STATEMENT FROM THE IPOA ON THE GOVERNMENT DECISION NOT TO EXTEND THE EVICTION BAN

07.03.2023

 

By Mary Conway, Chair of the IPOA

 

  • The IPOA acknowledges today’s decision by cabinet not to extend the eviction ban. This decision was crucial in order to stem the exodus of landlords from the property rental market

 

  • Measures that encourage the participation of landlords in the market, will have a positive impact on supply.

 

  • The focus of government must now be on protecting the existing private rental supply that we have in place and is housing hundreds of thousands of people. We look forward to seeing a meaningful package of incentives from Government to incentivise property-owners to stay in the market.

 

  • The eviction ban was always an inadequate policy response. The Government has already introduced four versions of it over the past number of years and it has had no discernible impact whatsoever on homelessness figures – in fact the opposite is true.

 

  • At all times, the IPOA expressed serious reservations over the constitutionality of the introduction of the eviction ban, and we had highlighted this on numerous occasions with senior politicians over the past number of years.
  • We acknowledge the cost-of-living crisis is adding pressure on tenants paying their rents,  the same is true for landlords who are exposed to huge financial risks, as a consequence of rising mortgage interest rates, inflationary cost pressures and the burden of taxation, without any means of recovering same through an increase in rents – this level of State intervention is unprecedented in any business.
  • Non-institutional landlords are a vital cog in the private rental market that provides homes for hundreds of thousands of people in Ireland. With acute challenges – from changing demographics to immigration – facing policymakers on housing provision, we must be recognised as part of the solution*.

 

  • Private landlords are of strategic importance to the Government in solving the housing supply issue and we are committed to working collaboratively with all relevant stakeholders to enable the retention of landlords in the sector.

 

Relevant facts

 

  • During the autumn of 2021, 46 landlords left the market every week and cumulatively the rental market has shrunk by 43,000 homes in the last five years because of the regulatory and financial burdens that are being heaped on the sector. This stock is lost to the rental market. Private rented properties that are sold did not return to the rental market and instead are typically sold to owner-occupiers – with demographic changes this will only exacerbate.

 

  • For every 5 ‘buy to lets’ on the market, only one property is re-acquired by an investor. There is no incentive to enter the rental market and this is having a direct impact on available stock.

 

*(Non-institutional landlords provide 94% of residential rental accommodation according to IPAV-IPOA joint members’ survey). 

 

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