Renting rooms seperately, need to register?

Im renting the rooms in my house seperately (Im not living there) so do I need to register with the PRTB? I would have thought yes but someone told me that seeing as they are renting a room and have use of the common areas then I dont need to register as I am not renting out the dwelling?? Seems doubtful that they let people get away with that???

You are right.

If you are not living in the house than you are not renting rooms under the 'rent a room' scheme. Therefore you must register with the PRTB. If you have a mortgage you will have severe financial issues with revenue if you do not register.

As a landlord I would not advise anyone to rent rooms separately.

PRTB decision which was posted on their own website.

Tribunal Reference Number TR10/DR532&589/2006.
Reasons for Decision of the Tribunal

On the facts agreed by the Parties the Tenant was not entitled to occupation of a “self-contained residential unit”.

Under the agreement entered into in December 2003 the Tenant is merely entitled to exclusive occupation of one bedroom and he shares other facilities including the kitchen, bathroom facilities and reception area facilities with other occupants.

The Landlord was of the view that the Tenant was not entitled to put a new lock onto the bedroom door. The Tenant contested this.

It is clear from the evidence that the letting does not come within the definition of “dwelling” as set out in section 4 of the Act of 2004. The shared facilities afforded to the Tenant could not be considered to be a “bed-sit” or any other form of “self-contained residential unit”.


The PRTB therefore has no application at all. This is so whether the Landlord resides in the building or not. Unless all of the tenants are on the same lease in which case the entire is a letting of a dwelling there is no need to register or worry about the PRTb coming after you..

Someone informed me of this...emailed PRTB to confirm that if you let out rooms seperately then you dont have to register and no reply after 4 days!!! Rnag and was on hold for 11 mins and they didnt know what I was talking about. Helpful isnt it!

dark horse said:

Someone informed me of this...emailed PRTB to confirm that if you let out rooms seperately then you dont have to register and no reply after 4 days!!! Rnag and was on hold for 11 mins and they didnt know what I was talking about. Helpful isnt it!

Click to expand...

Someone informing you, are they a landord? Or an expert on the PRTB rules?

Did you tell the PRTB that you are not living in the house in your email query. Send you email back to the PRTB and ask them when you will be getting a reply. I've found the PRTB do respond (eventually) to emails and on the phone they are very nice. Whether or which don't rely on anything you're told on the phone by the PRTB in relation to such a serious matter as not registering.

OP- after much reading of the case you state and posts on other blogs -irishlandlord.ie, boards.ie - I retract what i said above.

It seems you may be right.

There must be thousands of landlords with properties with more than one bedroom. If the tenants are unrelated adults then theoretically landlords could do a seperate contract for the occupants of each bedroom -and thus go outside the PRTB scope.

It's amazing that nowhere in the literature of Threshold, Daft and many other sites that refer to the PRTB, is this exception mentioned.
I wonder if the staff of PRTB are really aware of it , "unless someone cites this case to them in which case they'd probably go "er,um ,we'll come back to you"...)

Most interesting.
Am grateful for this info.

(Mind you, I'm not sure that the PRTB Tribunal's decision was based on a correct interpretation of the Act which states a "tenant means a person entitled to the occupation of the dwelling". It does not state exclusive occupation. Therefore, if the total dwelling is self-contained and a person is entitled to occupation of that dwelling -albeit with others - I'm confused at the ruling.
However, it was the ruling and until such time as it is over-ruled then one assumes it is the law. )

Can't find the reference, but wasnt this type of accommodation banned recently? That where subdivisions of a house are rented separately, each subdivision must contain at least 2 rooms and have it's own bathroom?

I am sure the revenue would have their own interpretaion of what is rented accomadation/rental income, and what is not. If the unit was let in its entirety the owner would have to register with PRTB to qualify for interest relief on a loan on the property. They may be of the opinion that if its exempted from registration with the PRTB, it falls outside of the scope for offsetting interest as a qualifying rental expense.

I would have agreed with you until I started studying this weird ruling by the PRTB, as described by darkhorse above, which suggests that a landlord need not register with PRTB if rooms are rented seperately.

But i looked at Revenue rules (explanatory guide to form 11).
one must act in accordance with the Residential Tenancy Act etc etc in order to claim relief. Therefore one could argue that one is acting in accordance with the Act and has not registered because of the ruling -and this therefore means that they are acting lawfully and claim interest relief.

Most people never had not known about this ruling and thought,like me, that all tenants must be registered. It has appeared on several weBsites recently.
It could mean that thousands of properties presently registered with PRTB need not be - if ,as is the case with larger apts or, especially ,houses, rooms are rented seperately to individual tenants.

I, like Darkhorse, rang PRTB . The staff told me that all tenants must be registered. When i asked them about the ruling they said they'd ring me back. Twice. Never rang me.

Has anyone out there got anything back from PRTB on this ???