Status: 11/17/2021 7:00 p.m.
The housing market in many Dutch cities is tense – to the displeasure of the population. Rotterdam now has protection zones that are supposed to keep speculators away. Other cities want to follow suit.
After the real estate crisis of 2014 in the Klaverstraat in the Rotterdam residential area Carnisse, the real estate agents’ offer signs hung on many facades of the unadorned terraced houses: “Te koop – to buy”. But now all the properties are off the market, says Bas Kurvers, the city’s councilor for building and living – 90 percent of the apartments in the district have been sold to investors. Kurvers believes that a term that is open to interpretation: “They call themselves investors, but these are not always the good ones. Many rent rents that are too high and let their apartments run down.”
Young families and start-ups have little chance of asserting themselves against financially strong investors, says real estate agent Daan Kardol. And not just because the big investors could offer more money. Because if an investor can buy without financing, while a private bidder can only buy with reservation of the bank financing, then the seller decides in most cases “for security”.
16 neighborhoods under special protection
But houses are there to live and not to earn money with, says the alderman Kurvers. The city has therefore declared 16 Rotterdam residential areas to be protected zones from January 1st. They can be recognized by prohibition signs with a red border, in the middle of which a laughing house is depicted. “Opkoopbescherming!” stands underneath – “purchase protection”.
The people of Rotterdam, says Kurvers, are showing that they are “working on an honest housing market”. And it is also a “warning signal” to all those who just wanted to earn money from houses: “We don’t want them here.”
The dispute over housing market policy is now driving many Dutch people onto the streets – as here in Rotterdam in October.
Image: EPA
The buyers should move in
From the coming year, apartments in the protection zones up to a market value of 355,000 euros must be inhabited by the owner himself or by family members in the first four years after acquisition. Speculators and rental sharks should be left out when buying.
In Amsterdam, where something similar is planned, the valuation limit is even over 500,000 euros. Purchase prices there have doubled over the past seven years.
Do the poor end up suffering?
Broker Kardol understands the advance of the cities, but points out that the offer for tenants will be reduced as a result. If offers are withdrawn from the market, there are consequences for students and poorer groups who do not have the opportunity to buy an apartment for themselves. For this, Kardol demands, “there must be a sensible alternative”.
Rotterdam is not about scaring off all investors, argues Kurvers. Rather, the dubious investors should be slowed down in order not to drive up rental prices any further. Social justice concerns everyone. “And when people are exploited and have to pay too high rents, then that cannot be allowed.”
Similar plans in many cities
Rotterdam is the first Dutch municipality to set up protection zones against investors. The Amsterdam City Council will probably give the green light for this in February.
And Utrecht, The Hague, Tilburg and Groningen have announced that they will follow suit. The Dutch cities want to have more access to the housing market again.
Protection zones against rental sharks in Rotterdam
Ludger Kazmierczak, ARD Den Haag, November 17, 2021 3:24 p.m.