Big drop in rental home listings

Within the first quarter of this year, 24 percent fewer homes have been put up for rent compared to the same period last year. The number of hire contracts was also down nine percent this quarter according to figures from Pararius, the biggest platform for rental homes in the Netherlands. The average price of a rental home did rise with 0.7 percent. "The strong decrease in rental offers is to be blamed on the crisis that reached its lowest point on the housing market in 2013, which is why many more people then offered their unsold home for rent. Now the sale market is attracting again, there are much fewer individual owners who choose to rent out their second home" says Jasper de Groot, director at Pararius. According to De Groot, the rental prices are still rising because there is a much slower decline in demand for rental homes than the rental offer in the private sector. The demand for rental home in the middle-price region (€700-€1000 a month) is by far the biggest. People who rent these homes are usually starters on the housing market who don't want to commit themselves to buying a house, but who have difficulty being granted a mortgage. The average price to rent a home in the private sector was €1232 per month.