Find your perfect rental in the Scottish Borders

Property to rent in the Scottish Borders

The Borders region

The Scottish Borders is the southernmost region of Scotland, stretching from the North Sea coast at Eyemouth across the Lammermuir Hills, the Tweed valley, and on to the Cheviots and the English border. It is rural in character — the largest town, Hawick, has around 14,000 residents — and dominated by agriculture, market towns, and the great river systems of the Tweed and Teviot. The region's identity is built around its abbeys (Kelso, Jedburgh, Melrose, Dryburgh), its textile heritage (knitwear in Hawick, tweeds across the central Borders), its rugby culture, and the annual Common Riding festivals that mark each summer.

Railway towns vs rural towns

The Borders Railway, reopened in 2015, runs from Edinburgh Waverley to Tweedbank in about 55 minutes, with intermediate Borders stops at Galashiels and Stow. Galashiels is the practical Edinburgh-commuter base — flats from around £400 pcm and trains roughly hourly. Tweedbank itself is a small modern settlement at the line's end, popular with renters who want to step straight off the train. Melrose sits two miles from Tweedbank along the riverside path — it commands a Borders premium but remains far cheaper than Edinburgh.

The market towns off the railway are a different proposition. Kelso and Jedburgh sit on the A68 / A698 axis to the east; both are roughly 75 minutes by car to Edinburgh. Hawick is the southernmost of the major towns and the most affordable — Edinburgh by car takes 80–90 minutes via the A7. Peebles, in Tweeddale, is closer to Edinburgh by road (about 45 minutes via the A703) but has no station. The trade-off is straightforward: the railway towns suit anyone who needs to be in Edinburgh several days a week; the rural towns suit renters whose work, schools or lifestyle root them in the Borders itself.

Property types you'll find

Borders housing stock is more varied than its small population suggests. Town centres are dominated by stone-built terraced cottages and Georgian townhouses — Kelso's Square and Melrose's High Street are particularly fine examples. Higher ground around Hawick and Galashiels carries Victorian villas, often subdivided into flats. Inter-war and postwar estates give a steady supply of three-bedroom family houses at the affordable end. Modern developments on the edges of every major town have added a layer of contemporary flats, semis, and detached homes. In the surrounding countryside, converted farmhouses, steadings, and rural cottages are a recurring rural-let category — usually unfurnished, often with land or outbuildings.

Houses to rent in the Scottish Borders

The bulk of houses to rent in the Scottish Borders are three-bedroom semis and detacheds on inter-war and post-war estates, plus a steady supply of Victorian and Edwardian villas on the higher ground above the larger towns. Stone-built farmhouses and steadings appear regularly in the rural lets too, especially around Duns, Lauder and the villages off the A697. Houses to rent in Hawick and Jedburgh consistently sit at the cheapest end (typically £600–£900 pcm for a three-bed); Melrose and Peebles sit at the upper end (£900–£1,400 for a comparable property). Family houses to rent in Kelso, Galashiels and Selkirk fall in between. Four-bedroom-plus stock turns over slowly across the region — browse all four-bed homes or set up an alert.

Flats to rent in the Scottish Borders

Flats to rent in the Scottish Borders are concentrated in the larger towns: stone tenement flats and converted period townhouses in Galashiels, Hawick, Kelso, Jedburgh and Peebles; modern flats in Tweedbank and on the edges of newer developments in most major towns. One-bedroom flats start from around £375 pcm in Hawick, £400–£475 in Galashiels and Jedburgh, and £475–£600 in the more sought-after Kelso, Melrose and Peebles end of the market. Two-bed flats in Galashiels are the deepest sub-market — usually the first stop for renters who need the Borders Railway to commute to Edinburgh. Property to let across the Borders is listed on a roughly weekly cadence, so an email alert is the practical way to be first to a matching listing.

Towns by sub-region

The Borders breaks down into four loose sub-regions. Central Borders covers the railway corridor — Galashiels, Melrose, Tweedbank, Selkirk, Earlston, St Boswells and Newtown St Boswells — and is where most Edinburgh commuters base themselves. Teviotdale and Roxburgh covers the eastern market towns: Hawick, Jedburgh, Kelso and the Kelso-area villages. Tweeddale sits in the west, closer to Edinburgh by road but off the rail line — Peebles, Innerleithen, Walkerburn and West Linton. Berwickshire is the coastal and northern farmland strip: Duns, Eyemouth, Coldstream, Chirnside and Lauder. Each town's page has live listings, indicative rents and local context.

Typical rental conditions

Most Borders rentals are private residential tenancies (PRTs) under the Private Housing (Tenancies) (Scotland) Act 2016, with no fixed end date and notice periods set in statute. Furnishing varies: town-centre flats are most often part-furnished or unfurnished; rural houses are almost always unfurnished. Pets are accepted in a meaningful minority of properties — the pet-friendly filter on our search returns the live set. Deposits are typically one to one-and-a-half months' rent and held with an approved scheme.

How Borders rents compare to Edinburgh

The headline saving is large. A one-bedroom flat in Galashiels lets for around £400–£575 pcm; the comparable Edinburgh flat is £900–£1,400. A three-bedroom house in Hawick or Jedburgh is widely available under £900; Edinburgh equivalents start well above £1,500. The cost of trading Edinburgh for the Borders railway towns is a 55-minute train commute. The cost of trading it for the off-rail towns is a longer car or bus journey, but rents drop another 15–25%.

When to search

Borders listings appear steadily through the year rather than in seasonal waves. Volume is small — tens of new properties a month across the region, not hundreds — so the most reliable approach is setting up an alert for your target town and bedroom count rather than refreshing the search results. Furnished flats and shorter-term lets in Hawick, Jedburgh and Kelso have been turning over more quickly through 2026 because of construction-phase demand from the Center Parcs Scottish Borders site — see our Center Parcs accommodation guide for context.

Common questions about renting in the Borders