2026: From Approval to Execution
Containment Areas
Porto’s municipality identified containment areas corresponding to the Parishes of Santo Ildefonso, Sé, Miragaia, São Nicolau, and Vitória.
Containment areas are defined by Decree-Law No.76/2024 as places where there is “an overload of accommodation establishments, which may justify restrictions on the installation of new establishments.” The municipality of Porto defined these areas as “all parishes or unions of parishes in the city with a pressure ratio equal to or greater than 15%”
The pressure ratio is determined according to the number of existing vacation rental establishments and the number of properties/units with a water meter installed and available for permanent housing or long-term rental in the city.
What does it mean in practice to be in a containment area? The registration of a new establishment is not automatically approved — it is conditional and, as a general rule, refused except in the exceptional situations described below. For those already registered and operating in one of these five parishes, the regulation does not retroactively cancel the existing license, but requires continued compliance with all current legal obligations.
Sustainable Growth Areas
The areas of sustainable growth correspond to the Parishes: Aldoar, Bonfim, Campanhã, Cedofeita, Foz do Douro, Lordelo do Ouro, Massarelos, Nevogilde, Paranhos and Ramalde.
According to Decree-Law No. 76/2024, these areas are created to “prevent an overload situation with undesirable effects on neighborhoods and places”, which justifies “special monitoring and monitoring measures.” The city hall considered the areas of the city’s parishes with a pressure index of less than 15%.
A maximum limit is defined for the attribution of new vacation rental registrations for each parish. This guarantees the balance between this type of accommodation and the properties/fractions available for other purposes, such as permanent housing or long-term rental, commerce, and services.
Parishes in Sustainable Growth Areas and Maximum Short-Term Rental Number Definition
Information from Porto’s Municipality. Short-term rental numbers, permanent housing and pressure ratio for 31/10/2022
| Parish | Short-Term Rentals (STR) | Permanent Housing | Ratio | New STR until 15% | Total STR until 15% |
| Aldoar | 20 | 6 036 | 0,3% | 885 | 905 |
| Bonfim | 1 296 | 16 076 | 8,1% | 1 115 | 2 411 |
| Campanhã | 173 | 17 296 | 1,0% | 2 421 | 2 594 |
| Cedofeita | 1 571 | 16 092 | 9,8% | 843 | 2 414 |
| Foz do Douro | 151 | 5 914 | 2,6% | 736 | 887 |
| Lordelo do Ouro | 119 | 11 268 | 1,1% | 1 571 | 1 690 |
| Massarelos | 328 | 4 602 | 7,1% | 362 | 690 |
| Nevolgilde | 293 | 2 549 | 1,0% | 356 | 382 |
| Paranhos | 227 | 28 639 | 1,0% | 4 003 | 4 296 |
| Ramalde | 117 | 19 783 | 0,6% | 2 850 | 2 967 |
| Total | 4 094 | 128 255 | 3,2% | 15 142 | 19 236 |
These two ratings can be changed depending on the pressure ratio.
Exceptional authorization for the installation of new Vacation Rentals in containment areas
The installation of new Short-Term Rentals in containment areas may be authorized by the mayor or the councilor with delegated powers in the matter, provided that one of the following situations occurs:
– Buildings for multifunctional use, in which the Vacation Rental is integrated into a social or cultural local development project or integrates the housing supply for rent at affordable prices.
– Urban operations that promote street commerce through the exclusive allocation for commerce of units for independent use directly facing public space.
– Building, autonomous unit, or part of an urban building that has been entirely unoccupied for more than three years;
– Building, autonomous fraction or part of an urban building that has been the subject of rehabilitation works, carried out in the last two years, allowing two levels of conservation to be raised when they were in a poor or terrible state of conservation;
– Building, autonomous fraction or part of an urban building that, in the last two years, has changed its use from industry to housing or services;
– Buildings constructed as a result of the demolition of a building that was in poor condition or was at risk of collapsing;
– Demolition of existing buildings in public spaces, legally constituted, without architectural, urban, or cultural value, so that this demolition results in a waterproofing index of less than 70% of the plot area;
In the case of buildings for multifunctional use, the supply of vacation rentals and accommodation intended for housing must be balanced. Thus, the housing component must represent 50% of the area, and affordable housing must represent at least 20% of the building’s construction area for a period of at least 25 years.
New short-term rental establishments may be authorized in containment areas when the modality is “rooms.”
What happens to existing registrations?
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