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Council hears Rentalscape demonstration as town staff weighs enforcement options for short-term rentals
Summary
Decker Technologies demonstrated Rentalscape, a platform the town uses to identify and monitor short-term rentals. Staff and council discussed zoning overlays, condo opt-outs, complaint tracking, data ownership, and whether the town should offer a public-facing portal. Decker said the product identified 3,300 properties and helped register over 900, generating roughly $346,000 in fees.
Decker Technologies representatives showed Fort Myers Beach council and staff how Rentalscape identifies short-term rental (STR) listings across platforms, links listings to parcel numbers, and supports registration and enforcement workflows.
"Our system has patent technology that allows us to scrape a lot of the big platforms ... and match that back to a parcel number," said Candy Marler Perfect, head of client success at Decker Technologies. She told council the platform has identified more than 3,300 properties in the town, and in a 17-month engagement helped staff register over 900 properties, producing about $346,000 in registration fees to date.
Decker and town staff demonstrated a staff-only map with blue dots for licensed listings, red for unlicensed, and yellow for new/unvalidated listings. Dr. Eric Brandenburg, senior director of client experience, said Rentalscape logs complaints and ties them to addresses; the town has recorded 81 complaints so far, 85% of which came through the platform's complaint portal. Council asked if Rentalscape can filter by weekly vs. monthly zoning; Decker said it can once the town provides zoning shapefiles.
Councilors also asked about opt-out condos and whether the public can access listing calendars. Decker said condos that 'opt out' still appear in the system and that the firm offers a public portal add-on to show licensed properties. On data ownership, Decker said staff "will always own the data" and that the company will retain contract data for two years after termination before deleting it. Staff agreed to review reports and consider a public portal or additional add-ons.
