How does my rent compare?
Compare your rent against the average of registered market-rent contracts in your area. This is a comparison against an average — not an assessment of whether your rent is fair under the Rental Act.
Useful for renters
- Housing benefit — information and application (island.is)
- Creating and registering a lease (island.is)
Official HMS rent-price index
Market rents for conventional apartments in the capital region
Index level
130.2
May 2023 = 100
Change from a year ago
+4.2%
Real change against CPI
-1.3%
Observation for August 2026; published 7 October 2026.
The index uses market-rent contracts from the latest two months and combines six room-count groups using trailing-12-month turnover weights. It measures price development, not the rent level in ISK, and is not intended for index-linking individual leases.
Source and methodology at HMSMarket rent trend since 2024
ISK/m² per month (weighted average, whole country)
Selected area: Whole country. Newest month (August 2026): market rent 3,521 ISK/m² and non-market rent 2,902 ISK/m².
- Market rent
- Non-market rent
Non-market rent includes apartments of non-profit rental companies, social housing, student housing and municipal housing — shown for comparison, never mixed into the market figures.
The national average per-m² rent of valid market-rent contracts changed by 3.6% over 12 months. CPI rose by 5.6% over the same period, equivalent to a real decrease of about 1.9% in this average. This is not the official HMS rent index.
Rent by municipality
Average rent per m² across valid registered contracts that HMS considers suitable for statistical analysis in each municipality, regardless of room count and whether the contract is classified as market or non-market rent. These figures are therefore not directly comparable with the market-rent figures above.
All included dwelling sizes and both rental segments combined
Comparison as of August 2026.
Reykjavík: 3,544 ISK/m², 15,184 valid contracts.
| Municipality | Average rent per m² | Change from a year ago | Valid contracts |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3,544 ISK | +5.8% | 15,184 | |
| 3,230 ISK | +4.9% | 2,005 | |
| 3,446 ISK | +4.5% | 1,986 | |
| 2,977 ISK | +6.1% | 1,730 | |
| 3,454 ISK | +6.4% | 707 | |
| 3,244 ISK | +6.0% | 567 | |
| 3,796 ISK | +8.5% | 153 |
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Reykjavík, Kópavogur and Akureyri are single areas in the detailed HMS export. Garðabær, Hafnarfjörður, Mosfellsbær and Seltjarnarnes come from separate municipality exports from HMS Leiguverðsjá. Leiguverðsjá includes only contracts no more than five years from their start or most recent amendment.
Rent and gross yield by area
| Area | Rent ISK/m² | Non-market | Contracts | Gross yield |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Akureyri | 3,115 ISK | 2,789 ISK | 997 | 5.59% |
| Garðabær & Hafnarfjörður | 3,768 ISK | 2,534 ISK | 613 | 5.62% |
| Kópavogur | 3,610 ISK | 2,564 ISK | 1,673 | 5.39% |
| Mosfellsbær, Seltjarnarnes & Kjósarhreppur | 3,761 ISK | 2,608 ISK | 598 | 5.52% |
| Reykjavík | 3,915 ISK | 3,125 ISK | 8,049 | 5.76% |
| Other regions of Iceland | 2,290 ISK | 2,123 ISK | 1,759 | — |
| Municipalities near the capital region | 3,186 ISK | 2,538 ISK | 3,587 | — |
| Other capital-region municipalities | 3,628 ISK | 2,445 ISK | 1,417 | — |
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Gross yield is a rough reference: before operating costs, property taxes, maintenance and rental-income tax — net yield is lower, and it is not comparable to deposit or bond rates. On rental-income tax: skatturinn.is
By number of rooms
| Area | 1 room | 2 rooms | 3 rooms | 4 rooms | 5 rooms | 6+ rooms |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Akureyri | 4,001 | 3,348 | 3,063 | 2,729 | 1,971 | 1,594 |
| Garðabær & Hafnarfjörður | 4,280 | 4,273 | 3,585 | 3,449 | 2,665 | 1,739 |
| Kópavogur | 4,221 | 4,020 | 3,594 | 2,932 | 2,526 | 1,626 |
| Mosfellsbær, Seltjarnarnes & Kjósarhreppur | 4,733 | 4,226 | 3,532 | 2,981 | 2,551 | 1,695 |
| Reykjavík | 4,420 | 4,299 | 3,696 | 3,238 | 2,994 | 2,023 |
| Other regions of Iceland | 3,209 | 2,716 | 2,293 | 1,970 | 1,723 | 1,530 |
| Municipalities near the capital region | 3,900 | 3,505 | 3,122 | 2,731 | 2,271 | 1,563 |
| Other capital-region municipalities | 4,115 | 3,965 | 3,578 | 3,276 | 2,739 | 2,038 |
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ISK/m² per month
About the data
- Source: HMS Leiguverðsjá — aggregate statistics for valid registered rental contracts, with market and non-market rent shown separately. Imported manually each month.
- Area grouping follows HMS; some municipalities are grouped.
- Cells backed by fewer than 5 contracts are not shown (HMS’s privacy floor).
- HMS estimates the register may overstate average rent by roughly 5% because leases between relatives and friends are under-registered.
- The register does not yet cover the whole rental market: HMS reports roughly 30,000 active registered contracts, while estimating that about 50,000 households rent their home. A general duty to register rental contracts took effect on 1 January 2026, so coverage should improve over time.
- Past months can be revised when contracts are registered retroactively.
- Gross yield = annual market rent ÷ median sold price per m² over the trailing 12 months in the same municipalities — computed only where the HMS group maps exactly to register municipalities.