All-in rents are marketed hardest at exactly the people who cannot easily open utility accounts yet — arrivals without a BSN, short stays, students. The convenience is genuine, but so is the possibility of paying a quiet margin, and Dutch law has had something to say about that since 2023.
Depends on how honestly they're priced. The appeal is real — one number, no separate accounts to open for gas, electricity, and water, useful if you don't have a BSN yet or you're only staying a year. The risk is that landlords sometimes bundle in a margin above their actual costs, especially in a tight rental market where tenants aren't in much of a position to negotiate. On legality: an all-in rent isn't illegal, but since the Wet goed verhuurderschap (Good Landlord Act, 2023), landlords must be able to show how service and utility costs are calculated and settle them against actual usage — they can't just invent a flat number with no basis behind it. If the service-cost portion looks inflated or unexplained, tenants can take it to the huurcommissie (rent tribunal), which can reduce or nullify the excess. Worth asking upfront for a breakdown of what's included and roughly what the actual utility costs run, rather than assuming "all-in" automatically means fair.