It feels like the biggest struggle in the Algarve for foreigners is to find long term rental accommodation. When you couple this with the D7 visa requirement for proof of long term accommodation, you’ll find a serious lack of supply in 2022. Throw in a highly seasonal tourist season where local owners are trying to recoup their losses after COVID by selling short term weeks on their accommodation and you’ll be looking at a tricky situation.
So what can you do to find long term rental accommodation in the Algarve? Sadly it requires a lot of hard work.
How to find long term rentals in the Algarve
Here are my three suggestions:
- Scour the online portals for possible rental homes. I have listed quite a few below.
- Put yourself out there in the relevant Facebook groups. It seems like there is a group for every village these days. If you don’t like Facebook create a new account and weigh up which is more important, a new home or your privacy.
- Physically go to the town you have picked and speak to anyone you can who may have a friend, sister or cousin who is renting out their home. Speak to real estate agents, waiters, hotel staff, shop workers etc.
It’s hard work, but if you do all those steps fairly diligently you may be moving in much sooner than you think. If you have any other ideas, let me know, I’d love to hear them.
A list of resources follow below the video.
HELPFUL RENTAL LINKS
…as discussed in the video
Rentals (and purchase) platforms
https://www.era.pt/
https://www.green-acres.pt/
https://casa.sapo.pt/
https://idealista.pt/
https://www.imovirtual.com/
Shorter term rentals
https://www.flatio.com/
https://www.airbnb.com/
Facebook Groups
https://www.facebook.com/groups/algarveaddicts
https://www.facebook.com/groups/LongTermRentalsAlgarve
https://www.facebook.com/groups/114052362542035
Also try
https://www.algarvelonglets.com/