Portugal's Two New Rental Schemes Took Effect on 1 September, and Neither Can Be Used Yet
The decree gave the government 30 days to publish the rules. Four months past that deadline there is still no rent ceiling, so a landlord cannot tell whether a contract qualifies for the tax exemption.
Portugal's two new housing supply schemes took legal effect on 1 September. Neither can be used, because the regulations that make them operable have not been published, and they were due by 19 June.
The schemes come from Decreto-Lei n.º 97/2026, of 20 May, the government's tax package for stimulating housing supply. One is the contrato de investimento para arrendamento habitacional (CIA), a contract signed with the IHRU that carries tax benefits for up to 25 years on investment in building, rehabilitating or buying property for residential letting. The other is the regime simplificado de arrendamento acessível (RSAA), which replaces the old Programa de Apoio ao Arrendamento and exempts qualifying rental income from IRS and IRC entirely.
The article that was not honoured
Article 16 of the decree is a single sentence. Within 30 days of publication, it says, the government approves the portarias referred to in article 1(5) and article 9(1) of Annex I and article 4(1) of Annex III. The decree was published on 20 May, which put the deadline in mid-June. Four months on, the Diário da República lists no regulating portaria against the act at all; the only related instrument is a correction notice. Público reported on Sunday that the government says the portarias are about to be published, without saying when.
The missing piece in Annex III is the one that matters most to an ordinary landlord. Article 4(1) sets the maximum monthly rent by property typology, to be fixed in a portaria based on 80 percent of the median rent published by INE for the council where the property sits, with scope to adjust for energy efficiency and private parking. Until that portaria exists, there is no published ceiling, and a landlord has no way to know whether a contract qualifies. The CIA is in the same position: article 1(5) of Annex I leaves the procedures and requirements for submitting and approving a CIA to a portaria that has not appeared.
What the schemes offer, when they work
The RSAA is generous on paper. Rental income from qualifying contracts is exempt from personal and corporate income tax, not merely taxed at a reduced rate. Contracts for permanent residence must run at least three years; the temporary-residence variant, for tenants whose tax residence is in a different council, has a three-month minimum. The landlord files a copy of the contract and proof of its registration on the Portal das Finanças with the IHRU by 15 January of the year after signature, and the IHRU passes it to the tax authority by the end of February, with the exemption running from the date the contract was signed.
The timing problem is worse than a simple delay, because article 18 of the decree revoked the previous regime on the same date the new one began. Decreto-Lei n.º 68/2019 and its companion went on 1 September. Existing contracts under the old Programa de Apoio ao Arrendamento keep their tax treatment under a transitional rule, but a landlord who wanted to sign a new accessible-rent contract this month has had the old door closed and the new one left locked.
What this means for you
- Do not sign a contract assuming it qualifies. Without the rent-ceiling portaria there is no published figure to measure a rent against, and the exemption is conditional on meeting it.
- The 15 January filing date is the one to diarise. If the portarias appear this autumn and you sign in 2026, the IHRU submission falls in January 2027.
- Failure is retroactive. Article 7 of the RSAA strips the benefit from the moment of breach and requires the difference in tax to be declared and paid with compensatory interest, so the qualifying conditions are not a formality.
- Tenants have no separate application. The scheme runs through the landlord and the IHRU platform. A tenant's only lever is asking whether the landlord intends to use it.
Our guide to renting in Portugal covers the contract rules that apply whatever tax regime sits on top. The government designed both schemes to add supply; three weeks into their legal life, the only thing they have added is a gap.
