Most expensive rental homes now sold most often

Rental supply falls 12.9 per cent while rents rise more strongly than inflation

Rotterdam, 7 October 2026 - In the third quarter of 2026, the sale of rental homes shifted towards the most expensive segment of the unregulated housing sector, according to an analysis by housing platforms Pararius and Huurwoningen.nl. Nearly a third (32.7 per cent) of the former rental homes sold had a rent of more than €2,000 per month, compared with just over a fifth (21.3 per cent) a year earlier. The share of mid-market rentals fell from 20.8 to 14.6 per cent of those sales. At the same time, rental supply in the unregulated housing sector decreased by 12.9 per cent and the rent per square metre rose by 4.4 per cent, more strongly than house prices and inflation. 

Number of available rental properties 

In the third quarter of 2026, 13,517 rental homes in the unregulated housing sector were offered. A year earlier there were 15,515. Home seekers had 1,998 fewer homes to choose from, a decrease of 12.9 per cent.

In the third quarter of 2026, 15,102 homes were let, 1,585 more than came onto the rental market. That difference is the largest since the third quarter of 2024. 

Supply by price segment

Pararius divides rental supply in the unregulated housing sector into three price ranges: from the deregulation threshold (€1,228.07) up to €1,500 per month, from €1,500 up to and including €2,000, and above €2,000 per month. Compared with a year ago, supply shifted towards the more expensive price ranges. In the cheapest price range of the unregulated housing sector, 3,037 homes were let last quarter, 23.3 per cent fewer than in the third quarter of 2025. This segment is still being hit hardest, which leaves home seekers on a small budget with less and less to choose from. In the middle price range, the number of homes let rose from 4,925 to 5,432. Above €2,000, the number remained virtually unchanged at 6,633 homes (6,543 a year earlier).

Average number of responses per listing

In the third quarter of 2026, a rental home in the unregulated housing sector received an average of 23 responses. A year earlier this was still 40, a decrease of 42.5 per cent. It is the lowest number of responses since the second quarter of 2021.

In the third quarter of 2026, rental homes up to €1,500 per month made up a fifth of supply but attracted over a third of all responses: 20.1 per cent of supply against 35.2 per cent of responses. A year ago that ratio was less skewed, with 25.7 per cent of supply against 34.3 per cent of responses.

For rental homes with a rent above €2,000, the picture is exactly the reverse. This quarter that segment is the largest of the three in terms of supply, at 43.9 per cent, but it attracts proportionally the least interest: 24.4 per cent of responses, compared with 25.9 per cent a year earlier.

The middle price range, from €1,500 to €2,000, attracts the most responses of the three: 40.5 per cent, against 36 per cent of supply.

In the third quarter of 2026, a rental home in the unregulated housing sector was online for an average of 21 days. That is three days longer than in the same quarter a year earlier, when it was 18 days.

Within every price range a home stayed online longer than a year ago, with the more expensive homes staying online the longest. A home with a rent above €2,000 was typically online for 27 days, while a rental home up to €1,500 disappeared from the rental market again within 15 days.

Pressure on the Dutch rental market

Pararius maps the balance between supply and demand with the tightness indicator. It combines four elements: total supply, the inflow of new rental homes, the time listings stay online and the number of responses per home. The lower the score, the tighter the market.

In the third quarter of 2026 the indicator came out at 0.99, compared with 0.40 a year earlier. Tightness therefore eased somewhat, but a score of 0.99 still means a pronounced landlord's market. The threshold of 5, the point at which the market reaches the earliest phase of equilibrium, remains far out of reach.

Average rent vs. required gross income

In the third quarter of 2026, new tenants paid an average of €1,914 per month for a rental home in the unregulated housing sector. A year earlier this was €1,869, an increase of 2.4 per cent. Landlords usually require a gross monthly income of at least three times the rent. At the current average rent, that comes to €5,742 per month, €135 more than a year earlier.

Although the monthly rent rose by 2.4 per cent, the average rent per square metre rose considerably harder, by 4.4 per cent. The total monthly rent grew less because supply has shifted towards smaller homes (96 square metres on average, compared with 99 square metres a year earlier); smaller homes have a relatively higher price per square metre, while the total rent ends up lower.

The Pararius Rental Price Index (PRP)

The Pararius Rental Price Index tracks the rent per square metre and sets it against house prices and inflation, with 2021 as the base year. In the third quarter of 2026, the rent per square metre was 4.4 per cent higher than a year earlier. House prices rose by 3.5 per cent over the same period and inflation came in at 3.2 per cent.¹

Since 2021, house prices have risen by 46.7 per cent, rents by 34.9 per cent and inflation by 29.4 per cent. Since the first quarter of 2025, rents have been rising more strongly than inflation.

Shift from rental to owner-occupied market

When a landlord decides to sell a rental home, that home ends up on the sales market. Pararius maps this sell-off using transaction data from the Kadaster, the Dutch Land Registry. In the third quarter of 2026, 5.4 per cent of all homes sold in the Netherlands were former rental homes, compared with 5.9 per cent a year earlier.²

* The figures up to and including Q4 2022 are compiled from earlier studies that formed the basis of previous editions of the Quarterly Rental Report.

For the breakdown by rent, Pararius and Huurwoningen.nl linked their own rental data to the Kadaster data. This shows the rent at which a sold home was previously listed on either platform. Landlords are increasingly selling off more expensive rental homes. Of all homes sold off, 32.7 per cent had a rent of more than €2,000 per month, compared with 21.3 per cent a year earlier. This is the first time since this measurement began (Q3 2024) that this is the largest group within the sell-off.³ In one year, the share of mid-market rentals fell from 20.8 to 14.6 per cent.

The Affordable Rent Act is meant to make rents affordable for middle incomes.⁴ Since 1 July 2024, a maximum rent has applied to mid-market rental homes with up to and including 186 points in the housing valuation system (woningwaarderingsstelsel). Within the sell-off, mid-market rentals have made up a smaller share every quarter since then. More than eight in ten rental homes sold now fall within the unregulated housing sector, for which the act sets no maximum rent. Private landlords in every price range do, however, pay Box 3 tax, and this has been increased since 2024.⁵

“The Affordable Rent Act was supposed to deliver more affordable rental homes, but it is achieving the opposite,” says Jasper de Groot, CEO of Pararius. “Since its introduction, more than 76,000 rental homes have already disappeared from the market through sell-offs⁶, and the sell-off is continuing. Landlords are now even selling their most expensive homes, because with the higher Box 3 tax, letting in the expensive segment is, I fear, no longer profitable for many landlords either. This makes the cure worse than the disease; the damage is already enormous and it will take decades to recover to the old level, which at the time was already far too small.”

The regional differences in sell-off are large. Of all homes sold in Amstelveen since 1 July 2024, 13.3 per cent had previously been listed for rent on Pararius or Huurwoningen.nl. Weesp follows with 10.1 per cent and Amsterdam with 9.1 per cent. Rotterdam (8.8 per cent), Wassenaar (8.1 per cent) and Hilversum (8.1 per cent) also score high. The Hague and Eindhoven both come out at 7.6 per cent. Utrecht is the only one of the G5 cities not in the top 15. The ranking includes cities where at least 500 homes have been sold since 1 July 2024.

Average rent per square metre by property type

In the third quarter of 2026, new tenants paid an average of €20.92 per square metre. That is 4.4 per cent more than a year earlier. Apartments came out at €22.61 per square metre, an increase of 5.4 per cent. Single-family homes cost an average of €16.70 per square metre, 1.5 per cent more than a year earlier. In the third quarter of 2025, these prices stood at €21.45 and €16.46.

Delivery types in the Netherlands

Pararius distinguishes three delivery types⁷: shell⁸, upholstered⁹ and furnished¹⁰. In the third quarter of 2026, upholstered homes made up the largest share of supply at 48.4 per cent. Furnished homes followed with 44.3 per cent and shell homes accounted for 7.2 per cent.

Renting furnished is the most expensive, at an average of €24.90 per square metre. For an upholstered home, new tenants paid an average of €22.09 per square metre and for a shell home €18.51.

Rental price developments in Dutch cities

Amsterdam remains the most expensive city for rental homes in the unregulated housing sector at €28.56 per square metre, followed by Amstelveen (€24.72) and Haarlem (€24.34). Renting is cheapest per square metre in Zwolle (€14.32), Leeuwarden (€14.33) and Helmond (€15.31).

Among the G5 cities, prices rose most strongly in Rotterdam (+5.0%, €22.92) and The Hague (+4.8%, €22.95). Utrecht (+2.4%, €22.87) and Eindhoven (+1.6%, €19.61) lagged behind. In Eindhoven, larger homes were let than a year earlier, which pushes down the price per square metre. Amsterdam saw the smallest increase of the five, at 1.1 per cent.

The largest increases occurred in Nijmegen (+18.1%) and Hoofddorp (+13.4%). In Nijmegen the homes let were on average 17.5 per cent smaller than a year earlier, and in Hoofddorp 19.2 per cent smaller. Smaller homes usually have a higher price per square metre. In Lelystad (−12.0%) and Dordrecht (−10.5%) the price fell most sharply, while larger homes were let there. These are smaller rental markets, where a limited number of transactions can make the average fluctuate more strongly.

In 36 of the 45 cities with sufficient supply, the price per square metre was higher than a year earlier.

Click here and here for an overview of price trends in Dutch cities.

Provinces

North Holland remains the most expensive province at €25.44 per square metre, followed by South Holland (€21.58) and Utrecht (€20.86). Renting is cheapest in Drenthe (€13.16) and Friesland (€13.60); they are the only two provinces with a rent per square metre below €15.

Within the Randstad, prices in South Holland (+5.4%) and Utrecht (+4.2%) rose harder than in North Holland (+3.3%). The largest year-on-year increases were in Zeeland (+9.1%) and Drenthe (+8.5%). In Flevoland the price remained virtually unchanged, with an increase of 0.9 per cent.

In no province did the average price per square metre fall.

Click here for an overview of price trends in Dutch provinces.

About Pararius

As the largest independent housing platform in the Netherlands, Pararius has been mapping developments in the rental market of the unregulated housing sector for years. The figures in this Quarterly Rental Report are based on rental homes that professional market players list and take offline via Pararius and Huurwoningen.nl. These are homes that were actually available for rent and whose rent, property characteristics and listing duration are known. Figures on sell-off are based on transaction data from the Kadaster, which is used to establish what share of the homes sold were previously rental homes. For the breakdown by rent and city, this data has been linked to the own rental data of Pararius and Huurwoningen.nl.

The data is continuously updated with new listing and letting data, so the Quarterly Rental Report gives a current and representative picture of the Dutch rental market in the unregulated housing sector. The Quarterly Rental Report is published every quarter and is compiled from anonymised listing data. A detailed explanation of definitions and calculations is included in the methodology.

Click here for a detailed explanation of the calculations.