Student Housing in Belgium: A 70.000-Room Shortage and Still a Lesson for the Netherlands

The Figures

A student room in Belgium costs an average of € 475 per month excluding charges and € 575 all-in, according to Kotkompas 2025. In five years the all-in rent rose by an average of € 100. Brussels is the most expensive student city in the country at € 680 per month; a studio there averages € 780.

The scarcity is structural. Projects for 25.000 new student rooms have been launched since 2020, yet another 70.000 are needed by 2030, above all in Ghent, Leuven, Brussels and Antwerp. Brussels counts around 125.000 students, making it Belgium's largest student city; an estimated 20.000 students spill over into the regular housing market, in direct competition with families and other renters.

Regional differences are striking. Leuven has a "kot ratio" of around 80%: eight in ten students live in student housing. In Antwerp that ratio is around 20%. Two cities with comparable student numbers therefore face entirely different housing tasks.

The Netherlands tackles the same problem more programmatically. Under the National Student Housing Action Plan, central government, municipalities, universities and housing providers are working towards 60.000 additional affordable student homes by 2030. The projected shortage for 2029 has meanwhile been revised from 60.000 down to around 32.500 rooms. The shortage remains large, but the direction is more favourable than in Belgium.

What Does the Belgian Government Contribute?

Less than one might expect. Student housing in Belgium is primarily a market of private individuals: the classic "kotbaas" letting a handful of rooms, complemented by listed operators such as Xior. The regions set quality standards and cities issue permits, but national coordination comparable to the Dutch action plan is absent. Market monitoring also comes from the private side: Kotkompas is an initiative of a student housing operator and a real-estate adviser, not of government. Slow permitting is consistently named within the sector as the main brake on new supply.

What Can the Netherlands Learn?

First: the strength of small-scale private supply. Belgian kot culture shows that tens of thousands of rooms can be carried by individual owners. In Brussels, new student rooms are sold to private investors from around € 113.000 per unit. The Netherlands has discouraged live-in landlords and small investors in recent years; the Belgian model shows how much capacity that leaves untapped.

Second: shared rooms over studios. The Belgian kot, with shared kitchen and sanitary facilities, is precisely the product that Kences in the Netherlands identifies as better for student wellbeing than the self-contained studios developers prefer. The Belgian market proves this product can be operated at scale.

Third: the lesson in reverse. Belgium's shortage of 70.000 rooms by 2030 shows what happens without a national target, without joint monitoring and with slow permitting. The Dutch action plan, however difficult its execution, does bend the forecast. TEN sees this daily in practice: Student Experience has housed students in Amsterdam, Leiden, Madrid and Granada for more than 15 years, and waiting lists only move when supply, coordination and operations come together.

The question is therefore not whether private capital or public coordination solves the student market, but how the two reinforce each other: Belgian willingness to invest combined with Dutch programming. The next article shifts to the other end of the age pyramid: seniors.

Sources

• Kotkompas 2025, Diggit StudentLife and Stadim (rent levels, supply added since 2020, 70.000-room shortage by 2030)

• BRUZZ, April 2025 (student numbers in Brussels, spill-over into the regular housing market, price levels per housing type)

• KBC, student housing analysis 2025 (market pressure, permitting, role of Xior)

• Steunpunt Wonen, student housing supply policy (kot ratios Leuven and Antwerp, local shortages)

• Fortior (sale prices of student rooms to private investors, Brussels)

• Dutch central government / Kences, National Student Housing Monitor 2024 and 2025 (National Student Housing Action Plan, 60.000-home target, revised 2029 shortage forecast)