The Netherlands could create as many as 120.000 additional homes by 2030 by simply renovating the existing stock of housing, a new report has suggested. 

IEB calls on government to renovate buildings to create more homes

A new study by the Economic Institute for Construction (IEB) has estimated that the Netherlands could utilise a relatively untapped resource and renovate existing buildings to help ease the tense situation on the housing market. 

According to the report, existing buildings could either be split (when a larger home is divided into several small ones), topped up (when an extra floor is added to an existing building) or transformed (when existing buildings like schools, offices and other buildings are converted into houses). 

Together, these three methods could allow the Netherlands to add between 100.000 and 120.000 additional homes to its stock, the report’s authors write. If the government supported the scheme with targeted subsidies and changed laws that discourage the splitting of homes in certain neighbourhoods, the IEB writes that up to 150.000 new homes could be created. 

Dutch government plans to build 900.000 new homes by 2030

The Dutch government has plans to add more than 900.000 new homes to the housing stock by 2030, but Natuur & Milieu, the environmental organisation that commissioned the IEB research, argues that they are primarily focusing on new construction projects to achieve this target. According to the report, renovating existing buildings has the benefit of being more environmentally friendly than building new ones, with CO2 emissions up to 85 percent lower. 

CBS reports that the Netherlands added 73.000 homes to its housing stock in 2023, of which 15.000 were created as a result of division and transformation. 

Other solutions to Dutch housing crisis floated

Renovations are just one method being floated as a way to ease the housing crisis in the Netherlands. IEB’s study comes just after a report by Rabobank that recommended the government reduce tax breaks for homeowners in order to reduce house and land prices. They argued that lots of the benefits of homeownership, such as the increase in value and living enjoyment, remain largely untaxed, while the brunt of rising house prices are pushed onto people who rent their properties. 

They suggested that the government increase the notional rental value - an amount that homeowners must add to their annual income as a kind of fictitious rental income for the purposes of taxation - from 0,35 percent to 1,7 percent. They argued this would dampen price growth, to the benefit of renters. 

The report also pointed out that the availability of land is a big problem standing in the way of house building. RaboResearch recommended giving municipalities more freedom to build on certain locations. 

What everyone can agree on is that, while methods like these might help, a long-term solution to the housing crisis is something that will take time.