State invests €375M in student digs

The Portuguese government has made its biggest investment yet in student residences.

It will invest €375 million in the construction, acquisition, repurposing and renovation of either existing or new building stock through its National Higher Education Accommodation Plan.
On 21 July the government announced the final results of applications for finance. Some 134 applications for projects with a total of 18,239 beds, 11,795 of which are new, which will enhance the existing offer. 6,444 will result from refurbishing the current network of student accommodation.
The north of Portugal will have the greatest number of beds financed by the PNAES (5,614), followed by the centre regions (4,790), and Lisbon (4,421). The Alentejo will have 1,991 new and refurbished beds, the Algarve 719, Madeira (434) and the Azores (270).
Under the terms of the Recovery and Resilience Plan (RRP) 15,000 beds will be made available for higher education students by Q1 of 2026. The €375 million initially earmarked will be managed and executed by the National Agency for the Management of the Erasmus+Education and Training Programme.