Bad Nauheim levies a year-round Kurbeitrag on non-local persons who stay overnight or use the town's spa facilities. The standard adult daily rate is €3.90 per person per day in Zone 1 (Bad Nauheim and specified streets in Nieder-Mörlen); Zone 2 (the remaining listed districts) is €1.90. The rate includes 7% VAT. Arrival and departure together count as one day. The charge is capped at the applicable annual pass: €150 for non-residents and €50 for residents. Reduced daily rates are €1.80/€0.90 for severely disabled persons with a degree of disability of at least 70% and blind persons, and €0 for children aged 6 to under 14 accompanied by an adult holding a daily or annual guest card. The 2025 bylaw entered into force on 1 January 2025.
Exempt from the duty to pay are people staying only for vocational education or training (not seminars), guests staying free of charge with a family whose main residence is in the area, patients in acute general-care hospitals, bedridden sick persons, people receiving outpatient spa treatments while resident elsewhere, persons liable for the municipal second-home tax, and children under 6 accompanied by family members. The exemption for categories 1–5 ends if spa facilities or spa events are used. Exempt from payment (subject to the bylaw's conditions) are persons unable to work, war-injured persons and persons needing care who receive specified public assistance and pay their own stay and cure costs, plus necessary accompanying persons of severely disabled persons or persons with at least 70% reduced earning capacity when the necessity is documented and the companion uses no spa treatments. Reduced rates apply to severely disabled persons with a disability degree of at least 70% and blind persons, and children aged 6 to under 14 accompanied by an adult holding a guest card.
For a short-term holiday rental, using a primary residence as a holiday apartment is permitted for up to 8 weeks per year. An unlimited or permanent holiday rental requires an appropriate building permit/use-change approval; the city treats a permanently holiday-rented unit as a commercial use distinct from ordinary residential use. In both cases, the host must submit the city's holiday-apartment registration application, comply with the Kurbeitrag bylaw, transmit all overnight stays to the city's Kur- und Servicebetrieb, and obtain any separately required trade permit. Under the Kurbeitrag bylaw, accommodation operators and persons renting rooms or housing temporarily for payment must record guests' names and arrival/departure dates, collect and remit the Kurbeitrag, issue guest cards, use the city's digital software for registration/data transmission/card printing, and are liable for timely and complete remittance. The bylaw provides fines of €5 to €50,000 for breaches.