Living in Austria: Richtwert, Befristung and the six-month deposit

The Austrian rental market is no Swedish queue and no Dutch points system — it's a system of its own with rules you want to know before the viewing, because three of them are directly about thousands of euros.

The deposit: three is customary, six is allowed

Start with the amount that has to go on the table. Unlike in the Netherlands (two months) or Belgium (three by law), Austria has no statutory deposit ceiling: three gross monthly rents is customary, but according to settled case law of the Supreme Court up to six months is permissible. So ask for the amount before the viewing, and count it into your moving budget. The deposit must be held interest-bearing and comes back — minus justified deductions — when you leave. The windfall stands opposite it: since July 2023 the Bestellerprinzip applies — the estate agent is paid by whoever engaged them, almost always the landlord. The two months' commission that tenants here paid for decades is a thing of the past.

Befristung: five years minimum, and a discount nobody claims

Fixed-term contracts are the norm in Austria for private lettings, and since 1 January 2026 the rule is: a minimum of five years if the landlord is a business (three years now only with private individuals), always in writing with an end date — otherwise the contract counts as open-ended. You as tenant can always leave after one year, with three months' notice. And in regulated old buildings (roughly pre-war properties under the full Mietrechtsgesetz) there is a right virtually no newcomer knows about: the Befristungsabschlag — on a fixed-term contract at most 75% of the permitted Richtwert rent is owed. Paid too much? That can be reclaimed years later at the arbitration board (Schlichtungsstelle).

What you pay — and the cap of 2026

The national average (€ 10.40 per square metre including service charges, end of 2025) says little for newcomers: it's pushed down by old regulated contracts. For new private contracts in Vienna the asking prices are around € 17 to 20 per square metre; the federal-state capitals sit noticeably below that. The good news is fresh: the Mietenpaket caps rent increases — in the free sector too — at a maximum of one percent in 2026 and two percent in 2027. And whoever stays longer looks at the Genossenschaften: cooperative landlords with cost-covering rents well below the market, against a one-off contribution you largely get back when you leave.

Vienna plays its own game

The city where most Dutch people land is also the city with the largest social housing stock in Europe: more than half of the Viennese rental market is Gemeindebau or subsidised. The key is called the Wiener Wohn-Ticket, and the condition that hits newcomers is the length of residence: two years of uninterrupted main residence in Vienna — since May 2025 no longer necessarily at the same address. The realistic route is therefore: start on the free market or with a Genossenschaft, get your Meldezettel right on day one, and put an item in your diary for your second birthday as a Viennese — then the cheap segment opens up.

In Vertrekklaar this is phase 4 of 5 of the journey: the same steps, but for your situation — in your order, tickable, and with the deadlines watched. See the whole journey to Austria.