The purchase protection ensures that homes cannot simply be bought up for rental purposes. Also called buy to let. In this way, more owner-occupied homes will remain available for people who will actually live in them as owners. In fact, there is a self-occupancy obligation when buying an existing home. The national purchase protection (Dutch: opkoopbescherming) came into effect on 1 January 2022. The purchase rules apply when a municipality has introduced them locally.
1. What is Purchase Protection?
2. Purchase Protection Exceptions
3. Purchase Protection Concerns and Disadvantages
3. Overview of municipalities with and without purchase protection
What is Purchase Protection?
The pressure on the housing market is being felt across the country. More and more people are having trouble finding affordable housing. In order to give home seekers, including starters and middle-income earners, a better chance of an affordable owner-occupied home on the housing market, a municipality can opt to introduce purchase protection. This can be done in neighborhoods where there is a scarcity of cheap and medium-priced owner-occupied homes or when the quality of life in a neighborhood is under pressure due to the purchase of homes for rent. The municipality must determine in advance which homes fall into the low-cost and mid-price segments. The amount of the price for homes to which the scheme applies is usually a WOZ value less than or equal to € 355,000. This is the value limit of the National Mortgage Guarantee. Municipalities can deviate from this and will also do so if the average house price is higher than the NHG limit.
Purchase Protection Exceptions
In three exceptional cases, despite the purchase protection introduced, a municipality must still grant a permit for rental, this applies to homes that:
- be rented to relatives;
- be part of a retail, office or commercial building;
- temporarily rented.
The temporary rental is subject to the condition that the owner has lived in the house for at least one year. In addition, municipalities themselves can determine additional exceptional cases that are appropriate to the problems and composition of the neighbourhood.
Selling a home and renting it back remains possible under the above condition. When purchasing a so-called mixed use or combination property, partial rental remains possible.
The purchase protection is currently valid for five years. This is followed by an evaluation of the necessity and relevance of this measure in the economic situation at that time.
Purchase protection concerns and disadvantages
The purchase protection will ensure that there are fewer rental properties. The number of student residences is also expected to decrease. After all, it is a misconception that buying up homes would make these homes disappear. Many people now live in these houses who prefer to rent instead of buying a house. Rents are expected to rise sharply due to a growing shortage of rental properties, based on the law of supply and demand. Private real estate investors often refurbish old or dilapidated buildings and add living space to the stock. These are homes that will no longer be available in areas where purchase protection has been implemented. The refurbishment and transformation of real estate into a residential destination is seriously hampered by the purchase protection. Buyers of a home for their own occupation are often looking for a home that is ready to move into. The question is therefore who will take up the gauntlet if many homes are no longer refurbished or renovated.
Due to the purchase protection and the attention that has been paid to this, there is an incorrect image in the media and private real estate investors are getting a worse image, while this is unjustified. Building up a pension or supplementing income are completely legitimate reasons to invest in real estate. Due to the arrival of special products, more and more consumers are building up their own (supplementary) pension by buying and renting out a house.
Thanks to a smart, legal construction with permits, the right of ownership of private individuals who own their own home has been further restricted. A seller of a house is no longer free to sell the house to the highest bidder. This highest bidder may no longer be present on the market. The introduction of purchase protection was originally intended to be introduced in a few districts of a city. In practice, however, this turns out to be the exception rather than the rule and municipalities often declare the rules applicable to the entire city.
Many municipalities have not introduced purchase protection because of doubts about its effectiveness and undesirable effects.
In a number of municipalities people wonder whether buying up homes by investors is a problem.
Overview of municipalities with and without purchase protection
Which municipalities have Purchase Protection? The overview below is regularly updated. Since the introduction of the Purchase Protection Act on 1 January 2022, the following municipalities have applied the instrument.
