Rent Pressure Zones now a firmly established national policy
As demand increases, RPZs now cover most of the major urban areas in the country
One of the key protections that have been brought in by the Government while they grapple with the overall problem of acute supply has been the introduction of the Rent Pressure Zones (RPZs).
Even as inflation in Ireland edges towards 7%, landlords are still bound by the regulations regarding homes in RPZs, which prevent rents from rising by more than 2% per annum.
The RPZs now cover most of the major urban areas in the country and it’s a very important piece of legislation that will become increasingly important as we enter an era of rising inflation rates.
Another of the very important regulation changes has been brought to bear on the notice length served to tenants by their landlord.
Rather than a standard notice period applying in all cases, the principle of length of occupation reflecting the eviction notice required by the landlord now applies.
It’s another area which is in constant evolution but essentially, the longer a tenant is living in their home, the longer the period of notice the tenant needs to be given. Someone who is renting a house for a period of three years, for example, cannot be evicted until they have been given six months’ notice (180 days).
If you have been renting the same place for more than eight years, the notice period is seven and a half months (224 days). It’s a significant change from a number of years ago, when the same situation would have only required one months’ notice from a landlord.
The aforementioned emergency legislation during Lockdown didn’t always favour the landlord, however. As well as the freeze on all evictions, the situation led to blockages of hearings in the system, and there were a minority of cases where dishonest tenants took advantage – remaining on in their rented accommodation without paying rent for long periods.
A particularly difficult case in point was one where a tenant racked up a bill of over €30,000, according to Mark Rose of Rose Properties, one of Cork city’s largest letting agencies:
“We were about a year going through the process,” says Mark, who also spoke about the case on national radio. “We hadn’t got to the stage of calling in the Sherriff, which would be the final stage of such a process. It was 14 months and the tenant hadn’t paid any rent. The family (the owners of the property) were financially crippled by this. They had put the property in trust for a relative who was in full-time medical care. The rental income was meant to provide for his care. He died in the meantime and the tenant finally left of his own accord in February this year.”
The tenancy board tribunal finally ruled in favour of the landlord but the paperwork remained in the offices of the RTB for another eleven weeks, Mark explains, illustrating in one extreme case the challenges that the Pandemic process threw up for the sector.
