According to the latest Rent Monitor from housing platform Pararius, rents across the country in the free sector aren’t rising as quickly as they were; in fact, they are levelling off. In Rotterdam, rents fell for the first time in ages.

Rents rising much more slowly across the Netherlands

Despite rents for new contracts falling in the third quarter (Q3) in Rotterdam, making it 3,4 percent cheaper to rent a place compared to the same period last year, rents elsewhere in the country rose on average by 3,6 percent per square metre compared to Q3 in 2018. This is the fifth quarter in a row that rent increases have stayed below 5 percent, and the average increase is much lower than that of the resale property market, which came in at 7,2 percent in Q3.

In general, rent increases are slowing down in the large Dutch cities, with Utrecht being the only one of the urban conglomerate to see rents rise above the national average. There, rents rose by a whopping 8,6 percent. In comparison, rents in Amsterdam only went up by 2,8 percent to 23,47 euros per square metre- still extremely expensive, but a much smaller increase than in previous quarters.

In The Hague rents only increased by 2,1 percent in Q3, making it 16,24 euros per square metre on average. According to Pararius, "The moderate price increases in most large cities seem to suggest that a price ceiling has now been reached.”

Smaller cities see big jumps in price

Whilst rent increases are slowing down in the bigger cities, the smaller surrounding ones are seeing some pretty massive hikes. Take Hoofddorp, rents rose by 17,5 percent compared to Q3 last year. However, it’s still more than six euros cheaper per square metre than Amsterdam. In Delft, prices are also rising, coming to 10,2 percent more than the same period last year.

This same trend can be seen in Zoetermeer and Leiden, where prices increased by 11,2 percent and 6 percent respectively in Q3 2019. According to Jasper de Groot, manager at Pararius, it’s a logical step for people to compromise on not only the characteristics of the accommodation they are looking for but also the location when prices in the big cities become too high. This is what we see now, with home seekers looking for places outside of the big cities.