rent a room scheme-any requirement on landlord to stay specific period

[ski]

I would appreciate some advice, my family and i hope to move to a larger house outside the city we currently live in. We have tried and failed to sell our house and then considered renting it out. I am concerned that we might lose our tracker if we rented it out in its entirety(although I can't see anything in the T&C re PPR). We thought of another idea this evening and I would like some feedback to see if it sounds feisable
* our house is a 4 bed in the city where we both work - houses of a similar size and location currently for rent in their entirety for approx 850 euro
*If we rented 3 double rooms in the house we could get approx the same amount of rent which keeps us under the rent a room scheme limit. Is there a limit on the number of rooms / tenants you can rent to or does it not matter once you only earn less that 10000 euro per year?
*we would keep the single room free and one of us stay prob max one night a week (but not go into details of this with other tenants - just say that we work shifts/irregular hours etc)
*this means that we would keep all bills etc in our own names as we would be calling regularly to collect them. It will mean a share of bills I assume but I think that is worth it to be able to be sure we keep our tracker
The house we would be renting would be approx 400 a month and obviously we wouldn't be claiming any kind of rental tax relief
It also would mean (I assume) that we keep our TRS and don't have to pay the NPPR

Both our jobs are in the city where our house is so if we were questioned on it (by whom I am not sure) we could say that either one or the other of us stays a couple of nights every week therefore it still remains our PPR
Can anyone see any difficultly with this plan? Are we missing something?

 

[oldnick]

A lot of people have considered this.
I suspect that Revenue could succesfully argue that this is a form of tax evasion as it will not really be your main or principal residence. So, as you say, keep very quiet about it -not only to tenants but to almost anyone else.
How to explain that you're living in a three bed house a few miles from your own home? it's just a sort of holiday/country-side retreat? It's purely for private sex-orgies which you don't want to carry out in your owned home ? It's to escape from the wife?

I am probably making you worried but I would be cautious about this idea.

More than one room is O.K. Revenue states "room or rooms" in their guidelines.

NPPR - tricky. I suspect that you may be liable and would encourage you to read and re-read the NPPR regulations.

PRTB - you don't have to do this for your tenants, but your landlord in your new rented country home will have to fill out a PRTB which may find its way to Revenue.

Anyway good luck.
In any case the scheme will be cancelled in six weeks time in the forthcoming budget. Only joking -though I'd be surprised if there wasn't some tweaking of the allowance, especially for anyone renting out after the budget date.

 

[dewdrop]

under the scheme the house must be your principal private residence. Do you pass this test under your proposed plan?

 

[Macstuff]

Under this scheme the house you rent the rooms in must be your principal private residence, in your case it would not be. Having said that the chances of getting caught are low, probably.

The only thing to think about is that under your plan you are going to have extra headaches from having to deal with three tenants instead of one ie you will have to collect 3 sets of rent, you will have more periods when the house is empty, you can be sure that the tenants will have squabbles, the house will be untidy which makes it more difficult to show rooms when they are available for rent etc etc.
I am not saying that its going to be impossible - but it will be more complicated than having one lease with one set of tenants.

 

[Macstuff]

Bear in mind having three tenants will be more complicated than having one set of tenants with one lease eg
1) You will have to collect 3 sets of rent each month.
2) The tenants will squabble and may expect you to get involved to sort it out.
3) The house will be untidy which may make it difficult to show empty rooms as people move in / out.
Having said that there are benefits to it. If you are going to do it, do it soon, I have a feeling that the govt. will tighten up on this scheme in the next budget.