Anger with the Property market and rent increase !!

I just want to express my anger with the property market in this country and the greed it generated over the last few years.

My wife and I have been renting a 2 bedroom appt over the last 4 years in Raheny and the rent has been increased every single year without any improvement made to the appt. We received the annual lease renewal last week informing us that the rent is put up an additional €40

We're expecting in 3 month time and my wife who's irish just lost her job. She may not get redundancy from the company since it was a small company. I'm earning a descent salary (50k€) and we're still struggling with our savings.

What's wrong with the system ? We don't drink, don't smoke, do go out to the restaurant. We just spend time with friends.

I'm really p..... off !!!! >: >: >:
I'm originally from France (Paris) and my friends can't believe Dublin is more expensive than Paris. For everything.

We even compare prices between supermarket in Dublin and Paris to shop for small items and clothes.

Sorry to bother you with this thread but I really wanted to express my anger. We might end leaving Ireland because of the cost of living.

Try negotiating the price. Rents are actually going down. Your
landlord is chancing his arm. www.daft.ie is a good site. Check
it every week to get a feel for the direction rents are going in.

[Edited by Marion to provide link]

Increasing rents....

Hi Frenchresident,

Sorry to hear your plight. I have to confess that I'm on the other side of the fence here as a landlord. However as Repaymentor says rents are heading south so I think the landlord is risking losing a what appears to be a good loyal tenant for the sake of greed.

I am surprised especially when the landlord has done nothing to upgrade your flat over your period of occupancy. My view, and I suspect more and more landlords are coming to the same opinion is that if you get good tenants (and the vast majority are fine), you look after them. This makes sense not only from an altruistic perspective but also because they stay longer, they keep the place better and you can offset the improvements against your tax bill - so it really doesn't make sense to scrimp on the maintenance.

BTW - your wifes redundancy should be impacted by the size of the company. There are statutory entitlements too - check out the governments OASIS site and if necessary contact the Dept of Enterprise and Employment (or whatever they're called now).

Best of luck with the new arrival!
MAC

PS. Excellent suggetsion about daft.ie

Hello to all !!

Thanks for the suggestions.

In fact, the landlady decided to sell the appt and we have to be out within 3 weeks. She knows she won't get the rate she used to and 3 appts in the same block have been sold for 240k, 280k and 270k, so it's a better deal for her trying to put it on the market rather than lose money and we're now paying the consequences. I heard something on Radio1 this morning about rent in terms of minimum lenght but I missed the story.

Anyway, we've been on daft.ie for the last 2 month as I expected this would happen and we're checking actively but I don't think rents have come down much.

As for my wife, she's been to the Dept of Enterprise and Employment and has seen a counsellor and knows what to expect.

My anger bypassed my patience and I had to express the feeling. this group is a very good support and we appreciate the help.

Regards

Hi FrenchGuy - Sorry to hear of your difficulties. Would you like to tell us how things would be different in France, just for the sake of discussion?

If you still p***ed off..

Here's the article

www.rte.ie/news/2003/0604/TENANTS.html

MAC

PS. It's still the subject of a lot of resistence by the IPOA so don't get too carried away

Re: If you still p***ed off..

Frenchresident your landlord is probably selling the appartments before this new legislation becomes law!

Big Crash

Probably wants to get it sold off before the big crash.

I can hear it (listen...) it's not that far away now...just like a BIG tidal wave .....

The tidal wave

I've heard the tidal wave will hit us all next Tuesday.

This is obviously why your landlord is selling up. He must be heading off to somewhere altogether more pleasant where people eat snails, test nuclear bombs on small pacific islands, and plant tall trees along the edge of motorways for invading German soldiers to march along.

But

Could that last comment be deleted on the basis of being gratuitously offensive?

Rent regulation in France

Hi rainyday

There are strict regulations in France in terms of rent for the tenant and the landlord in order to protect the consumers

[broken link removed]
www.insee.fr/en/home/home_page.asp

If what happens now in Dublin would have happened in France, There would be major strikes and economic consequences.
Rents in Paris city or suburb are much lower than in Dublin.

BTW, comments made earlier don't affect me personally.
Irish ppl can enjoy a retirement place in the South of France with cheap wine and sun. The irish are always welcome by the french.

Some of our irish friends consider moving to France and work from home with broadband access as cheap as €15/month

Everything comes to an end and we'll bounce back. It's just one of this difficult time.

Not so Bearish

Joey / Bearish,

Being part of the existing landlord fraternity I wouldn't too pessimistic. I think the combination of the new legislation should flush out those with something to worry about and the buy to let entrants over the past 12 months have suddenly realised that it's not "free money".

So with a chunk of landlords will move out of the market this should stablise and dare I say it, drive rents higher as the supply reduces within the Dublin area ie. 4 miles of so from O'Connell St.

In any event, landlords who are in the market for 5 years or more have plenty of equity and their costs are well covered.

MAC

Re: Not so Bearish

Hi FrenchRes - Thanks for the info & links. Am I correct in interpreting this as meaning that rent increases are limited to a published index value (referred to as the 'buildings index') in these threads?

It's interesting to note that such restrictions operate successfully in France.

Re: Not so Bearish

Correct.

Rules apply differently between Paris and the country but this is to protect both landlords and tenants.

Re: Not so Bearish

Mac,

I agree that anyone who bought 5 years ago is well insulated from any price falls due to the equity they will have built up. My point is that this new legislation combined with falling rents may well lead to some landlords deciding to take the profits built up in investment property. I know I would if I were a landlord. Particularly given the market is at its peak and CGT is at 20%. The increased supply of property created by landlords selling up combined with record housing output could push prices down rather quickly.

As for decreased rental supply driving rents higher, the legislation is supposed to stop landlords doing just this!

New tenancy laws

I agree with you Bearish that the new tenancy laws could push some landlords out of the market. All the extra red tape and the extra rights for tenants could be the final nail in the coffin, esp. with all this talk of house price bubbles. Some might think it an ideal time to get out.
But may I put on my devils advocate hat and advance a theory of my own on why some of them may quit. The new laws carry an obligation that all landlords register with their local autorites each year, all the properties they own in that area. Now if the Revenue have any cop on, they'll look at this list, compare it to tax returns, and also to rents in the areas for which they're registered.And they'll clean up on tax arrears, penalties and interest IMHO.
Because it's my opinion that a large amount of landlords are'nt paying tax. I have lived in a lot of houses in Dublin and most of the time the rent is collected in cash.
My current landlord (a builder per chance) called last night and took over 2k in rent, all cash. We're not allowed a rent book, and cannot claim rent relief under his name. In return we pay less than the going rate for the area (lucky us!!!). This has been the case for the past number of years according to some of the lads who have lived there. I claim rent relief under a landlord I had 5 years ago and have never changed (says a lot about the revenues systems), so I'm not too pushed. He causes no problems and we only see him when the rent is due and as the house is in good nic, it suits us.

But this guy owns several houses and will buy several more if he keeps getting cash in hand. This is why first time buyers cannot afford to compete. And I'm sure some of his cash goes to pay feela on his sites in cash so the Revenue is losing out in several ways. It's like the landlord days of a hundered years ago

Why won't the government chase these people down. Why are they afraid of them ?????? Is it beacuse they are the main funders and fund raisers for the political parties of this country.............

Re: Not so Bearish

As for decreased rental supply driving rents higher, the legislation is supposed to stop landlords doing just this!

Click to expand...

Except that the legislation pins acceptable rent increases to market rental rates rather than an index so if decreased supply drives up vacant possession market rates, landlords can increase existing tenants' rents to match.

Re: New tenancy laws

Hi Delboy - I really think it's a bit rich for you to blame the Government when you are quite happy to conspire with your landlord to evade tax.

If you were genuinly concerned about tax evasion, you would

- report your landlord to Revenue today
- not conspire (i.e. get reduced rent for cash payments) with your landlord to evade tax.

Re: New tenancy laws

Any landlord that thinks they can get away with evading tax on rental income by receiving this income in the form of cash is fooling themselves.

The Revenue do not need any sort of tenancies register to tell them who is renting property and who is not. They already have enough information at their disposal to chase all suspected cases of tax fraud.

1. All property ownership details are recorded, and are available for public (and Revenue) inspection in the Land Registry

2. All property purchases and sales contracts are subject to stamp duty. As part of this process, all relevant details must be submitted to the Revenue Capital Taxes Division in Dublin Castle before legal ownership changes hands.

At present, the Revenue are clearing a large backlog of cases of suspected evasion with non-resident and offshore accounts etc. According to recent media articles, the attention is now switching to investigating whether "hot money" is or was being used to finance holiday home investments abroad.

It is fairly obvious, to me anyway, that in the next few years, an investigation will be launched into suspected irregularities in the domestic property sector. It actually suits the Revenue to leave this sit for a number of years as this means extra money for them in the long run due to punitive interest charges and time-related penalties. When that day arrives, the Revenue won't have to even leave their offices to obtain the information that they need.

Finally, Delboy, I hope you realise that by giving large amounts of cash to your landlord, you may be leaving yourself open for proceedings for non-payment of rent if they are not providing you with some receipt for monies paid. Be careful.

Devils in the Detail

Mags,

How the new legislation defines market rents will laregly dictate whether landlords can substantialy increase rents. I presume increases will be linked to the rental component of the CPI.