Far too little compensation for rent freezing

It was one of the surprising measures that came out the day before yesterday: the rents of social rental properties are not allowed on July 1 this year and July 1 next year.

Yesterday, residential minister Mona Keijzer said that she is compensating for housing associations for that rental freez. And today it became clear what amounts are involved.

In total, corporations will receive 1.1 billion euros in compensation over the next three years (270 million in 2026 and 405 million in both 2027 and 2028).

According to the corporations, that is far too little, because in the same three years they will miss more than 3 billion euros because they are not allowed to increase the rent. The compensation money is a drop on the glowing plate, says Aedes, the association of housing associations.

“The rental frameworks put tenants in the cold,” says Aedes chairman Liesbeth Spies. The social landlords expect that they cannot build tens of thousands of planned new -build homes because they miss out on money.

They can also insulate fewer homes or give an electric heat pump instead of a gas boiler. “It is a soffer for tenants who do not receive a lower energy bill and for anyone who is waiting for an affordable social rental home,” says Spies.

For this year, the cabinet had previously decided that housing associations could increase rents by an average of 4.5 percent. Based on that, the corporations and Minister Keijzer agreed that the construction of social rental properties is going up: from just under 18,000 in 2023 to 30,000 a year. But that is becoming unfeasible now, the corporations say.

The representative of tenants, the Woonbond, was still happy with the rent freezing the day before yesterday. Today the union is angry. Because the Woonbond also believes that the corporations do not get enough compensation for the loss of rental income.

“It’s really a pittance,” says Woonbond director Zeno Winkels. “All good intentions are now in separate screws. This cabinet reduces the social rental sector.” He means that much less will be built now.

The social rents are therefore not allowed to rise for two years. At the same time, the income of tenants will increase because wages and benefits rise every year. And as a result, the cabinet is now expected to pay 500 million less housing allowance every year.

The first two years of that saving of 500 million euros annually, the coalition uses a ‘shopping bonus’. That bonus is in fact a one -off increase in the housing allowance in 2026, which costs the government a total of 1 billion. Only people who receive rent allowance get that ‘shopping bonus’.

And from 2027 the rent allowance will go down again. While the government still spends around 500 million euros less on tenants annually.