New proposed rent legislation aims to stabilise prices by increasing the time that tenants stay in a property, the housing minister has said.  

“The more tenants break their rental contracts, the more changes there will be to rental prices,” Roderick Galdes said. 

If contracts remain in place for longer, rent prices will increase at a slower rate, he said.   

The more tenants break their rental contracts, the more changes to rental prices, Galdes said. Photo: Matthew Mirabelli

Galdes was reacting to criticism of proposed legislation that will eliminate the so-called di fermo period in Maltese rental law.  

As it stands, tenants with a one-year rental contract must commit themselves to paying six months of rent before they can be released from the contract.   

This will no longer be the case when the proposed changes come into force, with the di fermo period effectively being extended to cover the entire period of the lease.     

That means tenants will have to honour the entire duration of the contract.

Galdes said the changes come following the lessons learned over the past three years when the current version of the rental law was put in place.   

“We took off from a point where the landlord could change the rent as they pleased,” Galdes said.  

 There is now a minimum of a one-year contract.   

The problem now, he said, is that a number of tenants do not stay for the duration of the contract.  

The aim of the proposed law is to increase the sector’s stability, adding that nothing has yet been set in stone.

“Till today, the law is still a proposal, and we are giving space for everyone to contribute.” 

He said the consideration of bills committee had taken note of the several stakeholders.  These include the landlords’ association and Moviment Graffitti.  

Graffitti, together with 16 other NGOs, signed a joint statement saying the amendments would reward abusive landlords and punish tenants.  

“The proposed amendments mean further weakening the tenants’ position by prohibiting them from leaving the leased property during the last six months of their rent contract,” the NGOs said.   

If the proposed amendment goes through, tenants who leave the property at any point during the contract – even in the last six months – will lose their deposit and make themselves liable to legal action from the landlord for loss of income, they said.