials holding a U.S. State Department tax exemption card.

Regular federal government employees on official business are not exempt. The government-connected exemptions cover only military personnel on permanent assignment and credentialed foreign diplomats.¹⁴ Claim an exemption only with records that clearly document the guest’s qualifying status; without documentation, expect denial and full tax liability.

Bookings Through Airbnb and VRBO

Hawaii treats marketplace facilitators differently from most states. Platforms that facilitate rental transactions are treated as the retail-level seller and must collect and remit GET at the retail rate on bookings made through their marketplace.¹⁵

Here is the Hawaii wrinkle. Property owners who sell through a platform are still independently liable for GET at the wholesale rate on those same transactions. In most other states, the platform’s collection fully relieves the seller; in Hawaii, it does not. You remain responsible for your own GET portion and still report the income on your own returns.

Platforms may also collect and remit some or all of the TAT and county surcharge, but coverage varies by platform and county. Even where a platform handles a tax, verifying that every applicable tax has been collected and remitted correctly is your responsibility. Platform terms almost universally disclaim liability for errors, and treating a platform’s tax collection as a guarantee is the sort of assumption that surfaces during audits.

Records to Keep

When a third party manages and collects rent for you, the rental collection agreement must show the owner’s name, address, tax ID numbers, and property address on the first page. A copy of that first page (or a federal Form 1099 showing rents collected) must be filed with the Department of Taxation. Noncompliance carries fines of up to $500 per violation.¹⁶

Keep rental agreements, booking confirmations, receipts, bank statements, platform payout reports, and documentation for every exemption claimed. The general assessment window for Hawaii taxes is three years from the date the return is filed; if you underreport income by more than 25%, the window extends to six years. Retain records accordingly.

Tax Compliance Is Not Zoning Compliance

Paying the TAT does not make a short-term rental legal. Each county regulates where short-term rentals are allowed through zoning ordinances, and violations bring fines and forced closure regardless of your tax standing. Honolulu, for instance, permits short-term rentals (stays under 30 consecutive days) only in resort-zoned areas and a limited number of apartment-zoned areas, and actively enforces against illegal rentals in residential neighborhoods.¹⁷ Maui, Hawaii County, and Kauai each have their own permitting systems and restricted zones. Confirm your property is in a zone where short-term rentals are allowed before you register for TAT and GET. Paying tax on an illegal rental does not legalize it, and it creates a paper trail county enforcement offices can follow.

1
Hawaii Department of Taxation. Department of Taxation Announcement No. 2025-03 – Transient Accommodations Tax Law Changes from 2025 Legislative Session
2
Legal Information Institute. Hawaii Code of Rules 18-237D-1-07 – Transient Accommodations, Defined
3
LII / Legal Information Institute. Hawaii Code of Rules 18-237D-1-06 – Transient, Defined
4
Hawaii County, HI. Transient Accommodations Tax (TAT)
5
Hawaii Department of Taxation. An Introduction to Renting Residential Real Property
6
Hawaii Department of Taxation. Tax Facts 96-2 – Transient Accommodations Tax
7
Department of Taxation. General Excise Tax (GET) Information
8
Justia Law. Hawaii Code Title 14, Chapter 237D-4 – Certificate of Registration
9
Hawaii Department of Taxation. 2026 Important Hawaii Tax Deadlines Calendar
10
Hawaii Department of Taxation. An Introduction to the Transient Accommodations Tax
11
Department of Taxation. E-Services Information
12
Department of Taxation – Hawaii Department of Taxation. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
13
Justia Law. Hawaii Code Title 14, Chapter 231-36 – False and Fraudulent Statements
14
Justia Law. Hawaii Code Title 14, Chapter 237D-3 – Exemptions
15
Hawaii Department of Taxation. Tax Information Release No. 2019-03 – Marketplace Facilitators
16
Department of Taxation, State of Hawaii. Hawaii Revised Statutes Chapter 237D – Transient Accommodations Tax
17
Honolulu Department of Planning and Permitting. Short-Term Rentals