Lisbon, Feb. 5 2025 (Lusa) - Rent support went to 145,870 tenants in Portugal in January, according to the Institute of Housing and Urban Rehabilitation (IHRU), a figure that represents a drop from the 233,323 beneficiaries recorded a year earlier.
"In January 2025, the universe of tenants with extraordinary support was updated, and support was processed for 145,870 tenants," an official source from the IHRU told Lusa, adding that in addition to these, there are another 46,364 tenants “who can be included in the measure” - taking into account the rules for granting support laid down in the law.
This extraordinary support, the maximum value of which can be up to €200 a month, is aimed at people whose rent payment requires them to have an effort rate above 35%, that is, they have to use more than 35% of their monthly income to pay this expense.
The support is awarded by the IHRU on the basis of information provided by the Tax and Customs Authority (AT), Social Security (SS), Caixa Geral de Aposentações (CGA) and the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT).
There are, however, situations that may be eligible, but in which the granting of support is dependent on the beneficiaries' prior validation of the data used to ascertain their situation.
At issue are tenants whose rent exceeds the value of their income or situations in which non-conformities are detected between the landlord's tax declaration of rental income, the tax declaration relating to the receipt or invoicing of rents, the reporting of rental contracts and the tenants' tax declaration that the AT reports to the IHRU.
In the same response, the IHRU states that it has developed a computer application for the purpose of prior validation of data by tenants, adding that it "will be made available during the current week."
After an initial rise, the number of beneficiaries has been shrinking: in January last year there were 233,323, falling to 223,200 at the end of April and now to around 146,000, to which the aforementioned 46,36 may be added, totalling 192,000.
When the support was paid for the first time in June 2023 (backdated to January of that year), it went to 154,212 households, with a further 32,000 eligible at that time.
The IHRU emphasises that the updates made to beneficiaries "may result in changes to the conditions of eligibility for the support" which could lead to its "interruption, decrease or increase in value or to new allocations."
Of all the beneficiaries who received rent support in January, 25,141 received the maximum amount of €200.
Overall, the average value of this support is around €100.46.
LT/ARO // ARO.
Lusa
