Also called the front-end ratio, as opposed to the back-end ratio (debt-to-income) which counts all debt payments, not just housing. A commonly cited guideline keeps it under roughly 28%, so housing alone doesn't crowd out everything else in the budget.

🇵🇹 Eurostat and INE data has repeatedly shown a large share of Portuguese tenants classified as "overburdened" by housing costs, spending well above the roughly 28% guideline, particularly in Lisbon and Porto. If your ratio comes out high, that reflects a genuinely difficult market, not necessarily a spending problem on your part.