It's not clear that anyone has the legal means to stop you from hosting your friends for free. Besides, couch surfers typically stay in the same house as the c

It's not clear that anyone has the legal means to stop you from hosting your friends for free. Besides, couch surfers typically stay in the same house as the current resident, and he/she has to maintain good relations with the neighbours. The apartment adjacent to mine recently got turned into a short-term rental place. Most of the time there's no problem, but every couple of weeks an extremely loud group of tourists comes over and treats it like a party house, making tons of noise, blasting soccer games on the TV with associated loud cheering, etc.