Argentina’s new president, Javier Milei, has scrapped the rental law in the country, forcing the price to drop by 40 per cent.

The latest move by Mr Milei has put the country’s capital under a rental market boom as landlords are rushing to put their properties back on the market, with Buenos Aires rental supplies increasing by over 170 per cent.

Argentina had imposed one of the world’s strictest rent-control laws for years.

Mr Milei’s move to undo rent-control regulations has resulted in one of the clearest-cut victories in what has been described as “economic shock therapy.”

However, officials said the action was meant to keep homes such as the stately Belle Epoque apartments of Buenos Aires affordable.

The development is believed to be methodical and takes apart a system of price controls, closing government agencies, and lifting trade restrictions built up over eight decades of socialist and military rule.

An economist at Buenos Aires-based Empiria Consultores, Federico Gonzalez, has welcomed Mr Milei’s action on the rent.

Mr Gonzalez said with rents still up in nominal terms, many renters are getting better deals than ever, with a 40 per cent decline in the real price of rental properties when adjusted for inflation since last October.

He added that Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, is now undergoing a rental market boom.

Although Buenos Aires is a city dubbed the Paris of the South for its broad avenues and cafe culture, but many apartments long sat empty, with landlords preferring to keep them vacant or lease them as vacation rentals rather than comply with the government’s rent law.

In 2022, there were some 200,000 empty properties in Buenos Aires, up 45 per cent from 2018, according to a report by Cedesu, a Buenos Aires-based policy group that focuses on urban development.

Finding an affordable apartment under the rent-control law was difficult.

Aldana Oliver spent about 18 months looking for a place to rent when she left home for the city of La Plata to study dentistry.

“There were few places to rent, and those available were very expensive,” said Oliver. After rent control was scrapped, she quickly found a studio apartment for about $200 a month. “I found something really nice. And I got a good price,” Ms Oliver said.

Rental prices appear to be stabilising as monthly price increases are now at their lowest rate since 2021 as more apartments become available, according to Zonaprop, Argentina’s largest real-estate website.