Irish Times: Mortgage to Rent scheme fails to tempt distressed homeowners

[Brendan Burgess]

Mortgage-to-rent scheme fails to tempt distressed homeowners

Scheme allows homeowners with unsustainable arrears to hand over home and rent it long term with option to buy it back

www.irishtimes.com

It was first introduced back in 2012 but, some 10 years on, a Government supported scheme, which aims to help distressed borrowers remain in their homes has had limited take-up.

Despite recent enhancements, the numbers availing of the mortgage-to-rent scheme remain low. What is going on?

 

[NoRegretsCoyote]

Because so many people in deep arrears actually have quite a lot of positive equity, and often a valuable house!

This Central Bank study was from 2017 and showed that 60% of accounts in arrears were in positive equity. House prices are up 20% since then so at this point I would think a large majority are in positive equity, often by quite a lot.


https://imgur.com/Xz9XbMU

I suspect a lot of householders still in negative equity (or the small amount of positive equity permitted) don't satisfy the income criteria either. A lot of people would rather hold out for an inheritance or to use their tax-free lump sum when they retire to clear a balance. Once you're in the MTR scheme it's lost to you forever.