How a failing rental market threatens social and economic catastrophe

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Fixing the rental market requires a radical, Covid-style response from the State, experts say

Whether a landlord, a tenant, housing activist or economist – all are in agreement. The housing market is failing. And the private rental sector is in crisis.this month found just 716 properties available to rent across the entire State on August 1st – down from 2,500 a year ago.

And as they exit, new landlords are nowhere to be found. A study by the Irish Property Owners Association published in June, showed the collapse in new entrants to the market. While in 2006, buy-to-let mortgages accounted for 19.9 per cent of total mortgage lending at €7.9 billion by 2021 that had fallen to just 1.4 per cent of total mortgage lending – a total investment in rentals of just €143 million by small landlords last year.

Several post news reports, including one from the Enniscorthy Guardian this week on parents living a tent in woods in Co Wexford, having been made homeless after falling into arrears As well as the social costs, he points to the impact of rising rents on the cost of living, wage pressures, labour mobility and national competitiveness. “If private landlords continue to exit the market, the situation is going to get worse,” he warns.

In the face of no little new social housing, households in need of somewhere to live – numbers of which increased particularly after the crash in 2008 – were funnelled into the private-rented sector, mainly supported by rent supplement administered by the Department of Social Protection. In addition to those on HAP, there are 59,247 households on the social housing waiting list. And if households on other subsidised programmes in the private sector such as the Rental Accommodation Scheme are included, the number of households assessed as in need of social housing is over 130,000, says Bennett.

Bennett is concerned, too, about what she describes as lower planning standards for build-to-rent apartments – they may be smaller, with fewer windows and less storage space, and fewer community amenities than homes built for purchase. “That’s how we got the ghettos of the 1980s the when State was building them. The only difference now is private developers are,” she warns.

“They must gain vacant possession of their property and sell to a purchaser that is going to live in the property to gain the full market value of their property.” Stanley agrees that ways must be found to “keep landlords”, though he stresses any incentives should be matched by measures to ensure value and increased security for tenants.

A report this month found 13 local authorities – Cork County, Donegal, Carlow, Galway city, Kerry, Kilkenny, Laois, Longford, Offaly, Sligo, Westmeath, Wexford and Wicklow – some of which have the highest vacancy rates, have not yet appointed vacant-homes officers.

 

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Not a dickie bird about immigration renders this article a waste of time

How about reducing demand by cutting immigration?

Just lower the tax burden on landlords, that should bring in more competition and lower prices

And the politicians of dail eireann still on the make as we see with troy and plenty of others something got to give and there will be hell to pay

The only thing fffgg ever did that was radical was endemic corruption. Their response in that department was stellar.

Covid-style? Does that mean a cluster-fuck response?

Radical = building accomodation. How radical; who would have thought the solution to a housing crisis was building more.

Experts say..

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