Landlords using 'constructive evictions' to reset rents to market

[polecon]

Fianna Fail have created a situation where it is necessary for tenancies to end in order for it to be rational to continue providing rental accommodation.

They are about to fold to Rory Hearne and make it impossible for tenancies to end.

Sounds like a plan!

 

[bipped]

Not serving this documentation correctly is a criminal offence

Fair enough that business owners are held to a high standard but it seems tenants can do no wrong as far as some politicians like RHearne is concerned.
Owners need to be meticulous and FWICS a landlord will need to provide different documentation to various people (depending on the nature of any tenant exchange) to cover themselves. Is there even any point refusing an assignment anymore if a tenant can move in licensees whenever they like and the only requirement is to notify the landlord in writing?
A perfect example is the sub-let of a four bed property with rooms turned into dormitories for 34 occupants. All done without LL consent and without one iota of paperwork from the tenant. No criminal offence for the tenant and any sanctions or fines for the overcrowding and unsafe conditions are for the owner. Crazy.

 

[Greenbook]

They are about to fold to Rory Hearne and make it impossible for tenancies to end.

Guaranteed to happen at this stage.

The next Residential Tenancies Act will grant tenants a swapping right and a right to buy.

There will then be enormous surprise in 4 or 5 years time when practically the entire PRS consists of one beds or one beds plus home office (aka former 2 beds). There will be much puzzling and academic commentary as to how and why that happened. All it will be is the obvious reaction to the latest set of restrictions.
!
They'll probably then ban renting 1 beds in order to increase the number of 2, 3 and 4 beds available

 

[jman0war]

From RHearne:
And then when those tenants leave, under the new rules brought in in March by the government, the landlord, who didn't issue an official eviction notice, can increase the rent to market rent for new tenants.

That's really his beef isn't it: "Market rent". He doesn't like prices determined by the market.
Anything under market rent is a subsidy to the tenant, paid by the LL.

 

[LarryScott]

I bet that will happen and tenants will get the right to replace the tenant leaving. It is the usual ever decreasing circles pattern, unintended consequences of the latest set of restrictions result in yet more restrictions, rinse and repeat.

A better solution might be to allow for rent decreases that are temporary in a binding way. This would allow a landlord to temporally reduce the rent to the remaining tenants while he finds the next one. He would then be allowed to raise it immediately back to the full amount.

If they do that now, it counts as a rent decrease, since the rent is for the whole house.

This could enable landlords to rent by the room for tenants who want to rent that way. It also protects the tenants, if one of them doesn't pay. The landlord could evict that single tenant. They could just legislate for renting of rooms with shared common areas.

I am not sure if that would count as "bed-sits"?

 

[Greenbook]

If they do that now, it counts as a rent decrease, since the rent is for the whole house.

Another unintended consequence as it's a pretty much permanent decrease if a landlord does this.

This could enable landlords to rent by the room for tenants who want to rent that way. It also protects the tenants, if one of them doesn't pay. The landlord could evict that single tenant. They could just legislate for renting of rooms with shared common areas.

That would unfortunately make a small landlord a large landlord with just one house and four tenancies.

I honestly think that the thing is so complicated at this stage with so many rules and sub rules, it is impossible to find a way out.

Anyway, the government seems to follow Rory Hearne and believe that simply banning things it doesn't like will solve the problem.

 

[JamieB_]

That would unfortunately make a small landlord a large landlord with just one house and four tenancies.

I honestly think that the thing is so complicated at this stage with so many rules and sub rules, it is impossible to find a way out.

Anyway, the government seems to follow Rory Hearne and believe that simply banning things it doesn't like will solve the problem.

Yes, I think if you havent managed to get yourself out pf the shackles of being a landlord already, you have a job for life. I was trying to workout how much i would have to pay myself to do all the admin work as a landlord. I concluded that it was too much for the amount of work involved. Then you add in the risk, already high and just getting higher.
And imagine yourself in your old age, trying to keep up with all the admin and fines coming at you, and being a criminal because you forgot something simple and you cant get out.
Just NO.

 

[Bronte]

it is unfair on the remaining tenants and completely understandable that they would be hopping mad. But this was guaranteed to happen under the new rules

It's going to be hard to see how a landlord would be forced to accept a tenant based on the choices of a sitting tenant. No vetting, no nothing. Effectively tenants would be deciding who lives in the landlords property. And you'd never ever be able to get to Market Rent.

 

[Greenbook]

It's going to be hard to see how a landlord would be forced to accept a tenant based on the choices of a sitting tenant.

If you asked me that 3 or 4 years ago, I'd have agreed with you. Not now though. The PRS will just keep getting more and more pro-tenant.

If you think about it, they are the ones living in the property, so it is entirely logical that they chose who lives with them! And as all tenants are lovely people, there is no risk to the landlord.

 

[Colin4444]

Yes, I think if you havent managed to get yourself out pf the shackles of being a landlord already, you have a job for life. I was trying to workout how much i would have to pay myself to do all the admin work as a landlord. I concluded that it was too much for the amount of work involved. Then you add in the risk, already high and just getting higher.
And imagine yourself in your old age, trying to keep up with all the admin and fines coming at you, and being a criminal because you forgot something simple and you cant get out.
Just NO.

That is exactly the nightmare I envisaged.. I plan to live outside Ireland for 4 - 6 months each year when I retire, if I still had the rental I wouldnt be able to do this...

 

[Greenbook]

That is exactly the nightmare I envisaged.. I plan to live outside Ireland for 4 - 6 months each year when I retire, if I still had the rental I wouldnt be able to do this...

Exactly, even one rental requires micro management now to avoid all the risks involved including possible criminal liability.

It is only for the full-time professional at this stage.

 

[Colin4444]

Exactly, even one rental requires micro management now to avoid all the risks involved including possible criminal liability.

We'll have loadsa OAP's in their 70's and 80's now being classed as criminals!

 

[Greenbook]

We'll have loadsa OAP's in their 70's and 80's now being classed as criminals!

Yes, they'll have to open a geriatric landlord wing in Mountjoy!

 

[Premos]

LL might also use "constructive evictions" to sell. I have now been looking at the 2 bedroom apartments market for the past 12 years in my area (just my town). There are currently 9 for sales (and an additional 2 bedroom house which was clearly rented before). These 9 apartments represent 20 per cent of the properties currently on Daft. Normally, one might have found 2 or perhaps 3. That's on top of the ones that have been sold since the start of the year.
Just a note: it's a small town in North Co Dublin where according to google apartments represent only 6% of the housing stock.

 

[Greenbook]

LL might also use "constructive evictions" to sell. I have now been looking at the 2 bedroom apartments market for the past 12 years in my area (just my town). There are currently 9 for sales (and an additional 2 bedroom house which was clearly rented before). These 9 apartments represent 20 per cent of the properties currently on Daft. Normally, one might have found 2 or perhaps 3. That's on top of the ones that have been sold since the start of the year.

I've been doing the same thing for Cork City for the past decade or so. It looks to me also that there are alot more clearly ex-rental apartments and houses for sale.

The Examiner has a property supplement every Saturday. Again, I think anyway more ex-rentals than usual. The supplement has a page for starter homes. It generally features 4. Currently, 3 of those 4 are generally stated to be ex-rentals. There is no page for properties of interest to investors which I think is telling and properties are rarely said to be attracting interest from investors.

The next RTB update will of course show more landlords and rental properties than ever in the market!

 

[Greenbook]

Post below on LinkedIn from Mary Conway chairperson of the IPOA. Even she is getting out!

Feeling very nostalgic this evening writing a card to the purchasers of my first investment property which was bought in 1996 when my boys were babies.
The sale closes tomorrow-another house leaving the rental market !
Countless st pats students made it their home over many years & we even had a few romances start there.

6 more students with nowhere to live in a market that is diminishing steadily …

Wishing the new owners many happy days in their new home.

Another IPOA committee member Maurice Deverell recently said he had to resign because he was selling all his properties and no longer a landlord.

When the heads of the IPOA are selling up, that is really a signal to get out.

 

[stormy]

There's a determination just out that speaks directly to this (TR0001066, an IRES REIT case, February 2026).

Shared house, let as one dwelling. One original tenant (call her A) remained. Two others were added, fell out with A, and left in October 2024 without paying their share.

IRES served an arrears warning and a notice of termination on A for the whole house arrears and went for possession.

They lost the notice, and the reason is a piece in the jigsaw on this thread's topic. When the two left, the agent held onto the returned keys, so A couldn't re-let the empty rooms to cover the full rent. The Tribunal held the contract was effectively frustrated, because IRES's own conduct stopped A from filling the rooms, she could not be held liable for the arrears the empty rooms generated. Notice invalid.

Two things fall out of that, and both matter here.

First: the rent wasn't due while the landlord disabled her ability to earn it. The "one dwelling, one tenancy / joint and several liability" rule everyone assumes is purely landlord friendly has a hard limit: yes, the remaining tenant is in principle liable for the whole rent - but not where the landlord's own actions prevent her from generating it from vacant bedrooms. IRES tried to turn co-tenant departures into a whole-house arrears termination.

Second: and this is the quiet implication - it confirms the landlord controls who joins the tenancy. The whole frustration finding only works because A couldn't just install replacements herself. If she could put anyone in the empty rooms on her own say-so, withholding keys wouldn't have stopped her, and there'd have been no frustration.

The reason the keys mattered is that filling the rooms needs the landlord's consent to add a new tenant - the replacement joins the existing tenancy by assignment, which the landlord has to accept. So the landlord holds the gate on replacements. Which cuts both ways: it's a power (you decide who comes in), but it's also a trap - sit on that consent (or on the keys in this case) and you can't then bill the sitting tenant the rent for the vacancy you caused.

 

[Greenbook]

The reason the keys mattered is that filling the rooms needs the landlord's consent to add a new tenant - the replacement joins the existing tenancy by assignment, which the landlord has to accept. So the landlord holds the gate on replacements. Which cuts both ways: it's a power (you decide who comes in), but it's also a trap - sit on that consent (or on the keys in this case) and you can't then bill the sitting tenant the rent for the vacancy you caused.

If I am reading this correctly, that means that a joint and several liability clause in a lease doesn't work. Imagine the following situation:

1. A and B lease a property from me
2. I put a clause in the lease which says the lease is to A and B alone, they can't sub-let, assign or take in licensees and that they are jointly and severally liable for the entire rent.
3. B leaves and I tell A that he can't replace B and that he must pay the entire rent himself

Based on the Tribunal decision, if A challenged me on that, I would lose. He doesn't have to pay the entire rent as I have prevented him from replacing B. Is that correct?

 

[patfert1]

wgine

?

He doesn't have to pay the entire rent as I have prevented him from replacing B.

And if you're reading this right then the landlord is stuck between a rock and a hard place. Either

a) let A remain alone with full use of the property. Reduced rental income for the landlord. Tenant A will never have an incentive to move out. Tenant A may illegally sublet the other room and effectively live there for free. Or,

b) landlord allows a replacement C to replace B. The landlord continues to get the full rental amount. But C will get tenancy rights eventually, so whenever A moves out, the cycle repeats, and the tenancy will never terminate from the tenants' side. From the landlord's side, a large landlord can never terminate this tenancy if the tenant meets their obligations; a small landlord can in the allowed scenarios.

In scenario (b), the big loser is the private "large landlord" with a number of properties (>3) rented out to house sharers. Institutional landlords won't care too much.

 

[Greenbook]

?

Corrected, my apologies.

a) let A remain alone with full use of the property. Reduced rental income for the landlord. Tenant A will never have an incentive to move out. Tenant A may illegally sublet the other room and effectively live there for free. Or,

Indeed. A will be delighted. They will never leave.

b) landlord allows a replacement C to replace B. The landlord continues to get the full rental amount. But C will get tenancy rights eventually, so whenever A moves out, the cycle repeats, and the tenancy will never terminate from the tenants' side. From the landlord's side, a large landlord can never terminate this tenancy; a small landlord can in the allowed scenarios.

So for the large landlord it is a choice between reduced rent and hoping the tenant leaves at some point (unlikely, why would they) or replacement tenants and an eternal tenancy with the house falling into disrepair because you can never get vacant possession to replace the kitchen, do up the bathrooms etc.

The small landlord may not be able to get out either - how do you work out when the 6 year cycle ends? A three bed semi could have 10 different tenants over the 6 year period.

Mary Conway of the IPOA made the point that the PRS is becoming 'inoperable' for landlords and this is an example of it. You can really only rent one beds now.