The private rental sell-off has reached Groningen, Tilburg, and Enschede — and internationals are trapped

When I talk to users who moved to Groningen, Tilburg, or Enschede, the story is almost always the same. They left Amsterdam or Utrecht because rent was eating half their income. They found a place on Pararius or Kamernet for €900–€1,100 a month. They figured they'd build a life in a smaller city, save some money, and maybe move back to the Randstad later.

That plan is falling apart.

The private rental sell-off that started in Amsterdam and Rotterdam has spread. NL Times reported in August 2026 that the private sector is "rapidly dwindling" in smaller Dutch cities and towns. This is no longer a Randstad phenomenon. The same forces that pushed landlords out of Amsterdam — the Affordable Rent Act, Box 3 tax changes, the abolition of temporary leases — are now hitting the cities that internationals relocated to for affordability.

Nationally, the numbers are stark. Private landlords sold 15,800 homes in Q3 2025 alone and bought only 6,000. That's a sell-to-buy ratio of nearly 3:1. The investor share of Dutch housing dropped from 9.4% in 2023 to 9.1% in 2025. And the homes being sold aren't being bought by other landlords — they're being bought by owner-occupiers who take them off the rental market permanently.

The Affordable Rent Act (Wet Betaalbare Huur), enacted in July 2024, extended rent controls to the mid-market segment using the WWS points system. The intention was good: protect tenants from excessive rents. The execution has been a disaster for rental supply.

In smaller cities, the economics were already thinner. A landlord in Amsterdam can maybe absorb lower yields because property values keep climbing. In Tilburg or Enschede, the margins were already tight. When the WWS cap tells you you can only charge €800 for a unit that was renting at €1,100, the math stops working. So you sell.

Box 3 is making it worse. The new regime, set for full implementation in 2028, will tax actual returns on investments — including rental income and capital gains. For small-scale landlords who maybe own one or two properties in Groningen, that uncertainty is enough. They're cashing out now before the rules get stricter.

The abolition of temporary leases (Wet vaste huurcontracten) in July 2024 removed another tool. Landlords who used flexible contracts to manage risk now can't. Combined with the transfer tax that was temporarily hiked to 10.4% before being cut back to 8% in 2026, the regulatory environment has been hostile enough that selling feels like the only sane option.

Here's the part that really hurts internationals. The average ex-rental home sells for €384,000. The average home bought from another owner-occupier sells for €511,000. That €127,000 gap tells you everything: the homes being stripped from the rental market are the cheaper ones. The entry-level stock. The exactly-the-price-range-internals-were-relying-on stock.

In smaller cities, this effect is amplified. The pool of institutional investors who might buy and hold rental properties is thinner outside the Randstad. So when a private landlord in Enschede sells, there's no corporation stepping in to keep it as a rental. It goes to a first-time buyer with a Dutch mortgage and a BSN, and it's gone from the rental market forever.

I've seen this play out with our own users. A PhD student in Groningen who was paying €950 for a studio got notice in January that the landlord was selling. She had two months to find something new. The comparable listings on Pararius were all €1,300+ — if they even stayed up long enough to apply. The free-sector stock that was affordable when she moved in 2023 simply doesn't exist at that price point anymore.

So where do you go when the private sector dries up? The obvious answer is social housing. But for internationals, that door is bolted shut.

Social housing in the Netherlands is allocated through WoningNet and similar systems, where priority is based on inschrijfduur — your registration time. In the Randstad, wait times run 7–15 years. In smaller cities it can be somewhat shorter, but we're still talking years, not months. If you arrived in the Netherlands last year, your inschrijfduur is essentially zero. You will not get a social housing unit.

There are also income caps. Social housing is reserved for households earning below a certain threshold (around €44,000 for a single person, adjusted annually). Many internationals working in tech or at the university earn above that line. So even if you waited ten years, you'd be ineligible.

This is the trap. The free sector is shrinking and getting more expensive — 42% of free-sector listings now exceed €2,000/month, up from 36.5% a year ago. The regulated sector is inaccessible because of wait times and income rules. There is no third option.

At House Hunter, we watch over 1,000 housing websites. We see listings appear and disappear in real time. What I can tell you from the data is that the velocity in smaller cities has changed dramatically.

Listings in Groningen, Tilburg, and Enschede that used to sit for 2–3 weeks are now gone in 10–14 days. Sometimes faster. The competition has intensified because the pool of available units is smaller, but the number of people looking hasn't dropped. Internationals who moved to these cities are still there. Dutch students are still there. Young couples who would have bought but can't afford the €384,000 asking price are still renting. Everyone's competing for a shrinking pie.

Landlords in these cities now have their pick of applicants. When you have 30 people applying for one unit in Tilburg, the landlord is going to choose the person with a Dutch payslip, a permanent contract, and local references. Not the expat who arrived three months ago with a temporary employment contract and no BSN history.

The upfront costs have become brutal too. For a €2,500/month property — which is what you're looking at in the remaining free sector — deposits and fees often run €7,500–€10,000. In smaller cities, that used to buy you several months of rent. Now it's just the entry fee.

The Affordable Rent Act was designed to protect tenants. Instead, it's removing the housing stock that tenants depended on. The Dutch government has recognized the problem — they've softened some provisions and cut the transfer tax back to 8% in 2026 — but the damage is done. Landlords who've already decided to sell aren't coming back because the tax was 2 percentage points lower.

Meanwhile, the Box 3 changes looming for 2028 continue to spook anyone thinking about buying a rental property. International investors have reduced their activity to a historic low of 7% of transactions. Housing associations and institutional landlords are expanding, but not nearly fast enough to offset the 38,000 net rental homes lost in 2025 alone.

The result is a policy paradox. The rules meant to make housing more affordable have made it less accessible for the people who needed affordability most. Internationals who chose smaller cities specifically because they offered a foothold in the Dutch housing market are watching that foothold disappear.

I don't have a clean solution. But I know this: if you're an international considering a move to a smaller Dutch city because you've heard rent is cheaper there, understand that the landscape is shifting under your feet. The particulier huuraanbod krimpt in kleinere steden in Nederland at a pace that should worry anyone who depends on it.