More than one in 10 homes which come up for sale in the most popular Dutch cities are being bought by private investors who rent them out, often to students or expats, the Volkskrant said on Wednesday.

In particular, investors are snapping up cheaper homes which are suitable for families and first-time buyers, the paper said. Last year, for example, 15% of homes sold for below €100,000 went to an investor, compared with just 5% in 2008, land registry researcher Paul de Vries told the Volkskrant.

‘The same homes are then offered as rental properties,’ he said.

Cities with a large student or expat population are tempting for private investors. In Maastricht, almost 20% of homes coming on the market are bought as an investment while in Groningen, Amstelveen, Amsterdam, Enschede and The Hague more than one in 10 properties changing hands end up being rented out.

In 2008, just 7% of home owners had more than one property but that has now gone up to just over 11%.