The Porto City Council has approved a new Build-to-Rent (BTR) project in the parish of Campanhã, adding 195 homes to the city’s affordable housing programme Porto com Sentido.
The development, to be delivered through a public-private partnership, will consist of two residential blocks next to the city’s wholesale market. The scheme will offer a mix of typologies — 66 studios, 29 one-bedroom and 100 two-bedroom apartments — with construction expected to take around 36 months. Once completed, the homes will be leased by the municipality for an initial period of ten years, with the option to renew.
Under the model, the City Council leases the entire building from the private owner and sublets the units to residents at below-market rents. Monthly rents will be capped at €525 for studios, €550 for one-bedrooms and €830 for two-bedrooms, with the additional condition that housing costs cannot exceed 35% of household income.
This is the second large-scale BTR scheme approved in Porto, following the Jardins do Oriente project signed in July, which secured 151 units. In total, more than 700 dwellings have now been contracted with private developers under this model, complementing the 400 affordable units already delivered to families in the city.
Pedro Baganha, Porto’s councillor for housing, described the initiative as “a valid path and another tool for the city’s housing policy, one that could even be replicated in other municipalities across the country.”
Despite some reservations from opposition parties over the definition of “affordable,” the City Council underlined that rents are significantly lower than current market levels and will provide much-needed relief to residents facing rising housing costs.