Small and relatively expensive housing in Amsterdam

Thirty percent of Amsterdam households own their home. A home owner in Amsterdam pays an average of nearly 1,000 euros a month in housing costs for a dwelling with less than 75 m² of usable space. This amount is much higher than in other major Dutch cities. Tenants pay an average of 590 euros for a dwelling of this size. These are figures released by Statistics Netherlands based on data collected in the Netherlands Housing Survey.

Amsterdam has the smallest houses of all Dutch cities. An average household in the capital has 74m² of usable space. For home owners the average is 67 m². Tenants have more space: 92 m². In the rest of the country, the average area of usable space is 140 m² for owners and 87 m² for tenants.

Sixty-one percent (246,000) of Amsterdam households live in less than 75 m² of usable space. In Rotterdam and The Hague, this is less than 40 percent. The national average is 19 percent.

Dutch people spend one third of their income on housing

In 2015, an average household in the Netherlands spent one third of its disposable income on housing costs. Compared to 2012 and 2009, the housing costs increased for tenants while they fell for home owners.

Of the 7.2 million private households, 60 percent own the dwelling they live in. In 2015, owners spent on average 894 euros a month on housing costs, 75 euros less than in 2012. Their mortgage, insurance and maintenance costs as well as additional costs also decreased.

In contrast, the costs for tenants have risen: they paid on average 654 euros a month on rent and additional housing taxes. This was 50 euros more than in 2012 and 100 euros more than in 2009. Although the rent has gone up, some of the additional housing costs have fallen slightly.

In 2015, total housing costs constituted an average of 28 percent of home owners’ disposable income. Tenants spent on average 39 percent of their income on housing costs. In Amsterdam this is 32 percent for owners and 39 percent for tenants.

Monthly housing costs of households, in current prices

Most Dutch people in terraced houses

Terraced houses are most common in the Netherlands. Forty-one percent of the households live in terraced housing, 32 percent in flats, 15 percent in detached and 13 percent in semi-detached homes. In the major cities most people live in flats; in Amsterdam this is 86 percent. Detached and semi-detached dwellings are rare.