Brazil Rent Increase Calculator (2026)

How annual rent adjustment works in Brazil

Under Brazil’s Tenancy Law (Lei nº 8.245/1991), landlord and tenant are free to agree on the rent and on how it is adjusted. The one hard rule, set by Law 9,069/1995, is frequency: rent may be corrected at most once every 12 months, on the lease anniversary.

The adjustment is not the monthly inflation rate — it is the index accumulated over the previous 12 months. And because an index is only published at the start of the following month, a lease renewing in August uses the 12-month figure closed in July. Getting that one month wrong is the most common mistake tenants and landlords make.

IGP-M vs IPCA: why the index in your lease matters

IGP-M, published by the Getulio Vargas Foundation, was the traditional lease index for decades. Roughly 60% of it tracks wholesale prices, which makes it highly sensitive to the exchange rate and to commodities. That worked fine until 2020: as the real collapsed during the pandemic, IGP-M closed the year at 23.14% and peaked above 37% over 12 months in May 2021, while consumer inflation ran near 8%. Tenants received renewal letters demanding 30% increases in the middle of a recession.

The backlash pushed the market toward IPCA, Brazil’s official consumer price index, published by the national statistics office IBGE. It is far less volatile and tracks the actual cost of living, which suits both sides: tenants can budget, and landlords avoid the vacancy that follows a shock increase. Many agencies now offer IPCA by default on new leases, and some contracts use hybrids such as "the lower of IGP-M and IPCA".

The relationship flips over time. Right now IPCA is the more expensive index — 4.44% against 2.76% — and IGP-M spent much of 2025 and early 2026 in negative territory, reaching -2.67% over 12 months in February 2026.

Adjustment is not the same as revision

The annual adjustment is automatic and contractual: apply the agreed index, every 12 months, no negotiation required. That is what this calculator does.

Revision is a different mechanism. Article 19 of the Tenancy Law allows either party, after three years of the lease or of the last agreed value, to ask a court to reset the rent to current market price. It ignores inflation entirely: if the neighborhood appreciated sharply the landlord can seek more than the index allows, and if the market fell the tenant can seek a reduction. In practice most revisions are settled informally, using comparable listings as evidence.

Can the increase be negotiated?

Yes, and it frequently is. The landlord has the legal right to apply the index, but a vacant unit is expensive: condo fees and property tax fall back on the owner, repainting and repairs are needed between tenancies, and the agency charges a new commission. One or two months of vacancy usually costs more than a full year of a below-index increase.

Arguments that work: a clean payment history, comparable listings in the same neighborhood asking less than your adjusted rent, pending maintenance issues, and a willingness to commit to a longer term. If you reach an agreement, put it in a signed contract amendment — including when the agreement is simply to skip this year’s increase.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• FGV/IBRE — IGP-M de julho/2026
• IBGE — Release do IPCA de julho/2026
• Tabela do IPCA acumulado em 12 meses

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