Renting in Zwolle (2026): prices, the room and holiday-rental rules, and getting your deposit back

Zwolle made sharing a home easier in 2025, but it still caps how many homes in one street may be let as rooms.

• Rooms (kamerverhuur). Letting a home room by room is allowed in most Zwolle neighbourhoods with an environmental permit. In the red zones on the city’s map no new rooms can be created. At most 15% of the homes in a street with the same postcode may be let as rooms, up from 10% before 2025, and each resident needs 1.5 m² of storage, or a shared facility within 75 metres (City of Zwolle).

• A room in someone’s home. A lodger arrangement, where you rent a room in the home the owner or main tenant lives in, is also possible in a rented home; in some parts of Zwolle it needs a permit (City of Zwolle).
• Holiday rental. Every bed and breakfast and every private letting to tourists needs a registration number, which is free and must appear in each advert, and tourist tax is due. A bed and breakfast may take up at most 30% of the floor area, to a maximum of 75 m², with the main resident present. A tenant may only do this with the written permission of the owner (City of Zwolle); see our subletting and Airbnb guide.
• Temporary lets of empty homes. An owner needs a permit under the Vacancy Act, and on such a lease several tenant protection rules do not apply (City of Zwolle).

A new tenant in Zwolle normally gets a written lease without an end date, and can have the rent checked.

• Open-ended. As a new tenant you get a lease for an indefinite period straight away; temporary leases only exist in set situations and last at most 2 years (Rijksoverheid). Our temporary rental contract guide explains how one ends.
• In writing. Every lease signed from 1 July 2023 needs your signature and the landlord’s. The landlord must also tell you in writing how much deposit you paid and when it is repaid, whom to contact about the home, the city’s report desk and how service charges work (City of Zwolle).
• Rent too high? Do the Huurcommissie’s rent check first; if you pay too much and cannot agree with the landlord, report it, which has been possible since 1 January 2025. An excessive rent increase has been banned since 1 July 2024 (City of Zwolle). In the first 6 months of a lease the Huurcommissie can review the starting rent (Huurcommissie).
• Housing corporation tenants. The city can only act on a rent or rent increase that is too high; other complaints go to the corporation. EU workers can also report a lease tied to their employment contract (City of Zwolle).

Zwolle tenants have a free, independent Huurteam, a city report desk behind it and, if needed, the court in their own city.

• Huurteam Zwolle. It explains your rights, checks your rent or service charges, supports complaints about maintenance or sustainability and mediates with the landlord, free of charge. It is also the report desk for the Good Landlordship Act and the Affordable Rent Act, and tenants of SWZ, deltaWonen and Openbaar Belang can use it too (City of Zwolle).
• What you can report. Intimidation and discrimination, a deposit that is too high, no written lease, double agency fees, excessive service charges, and sustainability problems such as poor insulation or damp (City of Zwolle). The city answers on 14 038 between 08.30 and 17.00 (City of Zwolle).
• The court. Rechtbank Overijssel is at Schuurmanstraat 2 in Zwolle; from September 2026 to 2030 roadworks around the building can change the route (Rechtspraak.nl). It is open on weekdays from 8.30 to 17.00 (Rechtspraak.nl). If cost stands in the way, see our legal aid guide.
• Need a lawyer? See our page on finding an English-speaking tenant lawyer in the Netherlands.