Rental Income Tax in Europe

Europe: Rental income taxes (%).

The tax levied on the average annual income on a rental apartment/property in the country.

Assumptions:

• Gross rental income is /US$1,500/month
• The property is personally directly owned jointly by husband and wife
• Both owners are foreigners and non-residents
• They have no other local income
• There is no mortgage, i.e., no loan is taken for the purchase

In arriving at the pre-tax profit figure, we calculate, and deduct:

• Depreciation / capital allowances if available. We assume a value for the apartment based on our valuation research, and depreciate on this basis.

We deduct any other costs which a landlord normally pays - management charges, buildings insurance, realtor agency fees, etc. We either choose a standard percentage deduction (if available) or typical actually incurred costs. If real estate tax is normally payable by the landlord, we deduct that.

Our rental income tax figures are provided by accountants (see list of contributors). For more details see the Data FAQ.

Source: Global Property Guide Research, Contributing Accounting Firms

European statistics. European house price and other economic statistics vary in quality. It is often a surprise to non-Europeans to discover that swathes of this rich, highly developed continent are not covered by good housing statistics.

Northern European countries have generally good house price time-series. In particular, all the Scandinavian countries generate excellent house price statistics. In the Baltics the situation is improving rapidly. Latvia generates an official annual house price time-series, and the realtor Latio publishes a monthly index. Lithuania has no official house price or rents time-series, but the firm Inreal publishes annual prices and rents for Vilnius for a few years. Estonia has high-quality housing statistics, generated by the Statistical Office of Estonia (SOE). Data on house prices, house sales and construction activities, as well as general economics statistics are all available from the SOE.

Central Europe is mixed. German house price statistics are weak. France has very good statistics, the Netherlands has good data, Belgium and Austria have acceptable data. Spain has made giant strides, Portugal is weaker.

Southern Europe tends to have weak statistical data. There is a particular lack of housing statistics in Italy, Greece, and Turkey (though Italy has some private, for-sale, data generators).

Statistics in Eastern Europe are weak. Efforts are being made to change this, for instance Bulgaria began publishing a house price time-series in 2006. Aside from this, the Czech Republic has an official index, and in Poland, REAS Konsulting produces a for-sale index.