Guides: answers to the question you ask right before you hire someone
No price lists, those are in the price guides. These are the questions you run into once you already know what needs doing and you want to know whether it is allowed, who pays for it and who is allowed to do it. Every answer rests on legislation or on a regulator, and the sources are listed in plain sight.
Odd jobs & assembly
What does odd jobs & assembly cost?Carpentry
What does carpentry cost?Flooring
What does flooring cost?Noisy neighbours in the Netherlands: the rules and hours that really apply
No Dutch law sets a quiet time. The six rules that are binding, who enforces them, how many decibels are allowed, and what courts decided in 2026.
Can I lay a hard floor in my apartment?
Laminate, parquet or tiles in an apartment is far from always allowed. The ten decibel rule from the 2017 model regulations, and what your floor fitter has to deliver.
Plastering & masonry
What does plastering & masonry cost?Party walls and access rights: who pays for what
The wall between you and your neighbours belongs to you both. Who pays for repairs, may the neighbour build into it or add a window, and may your scaffolding stand on their land. Per situation the article and the ruling.
Cracks in the wall
Which cracks are harmless, which are not, and how to measure over three months whether it is still moving.
Roofing
What does roofing cost?Hidden defect in the house you bought: who pays?
Per defect when the seller is responsible, the deadlines in the law, and what buyers who won did differently. With five real rulings.
Roof leaking
What to do in the first hour, where the leak usually really is, and who ends up with the bill.
Is chimney sweeping compulsory?
Not by law, but your insurer can refuse after a fire if you skipped it. What actually applies and who pays in a rental.
Electrical work
What does electrical work cost?Solar panels on a rented home: allowed, and who pays?
Install them yourself, through your landlord or rent them from a company: what Dutch law says per route about consent, yield, moving out and what changes in 2027.
Power failure
Working through the fuse box yourself, and how to tell it is the grid and not you.
Plumbing
What does plumbing cost?Blocked toilet
What you can try yourself in ten minutes, and how to tell the sewer is the problem.
Tracing a leak
How to find a leak without opening up the wall, and what leak detection costs.
Broken boiler: tenant or landlord?
Topping up and bleeding are yours, the boiler itself is the landlord's. Where the line runs and what to do if they refuse.
Leak from the flat above: who is liable?
Your upstairs neighbour is not automatically liable. What has to be true before they pay, and why you usually start with your own insurer.
Painting
What does painting cost?Handing back a rental home: what is yours, even after 30 years
What you repair and what the landlord repairs, item by item with the article. Plus the rule for contracts from before 2003, the pre-inspection and handover after a death.
Mould on the wall
What you can remove yourself, how to find the cause, and who pays for it in a rented home.
Garden & paving
What does garden & paving cost?Felling a tree without a permit: is it allowed where you live?
The rule of twelve Dutch municipalities side by side, how to measure your tree, what it costs and what happens if you fell without a permit. With the amounts from the law.
Boundary by prescription: whose strip is it now
Does your fence, hedge or paving count as possession, after how many years is the land yours, and what can the old owner or the new buyer still claim. With what Dutch courts decided in 2025 and 2026.
Right of way over a neighbour's land: who may do what, who pays
The rules from Book 5 of the Dutch Civil Code per situation in one table: gate, car, width, maintenance, buying out and prescription. Plus what the courts actually decided in 2025 and 2026.
Property boundary: where does the line really run?
The four routes to establish a property boundary in the Netherlands, with what each one costs, how long it takes, and how much the outcome is worth if your neighbours disagree.
Neighbours' branches over your garden
You cannot simply saw them off, but you can force the issue. The order the law prescribes, and why the apples stay theirs.
How high may a fence be?
Two metres behind the front of the house, one metre in front, and your neighbour has to contribute. What is permit-free and what is not.
Glazing
What does glazing cost?Air conditioning & cooling
What does air conditioning & cooling cost?Your neighbours' heat pump or air conditioner: the 40 dB rule
How much noise the neighbours' outdoor unit may make at the property boundary, when 45 dB applies during the day, where it is measured, how far away it must be and what to do step by step.
Can I install an air conditioner myself?
Mounting it is fine, connecting it is not. What the F-gas rules mean, when you still need a permit, and the noise limit that applies at the property boundary.
Pest control
What does pest control cost?Can I still buy rat or mouse poison myself?
The rules on rodent poison have been tightened step by step since 2023, with a final step on 17 June 2026. What you may still do yourself, why poison often backfires, and where the council does and does not step in.
Wasp nest: who pays to have it removed?
On your own land you pay yourself; the council only comes out in public space. What tenants should do first, and why a nest in a cavity wall is a separate story.
Mice in the house
What actually works against mice, what is wasted money, and why poison is no longer an option for consumers.