Outdated rents

With the entry into force of the "More Housing" Package, the overwhelming majority of housing lease contracts prior to the RAU (which came into force on November 18, 1990), became, in practice, for life. Until Law no. 56/2023, of 6 October, it was possible for landlords to cause the transition of lease contracts (even if subject to a transitional period of rent freeze) in which tenants were in one of the following situations:

• age 65 years or older;
• disability equal to or greater than 60%;
• Adjusted gross annual income of the household less than 5 minimum wages.

With this law, leases with tenants in one of these situations are now frozen for life, and can only be subject to annual updating based on the coefficients published by INE, nor can rents be updated based on the VPT of the properties. Following this lifetime freeze, DL no. 132/2023, of 27 December, was published, which establishes compensation to landlords, in the sense that the amount corresponding to the difference between the updated value based on the VPT of the property and the effective value of rent paid by the tenant is paid directly by the IHRU.

As an example, if a property has a VPT of €90,000, the monthly amount up to which you could update the rent before the "More Housing" Package (with a few exceptions) was €500. Thus, considering that the current rent actually paid is €150, the landlord will be entitled to a monthly compensation of €350.

The IHRU said that 2900 requests for compensation were made, with an average value of €215.76, and the compensation will begin to be paid in October, retroactive to the date of the request (and the measure took effect from July 1). This measure is valid for 12 months from the request, renewable for equal periods.