BC Registries & Online Services
Built for a Deadline: BC's Short-Term Rental Registry
When BC passed the Short-Term Rental Accommodations Act in 2023, it set a hard public deadline - a provincewide registry for all Airbnb, VRBO, and short-term rental hosts had to be live by early 2025. Premier David Eby named it directly as part of BC's housing crisis response. Forge was engaged by BC Registries to design the registry under significant time pressure, with the legislation already passed and the clock running.
Impact & Outcomes
Registry launched January 2025. All BC short-term rental operators required to register by May 1, 2025 - with non-compliant listings removed from platforms by June 1. The province estimated BC's STR regulations had already reduced rents by 5.7% and saved renters over $600 million in 2023. The registry became the enforcement mechanism that made those gains sustainable.
Challenge
The registry had to serve multiple user types simultaneously - individual hosts, property managers, strata hotels, and major platforms like Airbnb and VRBO - each with different compliance needs. It had to integrate with local government business licensing systems across dozens of municipalities, validate registration numbers in real time against platform listings, and launch on a fixed public deadline with no room for delay. The housing crisis context meant any failure would be politically visible.
Approach
Forge applied a rapid, hypothesis-driven design process, working within BC Registries' established design system and Agile framework. User research focused on the highest-risk user journeys first - host registration and platform validation - to ensure the core compliance flow worked before secondary features were designed. Close collaboration with policy and legal teams ensured registration requirements were accurately reflected in the user interface without creating unnecessary friction for hosts trying to comply in good faith.
Delivery
A provincewide short-term rental registry serving hosts, property managers, platforms, and government enforcement teams. Hosts receive a provincial registration number displayed on all listings. Platforms validate numbers in real time. Government enforcement teams gain monthly data feeds from all major platforms. Delivered on deadline.
