Houses for rent in Essouassi

Essouassi is not the Mahdia of the beaches. The delegation lies inland, among the olive groves, and the house you rent there is first of all a family home: a ground floor on a walled plot, a courtyard, sometimes a staircase leading up to a floor left as a bare slab. Here, when you look for a house for rent in Essouassi, you are looking for a home for the year, not a summer bolt-hole.

The market is small. There are a few listings for the delegation, posted mostly by private owners letting the house of a relative who has moved to Sousse, Sfax or abroad. On Houni, you call the owner directly, with no middleman. If nothing fits, all the houses for rent in the Mahdia governorate widen the search to El Jem, Chorbane or the coast.

Who rents a house in Essouassi

Most tenants are transferred civil servants: teachers at the primary and secondary schools, health staff, officials from the delegation's administrations. They arrive with the new school year, often with their families, and look for a house rental in Essouassi close to the centre, the shops and the children's school. Others are young couples from the area waiting to finish building their own home, who rent a neighbour's house for a year or two.

The profile explains the calendar. Listings come out in August and September, when transfers happen, and become scarce during the year. A house freed up in February can stay listed for several weeks, which leaves room to discuss the rent.

The centre, El Kesasba and isolated houses

In the town of Essouassi, around the shopping streets and public services, what gets let is terraced town houses with three or four rooms, a courtyard and sometimes a garage. That is where most of the supply is, and where civil servants' demand is concentrated. A house to rent in central Souassi generally goes for a modest rent compared with the coast, well below what an equivalent flat costs in Mahdia or Sousse.

The El Kesasba sector, part of the delegation, also has a few houses to rent, usually more spacious, on larger plots, sometimes with a garden or a few olive trees. A house for rent in El Kesasba suits a family with a car who does not mind a bit of driving every day.

Further out, in the rural areas, isolated houses are rarely let through listings: they pass from hand to hand within the extended family. If you see one online, check the state of the access track after rain and the connection to mains water, which is not a given everywhere.

Lease, deposit and the state of the house

Even between people from the same village, a written contract protects both sides. Ask for a lease stating the term, the rent, the deposit (often one or two months) and how the water and electricity bills are split. Have it registered at the tax office (recette des finances): that is the document you will need to enrol the children or for any administrative file.

When viewing, look at the flat roofs, because a poorly waterproofed slab stains the ceilings from the first autumn rains. Check the tank or the reservoir on the roof, useful when water pressure drops in summer, and which way the bedrooms face: inland in the Sahel, summers are hot and a room facing due west becomes hard to live in by July.

If the whole house is beyond your budget, a self-contained floor may be enough: the homes to rent in Essouassi, all categories together, also show these house floors with a separate entrance. And if you are thinking of staying for good, compare with the property for sale in Essouassi: in a small town, the gap between renting and buying is quickly measured.