At Myrtle Beach, we understand that short-term rentals, like those listed on Airbnb, are treated as commercial uses, even when they are located within residential buildings. This classification creates challenges for guests who suffer injuries during their stay. Homeowner and condo insurance policies are typically designed for residential use, not for the specific risks associated with running a lodging business. Unfortunately, this gap in coverage often complicates injury claims, leaving guests feeling frustrated and uncertain.
Our dedicated team at the Arndt Law Firm is committed to navigating these complex issues for clients in Horry County. We specialize in addressing the intricacies involved in short-term rental injury cases, from the initial coverage questions to building a solid case. We know the struggles that injured guests face, and we are here to advocate for your rights and ensure you receive the support you deserve.
If you or a loved one has been injured during a stay at a short-term rental in Myrtle Beach, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. Our experienced team is ready to help you understand your legal options and guide you through the claims process. Contact us today for a consultation, and let us fight for the justice and compensation you need.
The City of Myrtle Beach regulates short-term rentals as visitor accommodations, defined as a living unit or other accommodation furnished, rented, leased, or sub-leased for any period less than ninety continuous days, and the ordinance states outright that a visitor accommodation is a commercial use. Ninety days is also where state law draws the line, so a guest at a Myrtle Beach rental is a transient rather than a tenant, and the Residential Landlord and Tenant Act does not reach the stay at all.
The city allows visitor accommodations by right only in a defined set of districts: RMV, MU-H, C6, and the amusement, entertainment, and highway commercial districts, and by special exception in the interim redevelopment district. They are not allowed in any single-family or other multi-family residential district, and not in several commercial districts either, including downtown commercial and medical/professional. The city has also adopted a Short-Term Rental Conversion (STRC) Overlay Zone, Ordinance No. 2024-69, adopted December 10, 2024.
In the strip between Kings Highway and the Atlantic Ocean, it bars buildings of more than two units that were built or used as visitor accommodations from being rented for ninety continuous days or more, with an exception for units already licensed for long-term rental when it was adopted. Its stated purpose is preserving tourist accommodations on the oceanfront.
For a guest who was hurt, none of that is trivia. A property operating as a commercial lodging business while insured as a residence is the single most common reason these claims run into a coverage denial. And where a unit is operating in a district that does not permit the use, that fact bears on how the property was being run and on what the owner and any manager knew.
Does Myrtle Beach treat a short-term rental as a business?
The city regulates short-term rentals as visitor accommodations and applies a commercial accommodation model, treating them as commercial uses even where they operate inside residential structures. That classification is directly relevant to whether a residential insurance policy responds.
A standard homeowner's or condo unit owner's policy is written to cover a residence. Many contain business pursuits or business use exclusions, and renting to paying guests is capable of triggering them.
That leaves three possibilities that look identical from a guest's side of the front door. The host holds proper landlord or commercial coverage. The host holds a rider extending a residential policy to rental use. Or the host holds an ordinary residential policy that may not respond at all.
In this market, there are usually more layers than in a single-family rental town. A condominium building carries a master policy covering common elements, while the unit owner carries a separate policy covering the interior. A rental management company handling cleaning, maintenance, and turnover carries its own commercial coverage, and it is frequently the more productive route. A homeowners association or property owners association controls the pool deck, the walkways, the parking areas, and the elevators.
Establishing which of those responds is early work rather than late work, because it determines whether there is a policy to negotiate with at all. This page makes no claim about what any booking platform's own coverage program pays, since those terms were not reviewed, and the existence of a platform program does not answer whether the host's policy responds.
South Carolina decides property injury claims partly by asking why the injured person was there. South Carolina recognizes four general classifications of persons who come on premises: adult trespassers, invitees, licensees, and children, each owed a different standard of care.
Hosts do argue the other way. South Carolina's traditional rule is that a landlord owes no duty to maintain leased premises, absent an express warranty or fraudulent concealment, and the Residential Landlord and Tenant Act does not help a guest either, because it excludes transient stays. Young v. Morrisey, 285 S.C. 236, 329 S.E.2d 426 (1985); South Carolina Code § 27-40-120(4) (2026).
The answers are control and conduct: a host or association is responsible for what it kept control of, for repairs it performed badly, and for anything it voluntarily undertook, such as advertised pool supervision or a gate it promised to maintain (Daniels v. Timmons, 216 S.C. 539, 59 S.E.2d 149 (1950); McQuillen v. Dobbs, 262 S.C. 386, 204 S.E.2d 732 (1974); Wright v. PRG Real Estate Management, Inc., 426 S.C. 202, 826 S.E.2d 285 (2019)). No South Carolina appellate decision has yet applied this to a short-term rental host, so the point is argued rather than settled.
A paying guest is present under a commercial arrangement, which places them in the most protective part of that framework rather than in the position of a social visitor. The duty owed to an invitee is reasonable care, including a duty to warn of latent or hidden dangers of which the property owner has actual or constructive knowledge.
Constructive knowledge does real work here. A host who has never inspected a balcony rail, a stair tread, or a water heater does not escape responsibility by not looking, because the standard reaches conditions that should have been discovered. The full framework is set out in the premises liability analysis.
A caution about the case law: Sims v. Giles contains, in a footnote, a sentence stating that the licensee and invitee distinction "is hereby abolished," but the court is quoting West Virginia's decision in Mallet v. Pickens, 522 S.E.2d 436, 446 (W. Va. 1999). The Sims court's own parenthetical notes that South Carolina is not among the jurisdictions that abolished the distinction. South Carolina retained the categories and continues to apply them.
Oceanfront and resort-style properties generate a different hazard profile from an inland rental house.
Balconies and railings lead the list, because a failure produces a fall from height rather than a fall on a level, and because rail height and structural condition are measurable against building standards rather than argued as impressions. Exterior stairs and unfamiliar riser heights follow, particularly in older multi-story buildings.
Pools and pool decks recur, and the questions are barriers, gates, depth markings, surface condition, and whether any supervision was represented. Elevators in high-rise buildings raise maintenance and inspection questions that sit with the association or a service contractor rather than with an individual unit owner.
Beach access points, boardwalks, and dune crossings involve conditions that may be controlled by the city, the association, or neither. Balcony and window safety for children is a recurring and serious category. Hot water scalding, defective furniture, and cleaning chemicals left accessible during turnover complete the common list.
More parties are typically involved here than in a single-family rental, and the money often sits with one of the less obvious ones.
The unit owner is the starting point. A rental management company that handles maintenance, cleaning, guest communication, and turnover may be independently responsible and usually carries commercial coverage. A cleaning contractor, a pool service, an elevator maintenance company, or a landscaping contractor can each be responsible for the specific condition.
The association matters more in this market than in most, because in a condominium or resort building the common elements where a great many injuries happen are controlled by the association rather than by any unit owner. Which body controlled the exact location of the injury is a question of fact and often the most important one in the case.
Whether a booking platform can be held liable as an operator rather than a listing service is contested territory that this page does not resolve. Identifying every party who controlled the property or part of it carries additional weight for injuries occurring after January 1, 2026.
In South Carolina, when dealing with certain claims, a defendant may request that a person who was not originally sued be included on the verdict form and assigned a share of the fault. However, this is only permissible if that person is disclosed within 180 days of the start of the action. If this condition is met, the plaintiff may then amend the complaint to add that person as a defendant, with the amendment relating to the beginning of the case. It's important to note that for injuries occurring before this date, the previous statute applies, which does not allow for such mechanisms. This process is outlined in South Carolina Code § 15-38-15 (2026).
Who is responsible if I was hurt in a common area of a rental building?
Often the association rather than the unit owner, since common elements including pools, walkways, elevators, and parking areas are typically controlled by the association. Establishing who controlled the exact location is usually the central question.
A short-term rental is marketed, and what the host represented becomes evidence in a way it never does with an ordinary residence.
A property advertised as suitable for young children, or as having a gated pool, a secure balcony, or a safe beach access, has made a representation a guest is entitled to rely on. Where the reality differed, that gap speaks to both the condition and what the host knew. House rules work the same way: a rule warning about a particular stair or a slippery deck indicates awareness of the hazard even while the host relies on the warning as a defense.
Prior guest reviews are frequently the strongest single item, because a complaint about a loose rail, an unlit stairwell, or a broken gate is documented notice from an independent source. Listings and reviews can both be edited or removed, so capturing them by screenshot immediately costs nothing and cannot be recreated later.
Beyond the platform, the file includes the business license and any city registration record, zoning status for the address, association records including maintenance and prior incident history, management company records on turnover and repairs, and communications with the host before and after the injury.
A disproportionate share of serious short-term rental injuries involve children, and the reason is structural rather than careless. A rental is configured for its owner rather than for whoever books it, and hazards a resident family has adapted to are invisible to a guest arriving for a weekend.
Pools and pool decks lead the category. The questions are whether a barrier existed, whether a gate self-closed and self-latched, whether depth was marked, and whether any supervision was represented in the listing. In a building with a shared pool, the association typically controls it, which puts that claim somewhere other than with the unit owner.
Balconies are the second and produce the most severe outcomes. Rail height, spacing, structural condition, and corrosion in a salt air environment are measurable against building standards rather than argued as impressions, and a balcony in an older tower may date from a period with different requirements.
Cleaning chemicals are the quieter risk. A property turned over between guests has supplies moved, restocked, and sometimes left accessible in a way a permanent residence would not. Unsecured heavy furniture and televisions belong in the same category.
When it comes to a child's own claim, deadlines are extended because these claims are tolled while the child is a minor. Although the specifics of how this tolling is calculated for minors can be somewhat unclear, a prudent guideline is that the action should be initiated within one year after the child's eighteenth birthday. Therefore, any claim approaching that milestone should be regarded as urgent, rather than assuming it will have a longer timeframe. This principle is supported by South Carolina Code § 15-3-40 (2026).
In contrast, a parent’s own claim operates under different rules. The medical expenses incurred by a parent and any services they lost are considered the parent’s responsibility, not the child's. Consequently, these claims follow the standard three-year limitations period starting from the date of the injury.
Who is responsible for a pool at a rental building?
Usually the association where the pool is a shared amenity, and the unit owner or manager where it is private to the property. Barrier, gate, and marking requirements are questions of fact answered from the physical condition and the governing documents.
An injured guest recovers as long as their share of the fault is not greater than the defendant's, and where more than one defendant is involved, the guest's share is compared to the combined fault of all of them. The award is reduced by the guest's percentage and barred at 51 percent. Nelson v. Concrete Supply Co., 303 S.C. 243, 399 S.E.2d 783 (1991). That rule is common law rather than statutory.
Hosts and insurers raise a recognizable set of arguments. The guest was unfamiliar with the property, or had been drinking, or should have seen an obvious hazard. Others follow: the house rules said so, or children were unsupervised.
Each is a percentage rather than a bar, and several are weaker than they sound. Unfamiliarity is the condition of every guest at a short-term rental, which is a reason the duty to warn exists rather than a defense to it. A house rule is not a substitute for a safe condition, and whether a written warning was adequate to the specific hazard, and reached the guest before the injury, is a question of fact.
| Potential source of recovery | When it responds | What to establish |
|---|---|---|
| Unit owner's residential policy | Where no business use exclusion applies | Whether the policy excludes commercial rental use |
| Owner's landlord or commercial policy | Where proper coverage was obtained | Limits, and whether rental use was disclosed |
| Management company policy | Manager handled maintenance or turnover | Scope of the management agreement |
| Association or master policy | Injury in a common element | Who controlled the exact location |
| Contractor policy | A service created the condition | Which company serviced the property and when |
The general deadline is three years from the date of injury, and a guest who lives out of state files in South Carolina under South Carolina deadlines, since the claim arises where the injury happened. Residency is not a requirement.
Where a guest died, the personal representative brings the wrongful death claim and the three years runs from the date of death rather than the date of the injury. S.C. Code Sections 15-3-530(6) and 15-51-10 et seq.
Where the injury resulted from how the property was built rather than how it was maintained, South Carolina Code § 15-3-640 (2026) bars an action based on the defective or unsafe condition of an improvement to real property more than eight years after substantial completion.
That bar protects designers, builders, and remote owners. South Carolina Code § 15-3-670(A) (2026) takes it away from anyone in actual possession or control of the property, an owner, a tenant or a manager, who knew or reasonably should have known of the condition, and from anyone guilty of fraud, gross negligence, recklessness, or concealment. Against the host, the association, or the management company, the age of the building is frequently not an answer.
Claims presented by children are tolled during minority, though not beyond one year past the eighteenth birthday, which is relevant given how many of these injuries involve children.
Where an association or a management company is the responsible party, the ordinary three-year deadline applies. Where a public body controlled the location, such as a public beach access, the South Carolina Tort Claims Act applies instead.
The deadline is two years from the date the loss was or should have been discovered. It extends to three years only if a verified claim was filed with the responsible agency or political subdivision and received within one year of the loss. Recovery is capped at $300,000 for one person and $600,000 for a single occurrence, and punitive damages are not available against a governmental entity.
Where an injury at a rental required an emergency response, the responding agency generates its own run report, separate from anything the host, manager, or association holds. Inside the city limits, that is the Myrtle Beach Fire Department. In the unincorporated Grand Strand, Socastee, Carolina Forest, and other areas where many rentals are located, it is Horry County Fire Rescue, which also provides EMS county-wide.
Suit is filed in the Court of Common Pleas for Horry County, Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, at the courthouse at 1301 Second Avenue in Conway, (843) 915-5080. The Common Pleas division can be reached directly at (843) 915-5083. The county also operates a Clerk of Court extension office at the South Strand complex, 9630 Scipio Lane in Myrtle Beach, (843) 915-5082, co-located with the South Strand magistrate court.
Out-of-state guests can pursue these claims without returning to South Carolina for every step. The main challenge is usually maintaining continuity of medical care across two states, and documenting the injury before leaving the area helps considerably.
Seriously injured guests are transported to Grand Strand Medical Center at 809 82nd Parkway in Myrtle Beach, the only Level I adult trauma center and Level II pediatric trauma center in Horry and Georgetown counties. Conway Medical Center at 300 Singleton Ridge Road in Conway also serves the area.
Treatment in the same city produces a cleaner record than a transfer across a state line, though follow-up care at home still has to be reconciled with it.
An injured guest has no standing to walk into a management office and ask for maintenance history, which is a practical obstacle that does not exist in an ordinary premises case.
What can be captured immediately is the platform side: the listing as it stood at booking, the photographs, the amenity claims, the house rules, the messages exchanged with the host, and the reviews. All of it is editable by the host, and none of it can be recreated later.
What has to come through a written request or through discovery is everything held by the building: association maintenance records for the common element where the injury happened, the operator's incident log, prior complaints about the same condition, inspection history, and any contractor's service records. Each sits with a different party.
The city record is a third category. A business license, any short-term rental registration, and the zoning status of the address are matters of public record and describe how the property was being operated.
Can I get the building's maintenance records myself?
Not directly. Association and management records generally come through a written request or through discovery once a claim is brought, which is a reason to capture the platform listing and reviews immediately, since those are available to you and are editable by the host.
The property owner is the primary defendant, along with any management company, association, or contractor responsible for the condition. Whether a platform can be liable as an operator is contested rather than settled.
That is a common problem and a reason to identify every other policy, including a management company's commercial coverage, an association master policy, and any contractor responsible for the hazard.
In South Carolina, where the injury occurred, under South Carolina deadlines. Residency is not required.
It can. The city restricts short-term rentals by zoning district, and whether a unit was operating lawfully is part of the record about how the property was being run.
Nothing up front. Consultations are free, and the fee is contingent on recovery.
The Arndt Law Firm starts a short-term rental claim by finding the coverage, because a property run commercially under a residential policy may have no insurer willing to respond. That answer decides whether there is anything to negotiate. In a condominium or resort building, that means the unit owner, the management company, and the association all get identified rather than just the name on the listing.
The platform record is captured immediately, since listing photographs, amenity descriptions, and prior guest reviews are editable by the host, and prior complaints are frequently the clearest evidence of notice. Horry County claims are filed in the Court of Common Pleas in Conway. Attorney Jonathan S. Arndt has been licensed in South Carolina since 2018 and reviews the firm's short-term rental matters.
Guests owe nothing unless the claim recovers, and an initial conversation costs nothing wherever you live. You can reach the firm through the contact page. A rental is cleaned and often repaired within hours of a guest leaving, so the condition that caused an injury is usually gone by the next afternoon.
Last reviewed: August 2026
This page was reviewed by Jonathan S. Arndt, licensed in South Carolina since 2018.
Content is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Consult a licensed South Carolina attorney for guidance specific to your situation.
