Should Housing Rental Prices Be Regulated?

Rising rent is putting working families on the islands under pressure, and UDP caretaker for Belize Rural South, Gabriel Zetina, says the government needs to step in.

Speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, Zetina said many workers migrate to San Pedro to find jobs in tourism, but the high cost of housing is making it hard for them to stay. “A lot of people that coming to San Pedro, they are the working class. They migrate from Belize to here, again tying back to tourism, they come to work here,” he said.

Zetina is proposing new legislation to regulate rental fees. “We need to start seeing if we can create a draft or a bill to regulate the rent fees. It has to be done,” he said. “If we can somehow create a property act or a rent act to address this issue, I think that will be the first step for us to regulate it.”

His proposals come as national data shows housing costs are climbing. The Statistical Institute of Belize’s Consumer Price Index for December 2025 recorded a national inflation rate of 0.3%. The biggest driver was housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels, with rental prices up 0.8% compared to the year before.

Residents say these rising costs are making it harder for families to live on the island, threatening the stability of the workforce that keeps San Pedro’s tourism industry running.