The Greek government is examining a new tax intervention targeting rental income, with the scope of potential tax relief largely dependent on the additional tax revenue generated from this year’s income tax returns and the uncovering of undeclared rental payments.
Real estate: New tax intervention on rental income in Greece
Economic policy advisors believe that improving tax compliance could create the necessary fiscal space for new rate reductions without disrupting budget execution. The philosophy behind the intervention goes beyond simply relieving landlords of their tax burden — it extends to tackling tax evasion that continues to be recorded in the real estate market.
As parapolitika.gr has already revealed, the plans primarily target landlords with annual rental income of up to €12,000. This is the category that did not meaningfully benefit from previous changes to the tax scale, as the last intervention mainly addressed higher income brackets. Currently, rental income up to €12,000 is taxed at 15%, while income between €12,001 and €24,000 is taxed at 25% — down from the previous rate of 35%.
The main scenario envisions reducing the first tax bracket rate to 10% or even 8%, offering significant relief to thousands of small landlords who are frequently burdened by maintenance, repair, and other operating costs that eat into their net income.
The government initiative is also linked to housing policy, with the goal of boosting the supply of residential rental properties. According to estimates, lower taxation could serve as an incentive for more landlords to declare their actual rental income and bring properties to market that are currently sitting vacant or underutilized.
The MIDA property registry set to play a decisive role in the crackdown on hidden rentals
The Property Ownership and Management Registry (MIDA) is expected to play a pivotal role in implementing the plan, enabling extensive cross-referencing of data on properties, lease agreements, and declared income. Through the new registry, which is set to go live in the coming days, more than 7 million property owners will be required to reconfirm or re-register their entire real estate holdings — in an environment where available data has until now remained fragmented and frequently inconsistent across different government databases.
The objective is to create a unified, reliable, and interoperable recording mechanism that will give the state a clear picture of the actual use of every property in the country — from owner-occupied and rented to vacant and unused. To this end, Greece’s Independent Authority for Public Revenue (AADE) will consolidate data already held in various registries, including tax forms E9 and E2, the National Cadastre, and data from the Hellenic Electricity Distribution Network Operator (DEDDIE), in an effort to produce a comprehensive “mapping” of all real estate assets.
The new MIDA registry will record with greater accuracy all key characteristics of each property, including its type, location, surface area, use, electricity connection status, and whether it is being utilized. The cross-referencing of this data is expected to serve as a powerful tool for targeted audits and the detection of undeclared “black market” rental income.
It is no coincidence that the average declared rental income from a primary residence, based on 2025 tax returns, came to just €241 per month — an amount that, given current market conditions, barely covers the monthly cost of renting a parking space in many parts of the country.
The stark gap between declared amounts and prevailing market rents reinforces estimates that a significant portion of rental income continues to go unreported in tax filings. It is precisely this area that the Ministry of Finance aims to address through MIDA and the mandatory payment of rent via bank transfer, effective October 1st.
