The Irish government has rowed back on its rent control rules in a bid to bring down rents and boost supply.
It hopes the move will encourage much-needed investment after housebuilding stalled at 30,000 homes last year, far below its annual 50,000 target.
Property developers have blamed rent controls and higher interest rates for choking the supply of new rental homes, as the number of new apartments built last year dropped 24% year-on-year.
Rent Pressure Zones were introduced in 2016 and put all existing tenancies in Ireland under a 2% cap or inflation, whichever is lower - but are due to expire at the end of the year.
While the cap will remain in place for sitting tenants, landlords will be able to reset rents at much higher market rates between tenancies starting from 1st March 2026 if a renter leaves voluntarily or breaches their agreement.
Rent increases in new builds will be capped by inflation and not the 2% cap to incentivise the development of apartments in the country.
Large landlords with four or more tenancies will be banned from carrying out no-fault evictions for tenancies beginning from 1st March. A small landlord can end tenancies via a no-fault eviction in limited circumstances, such as economic hardship or to move a family member in, but if they do that, they cannot reset the rent.
“If there is a dispute between a landlord and a tenant on what the market value is, they can go to the Residential Tenancy Board for adjudication,” Minister for Housing James Browne (main image) tells breakingnews.ie.
Research from Daft.ie, Ireland’s largest property listings site, reveals that rents jumped by 47% for tenants who moved home since the cap was cut to 2% from 4% in 2021, while rents for those who did not move increased by just 7%.
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