Existing housing rents frozen

The Portuguese government has announced through its Ministry of Housing that existing rental contracts will remain outside the current rental regime — indefinitely – in order to protect tenants.

The measure was announced this week by the Minister of Housing, Marina Gonçalves to protect tenants, the majority of which are pensioners.
In an interview with the newspaper Público and radio Renascença, she explained that the measure, which is part of the Government’s legislative housing package ‘More Housing’ included as an offset a compensation to be paid to landlords losing out because of rents not being increased in line with the market, the details and amounts of which are still being worked out.
“In addition to the two more immediate measures, which are exemption from IRS income tax and IMI property tax, there is a third aspect which is an indirect increase in the rent reflected by State compensation paid to the landlord”, says Marina Gonçalves.
“We need to look a this to understand which contracts we are referring to, how many are €20, how many are €200, and how many are €400 and from this work out a fair compensation to the landlord,” she added.
As to the rent subsidy that the Government has included in the package to help alleviate the housing crisis, the minister foresees that this could reach up to 100,000 families with an effort rate above 35%.

Photo: Lusa – A. Cotrim