Portugal's housing crisis reaches new extremes as a one-bedroom rent in the capital eats up almost an entire salary
The median rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Lisbon now stands at around €784 a month. With the national minimum wage at €920, that single apartment swallows 85% of a person's pay check.
Rents rose 9.1% over the year
The median rent on new lease agreements in Portugal reached €9.46 per square metre in the first quarter, a year-over-year rise of 9.1% that accelerated from the 7.9% recorded in the previous quarter, according to the National Statistics Institute (INE).
According to the agency's local-level Housing Rent Statistics, in the first quarter of 2026 the median rent across 39,395 new lease agreements reached €9.46 per square metre. That figure represents year-over-year growth of 9.1%, higher than in the previous quarter (7.9%), while the number of new lease agreements rose by 0.7% compared with the first quarter of last year.
The median rent increased across all NUTS III sub-regions, the INE said. The highest rents were recorded in Greater Lisbon (€14.38 per square metre), the Autonomous Region of Madeira (€11.97), the Setúbal Peninsula (€11.35), the Algarve (€10.71) and the Porto Metropolitan Area (€10.13).
Lisbon posts the highest median rent
The INE data further indicate that, in the first quarter of 2026, the median rent rose year-over-year in all 24 municipalities with more than 100,000 inhabitants. Vila Nova de Famalicão showed the largest change (15.1%), while Lisbon posted the highest median rent (€17.42 per square metre), albeit with a year-over-year rate (8.2%) below the national figure (9.1%).