To rentout your own home you will always need permission from the bank or lender prior to doing so. In the big cities you will (almost always) need permission from the municipality) or find restrictions.
And often the bank does not grant you permission. If – for whatever reason – you would not pay your monthly mortgage loan installments the bank is entitled (due to right of mortgage) to claim the loan including costs and interest. However is a tenant lives in your house the bank will have much more difficulties to sell the house and if they succeed most probably this will be against a substantial lower price. Perhaps not sufficient to cover their loan including costs and interest.
That is why banks are reluctant to allow you to rentout (solution; buy to let mortgage) in regular situations.
However there are situations in which banks sometimes can make an exception;
In the situations described below the regular protection of the tenant does not commonly apply.
Diplomat clause (Art. 7:274 lid 1 sub b & lid 2 BW); If you will be assigned by your employer to a foreign country you can rentout (still ask the bank for permission in advance !) with a diplomat clause which means that as soon as you return from the assignment abroad you will come to live in your own main residence again and the tenant will leave. The diplomat clause has to be integrated in the rental contract and there are some additional requirements applicable. The type of rentout is called Rental agreement with diplomat clause. Please do not forget that you still have to cancel your rental contract timely even though it has an enddate !
If your house is empty and for sale, you could try to arrange a rentout via the “Leegstandswet”. Duration of the rental contract can vary from 0.5 – 5 years, your house must be empty and for sale, you will have to apply for a permit / license from the municipality. You can define your own rental price and you can cancel (with an cancellation term of 3 months) prematurely (tenant one month) if the contract has no expiry / enddate.
Finally some banks allow rentout of your current house if you buy another house yourself. Please ask us about the details.
Before rentout we advise you to have your rental contract assessed by a laywer or someone specialized in this particular area of law. This to prevent you from a tenant not willing to leave your house.
Also inform your insurance company (housing, inventory, liability insurance) about the changes regarding renting out your house / apartment at the risk of non coverage. If you want to rentout just let us know, we can see what opportunities a trustworthy associated real estate agent can do for you.
(*) From a tax perspective there have been developments that make it less attractrive for landlords to keep on renting out homes. Hence you see a movement that lots of houses and apartments are currently sold.
