Michigan

Short-term rental company sues Michigan over $18.7M tax bill

Published

3 months ago

December 26, 2025

Short-term rental company sues Michigan over .7M tax bill

A nationwide short-term rental company is suing the state of Michigan over a tax audit that found the company owes about $18.7 million in unpaid use taxes to the state.

HomeAway, a Texas-based company best known for its vacation rental platform Vrbo, received a September bill for taxes due from the Michigan Department of Treasury for unpaid use taxes and interest in 2020, 2021 and 2022, totaling $18.7 million, according to the lawsuit filed in the Michigan Court of Claims.

HomeAway maintained in its Dec. 18 filing that it is the homeowners themselves who are responsible for collecting use taxes related to the short-term rental of their homes and remitting those taxes to the state.

“All funds representing use tax collected from guests were disbursed to the hosts,” the company said in its filing.

The state Department of Treasury and HomeAway declined to comment on pending litigation.

The tax fight comes amid a separate, but related, years-long fight in communities across the state and in the Legislature over how to best regulate and, in some cases, tax short-term rentals, which began to grow in popularity in Michigan after the 2008 housing crisis.

The Legislature has toyed with the idea of banning any local regulations over short-term rentals, putting some limits on those local regulations or establishing a statewide policy for short-term rental housing. State Rep. Mark Tisdel, R-Rochester Hills, helped introduce bills this fall that would allow communities to hold a vote on whether to tax short-term rentals locally to pay for essential services such as police or fire. The legislation has yet to receive a hearing.

In its suit filed Dec. 18 in the Michigan Court of Claims, HomeAway maintained that it was cognizant of the state’s 6% use tax and made provisions for its collection. But the ultimate remittance of that tax to the state is left to the homeowner.

When onboarding, according to the suit, a host or homeowner is given options regarding how they collect taxes. In Michigan, they could make it a percentage of the rental amount at booking or collect and remit the tax separately.

In either case, HomeAway argued, the host was responsible for paying the use tax. If the host made it a percentage of the rental amount due at booking, the taxes charged in the booking process were sent back to the host for remittance to the state. If the host indicated he or she would collect and remit on their own, the entire process was left to the host, according to the filing.

“The host acknowledged and represented that the host would handle tax collection from guests independent from HomeAway’s online checkout process,” HomeAway wrote in its filing. “…HomeAway never received or retained any tax amounts.”

In January 2023, the Department of Treasury began an audit of the prior three years, and in June 2025, the department issued a bill for taxes due for the audit period. The department found HomeAway wasn’t responsible for paying taxes if the host indicated he or she would collect and remit on their own. But the department maintained the company was responsible for remitting taxes where the host picked the option requiring the tax to be a percentage of the rental amount due at booking, the lawsuit said.

On Sept. 19, 2025, the Department of Treasury issued an $18.7 million bill, with about $15.1 million owed in use taxes and $3.6 million owed in interest. The bill included a total of $676,246 in use tax and interest for 2020, $8.6 million for 2021 and $9.5 million for 2022.

“The department — for the first time during the audit — alleged that for all bookings for which tax was collected on behalf of and at the request of the host, HomeAway unjustly enriched itself by failing to remit the collected taxes to the department,” the filing said.

The state treasury bills, attached to the lawsuit as exhibits, only note that the money due is for use tax and interest following an audit. There is no mention in the bills of which type of rentals HomeAway was responsible for when it came to remittance of the use tax.

HomeAway, in its lawsuit, denied that it was unjustly enriched, arguing the company didn’t keep any of the tax payments, but instead forwarded them to homeowners to remit to the state.

“It was the hosts — not HomeAway — that were responsible for remittance of use tax to the departments,” the filing said.

HomeAway also alleged the department’s audit violated the federal and state Equal Protection Clauses because it treated HomeAway differently from other similarly situated taxpayers.

“There is no precedent to support the department’s allegation, nor has the department applied this theory to similarly situated taxpayers,” the filing said.

eleblanc@detroitnews.com

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Michigan

Michigan-based Stryker hit with cyberattack

Published

11 hours ago

March 11, 2026

Press Room

Michigan-based Stryker hit with cyberattack – CBS Detroit

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Michigan-based medical equipment company Stryker said on Wednesday that a cyberattack is causing a “global network disruption.”

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Michigan

Michigan hockey vs Notre Dame time, channel in Big Ten Tournament

Published

23 hours ago

March 11, 2026

Press Room

Michigan hockey vs Notre Dame time, channel in Big Ten Tournament

Michigan hockey may be the No. 1 team in the nation in the USCHO and NPI rankings, but they fell short of a regular-season title and don’t have the clearest path to a Big Ten Tournament win.

But three wins can help the Wolverines solidify their status as the best in the nation, even if they’re No. 2 in the Big Ten as of now.

The Wolverines (26-7-1) face Notre Dame in the quarterfinals of the 2026 Big Ten Hockey Tournament on Wednesday, March 11, at Yost Ice Arena in Ann Arbor. The game is set to start at 7 p.m. ET and will not be televised on a traditional channel, but streamed exclusively on BIG+.

Michigan finished with the most overall wins (26) and most conference wins (17) in the Big Ten, but finished second to Michigan State in points, relegating them to the No. 2 seed. As a result, the two-time defending-champion Spartans got a bye and head right into the semifinals, while the Wolverines play last-place Notre Dame to kick off the tournament.

Since the tournament reseeds winners for the semifinal round, it is not clear who Michigan will play if it wins. However, with the Spartans holding the No. 1 seed, a rematch between the top two teams in the conference can only happen in the final game, which will take place on Saturday, March 21.

Here’s what you need to know as Michigan hockey begins its quest for a Big Ten tournament title.

Michigan hockey vs Notre Dame, Big Ten tournament time

Date: Wednesday, March 11.
Time: 7 p.m. ET.
Location: Yost Ice Arena, Ann Arbor.

Michigan hockey vs Notre Dame, Big Ten tournament channel

Time: 7 p.m. ET.
Channel: N/A.
Streaming: BIG+.

Wednesday’s game against Notre Dame will not be on a traditional television channel, but can be streamed on the BIG+ app.

Big Ten hockey conference tournament bracket

The Big Ten hockey conference tournament uses a three-round, single-elimination bracket that involves all seven conference teams, with the top seed earning a first-round bye. The remaining six teams then play a knockout round with the winners advancing to the semifinals.

Big Ten hockey 2026 standings

Michigan State (51 points).
Michigan (49 points).
Penn State (41 points).
Wisconsin (39 points).
Ohio State (29 points).
Minnesota (27 points).
Notre Dame (16 points).

Big Ten Tournament hockey 2026 quarterfinals schedule: March 11

No. 7 Notre Dame at No. 2 Michigan, 7 p.m. ET (BIG+).
No. 6 Minnesota at No. 3 Penn State, 7 p.m. ET (BIG+).
No. 5 Ohio State at No. 4 Wisconsin, 8 p.m. ET (BIG+).

Big Ten Tournament hockey 2026 semifinals schedule: March 14

Lowest remaining seed at No. 1 Michigan State, time TBD (Big Ten Network).
Second-lowest remaining seed at second-highest remaining seed, time TBD (Big Ten Network).

Big Ten Tournament hockey 2026 semifinals schedule: March 21

Lowest remaining seed at highest remaining seed, time TBD (Big Ten Network).

Need to catch up on the news during your lunch break? Sign up for our Sports Briefing newsletter to get daily summaries of Detroit sports!

You can reach Christian at cromo@freepress.com.

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Does Kyle Whittingham face ‘win now’ pressure at Michigan?

Published

1 day ago

March 10, 2026

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Does Kyle Whittingham face ‘win now’ pressure at Michigan?

For some programs, spring football has started in earnest, but for Michigan football, it will have to wait another week. But with practices on the horizon, college football pundits are starting to ask questions about what the upcoming season may look like, and among the questions is what Kyle Whittingham’s Wolverines will be in his first year.

On3’s popular show ‘Ari & Andy’ attempted to ask and answer that question on their latest episode.

As the duo of Ari Wasserman and Andy Staples mulled over various storylines in the coaching realm, once they got to the ‘newcomers’ — coaches who have taken over new programs — they started with Whittingham. For Wasserman, the big question is how quickly Whittingham can win in Ann Arbor?

“How much pressure is Kyle Whittingham to make sure that Michigan doesn’t lose whatever momentum that it had from winning the national championship and falling back into another 25 year period of being pretty good, but not great?” Wasserman said. “Because on one hand, this is a very critical moment in their program arc. But on the other hand, don’t you also have to give him the benefit of the doubt that, hey, what happened at the end of or during last year was highly dysfunctional in a way that we don’t really see very often in sports in general, let alone college sports? And you got hired during a weird time on the calendar. You probably weren’t anticipating coaching this year.

“Like, do you get a year to try to get your bearings of a new place that expects to win a championship? Like, I don’t know how Michigan fans are viewing this season. Now you’ll tell me what you always tell me. They demand excellence, and they expect excellence. There’s no honeymoon. I think that’s true. But from a rational analysis of this, I don’t know how to view what the (expectations are), like what is a successful season for Kyle Whittingham in year one, make the playoff?”

Staples is a little less about the questions and more about the answers. Because in his mind, regardless of how he got there, Whittingham to Michigan might be the best hire of the entire cycle.

“This really isn’t about Michigan’s expectations. It’s more about Kyle Whittingham’s expectations,” Staples said. “And the fact that Kyle Whittingham did this and the fact that Michigan did this, this was Michigan going out and getting the best coach they could get. But it’s very interesting because let’s say Michigan had fired Sherrone Moore in a more conventional way. And it had been just for losing and had been at the end of the season. And Kyle Whittingham had been one of the coaches that was available, but one of many that was available that the whole cycle hadn’t already been done. I still would have called hiring Kyle Whittingham, maybe the best hire of the cycle. I don’t think a 66-year-old guy goes to this place to build, to rebuild it. He’s going to win now. That’s the whole point of this. He’s not doing this except it is to win now.”

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