Buying or renting a house in Portugal: financial burden will increase in 2023.

Housing purchase and rental prices in Portugal continue to rise in 2023. Although the rate of increase in housing costs has slowed down in some cities, they are still growing faster than family salaries. As a result, the efforts required to buy or rent a home have increased over the past year in almost all Portuguese district capitals, according to a study conducted by a real estate analyst.

Efforts to rent and buy housing

The effort required to rent housing in Portugal has increased by nineteen percentage points, from 62% in the fourth quarter of 2022 to 81% in the fourth quarter of 2023. As for buying a home, the national effort level has risen by 14 points, from 57% to 71%.

Cities with the most significant increase in costs

Among all 20 cities studied (with representative samples), Faro saw the most significant increase in rental efforts over the past year, rising from 58% in the fourth quarter of 2022 to 87% in the same period of 2023 (+29 percentage points).

The level of effort required to buy a home in cities

At the end of 2023, the city with the highest effort to buy a home was Funchal (113%), followed by Faro (107%) and Lisbon (101%). At the same time, there are six district capitals in Portugal where housing can be purchased with an effort level equal to or below the recommended 33%.

Increase in the cost of buying a home

The study also showed that the percentage of income that families have to spend on buying a home has increased in all regional capitals except for Vila Real. In Faro, the effort to purchase a home rose from 69% to 107%, which is an increase of 38 percentage points. Other cities also follow with rising costs for housing purchases.

Overall situation

Thus, the situation with housing prices in Portugal continues to worsen, making access to housing unattainable for many families.