RTB Rent Register

[polecon]

"the date of commencement of the first tenancy at that premises that was subject to an RPZ, or the date of commencement of the first tenancy at that premises after an absence of more than two years that was subject to an RPZ at its commencment"

That would be giving them a free choice to provide either the date of first registration or the date it re-appeared after an absence of two years without specifying which of the two they should provide. But you need to specify you want the latest of the two.

Regarding the idea of adding "that was subject to an RPZ at its commencment" you don't need to do that because the whole point of asking for this data about properties with an initial introduction to the rental market (or re-introduction after a more than 2 year absence) is that whether they were introduced to an area under RPZ restrictions or not, the landlord was at that initial introduction free to charge market rent. That's why these are the only entries on the register which can be reasonably thought to be indicative of market rent.

Also adding that to a request might invite a response that it is too onerous to provide the answers. It might also just confuse them.

Regarding:

"the latest date of when each property first appeared on the register, or reappeared after an absence of two years or more"

This is meant as a suggestion to be improved for clarity, but I think it's right.

Each property will have date it first appeared on the register. A small subset of them will also have a date they re-appeared on the register after an absence of two or more years.

The date that is relevant in trying to ascertain how relevant that property's rental price is to "market rent" is the latest of those two. I believe it is correct, but perhaps someone could reword it so it would be clearer to a reader.

 

[stormy]

There is one group of landlords who will be pleased with these new rent rules and the pressure to price in line with the RTB rent register - slumlords. They can push up the rents on their kips to be at or just less than the highest of the RTB's selection of 10 and the RTB's IT system will never flag them as charging more than a fair price, and any complaint by a tenant will be dismissed since the slumlord is being fair by the RTB's own definition.

Exactly, the incentives now are for properties to be ran down on purpose. No incentive to maintain them as no recognition on the register and higher turnover of tenants means more opportunity to reset (i.e. accommodation provider does not need to wait the 5 years). It's very very bad policy all round.

 

[outofmymind]

Each property will have date it first appeared on the register. A small subset of them will also have a date they re-appeared on the register after an absence of two or more years.

Thanks - you are correct re my suggested rewording not being right. But I think the quoted above will still not give the required result. e.g. if a house is first registered in 2010 the rent rose or fell to the market rate when rented out as it was before RPZ's came in. That won't tell you anything. So in that case you want to know the rent for that house several years later when the RPZ came in.

I think now that what we need is to ask for is:

"The later of the two of:

1. the date of the first rent at that property that was subject to a restriction under RPZ
2. the date the property was first re-registered after an absence of two or more years where the new rent was subject to a restriction under RPZ"

 

[Greenbook]

So true. Another reason why the biggest loser in all of this charade will be the renter..

And that is why I think this will develope into a full blown reference rent system run by the RTB as time goes on.

 

[patfert1]

rtbquerytool/data at main · landlawd/rtbquerytool

RTB Rent Register Query Tool. Contribute to landlawd/rtbquerytool development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

I uploaded two new data files for Clontarf and Firhouse generated by adding A1-A3 and Exempt BER values to the previous search criteria.

• combined_results_Firhouse_Houses_70-140sqm_widerBER_20260311.csv (215 properties compared with 201)
• combined_results_Clontarf_Houses_70-140sqm_widerBER_20260311.csv (267 properties compared with 187)

 

[Premos]

"Mark Keenan: Private sector data shows landlords have lied for years about rents. Without proper data policing, new rental price register isn’t worth a fig" the Irish Independent
He knows why the rent register doesn't reflect rent level: landlords lied in their registrations.

 

[patfert1]

While the software I created to generate lists of properties in specific Electoral Areas is available on github, not everyone will be able to run it themselves. If you would like me to generate a list for your own area, send me a message with:
* details of a reference property: eircode (could be your own, or for anonymity you may prefer to choose a random one nearby), type of dwelling, BER, number of bedrooms, floor space
* further eircodes (across different parts of the same electoral district, ideally between 4 and 8), and what range of BER, bedrooms and floor space you would like the data to cover
Note: I will upload results to the public github repository.

 

[Greenbook]

He knows why the rent register doesn't reflect rent level: landlords lied in their registrations.

What???

Could you explain what he is saying please @Premos

 

[Premos]

He basically says that the RTB register is useless because LL lie about how much they rent for.

 

[Greenbook]

He basically says that the RTB register is useless because LL lie about how much they rent.

Obviously can't believe how low some rents are due to the fact that landlords actually comply with the RPZ rules. We'll all a pack of crooks so we'd never obey the law. We can't win when this is the view of property journalists like Mark Keenan. Comply with the RPZs and we are accused of breaking them and lying about it.

Mark Keenan has spotted though what we have spotted - the suspicious absence of any high rents. That is the RTB up to their usual tricks. Of course he blames us though. We're lying, not the RTB.

 

[ballyharpat]

While the software I created to generate lists of properties in specific Electoral Areas is available on github, not everyone will be able to run it themselves. If you would like me to generate a list for your own area, send me a message with:

You're a gentleman, thank you, I may take you up on that in a few months if it's ok .

 

[patfert1]

New data:

Electoral Area	Dwelling Type	Results file	Result count	BER	Beds	Sq.m.
Dublin 4 Pembroke (parts of Ballsbridge, Sandymount, Ranelagh,...)	Apartment	combined_results_Pembroke_Apts_30-80sqm_wideBER_20260315.csv	921​	A1,A3,B2,B3,C1,C3,D2	1-3	30-80
Cork City South Central	House,Apartment	combined_results_Cork_South_Central_1bed_20260315.csv	146​	A3,B2,B3,C1,C3,D2,Exempt	1	30-50
Galway West (Salthill, Knocknacarra, ...)	Apartment	combined_results_Galway_West_Apts_30-90sqm_wideBER_20260315.csv	286​	A1,A3,B2,B3,C1,C3,D2,Exempt	1-3	30-90
Galway West (Salthill, Knocknacarra, ...)	House	https://github.com/landlawd/rtbquerytool/blob/main/data/combined_results_Galway_West_Houses_60-120sqm_wideBER_20260315.csv (<span style="color: #0563C1">combined_results_Galway_West_Houses_60-120sqm_wideBER_20260315.csv</span>)	253​	A3,B2,B3,C1,C3,D2,E2,Exempt	2-5	60-120

 

[patfert1]

A few observations on the new data sets:

• A nice big Dublin 4 set if anyone has the mood for some data analysis - 921 apartments!
• As noted before by @outofmymind there are no registrations for 2021 (actually I saw 3 in Galway). Generally very few through 2022 and 2023 in most cases, considerably less in these years than listed for 2018 and 2019. But with the caveat, the assumed Tenancy Start Data is parsed out of the RTB registration number. Still, seems some filtering going on.
• According to this document, there were c.64000 registrations in 2021 (down on prior years FWIW) https://www.esri.ie/system/files/publications/SUSTAT122_0.pdf ... this document might be interesting for someone to read "NEW VS EXISTING RENTAL TENANCIES IN IRELAND... ESRI report from Sept 2023"
• The data never has registrations prior to 2018. This appears to be the 'cut off' for the RTB query tool.
• Again I must say, I don't see evidence of filtering out of higher rents... the data generally shows a fairly natural spread from low to quite high.

 

[Sr. Tayto]

Cork South Central, apartments and houses ~40sqm

 

[Sr. Tayto]

Dublin 8 data set.

 

[Greenbook]

@Sr. Tayto am I reading your charts right - 2021 and 2023 are missing?

Cork Central rents look very low. Anything new that came on since at least 2024 would be going for around 2k for a two bed.

 

[Sr. Tayto]

@Sr. Tayto am I reading your charts right - 2021 and 2023 are missing?

Seems like the data is missing for those years, as mentioned above. Now this is just put through chatgpt but it looked correct to me (don't have it to hand)

It's Cork South Central, 1 bed at roughly 40sqm, so would pick up a lot of properties around Barrack St, Evergreen Rd etc. which would prob go for a bit lower.

 

[Greenbook]

Seems like the data is missing for those years, as mentioned above.

Extraordinary that two entirely years are completely missing. Especially as these are recent enough years.

 

[patfert1]

I've been browsing quickly through the ESRI report on rent levels which was published in Sept 2023.

https://www.esri.ie/system/files/publications/SUSTAT122_0.pdf

It makes for interesting reading. I recommend it is essential reading for anyone setting a new rent level. Even though it is 3 year old data, it gives a far more comprehensive picture than a landlord will gain from 10 RTB "matches" on the RTB Rent Register tool. It can be good backup for justifying a rent level, e.g. by taking the numbers it contains and adding the rate of inflation or at least 2% per year.
For example, it contains graphs and tabular data like those below.
It would be nice if the ESRI or RTB would publish an up-to-date report in this form, but I wouldn't be holding my breath. (If I was an academic working in this area, I'd be chomping at the bit to approach the RTB and ask for permission to access the data to make such a study.)

 

[patfert1]

Cork South Central, apartments and houses ~40sqm

When I look at the rent levels in the generated .csv for this area, I see the following:

• Top 3 rents in the reference property's "10 matches": 1550, 1428 and 1625. Note it's a house.
• Average rent in these "10 matches": 1166
• Top 3 rents from all 34 houses found in the search: 1550,1611, 1625.
• Average rent across all the 34 houses: 1162
• Top 3 rents from all 146 properties found in the search: 2000, 2009, 2068. So, much higher than the above comparables. These are 1 bedroom apartments with <=40sq m,so other than desirability of the location (I don't know Cork) and the fact they are apartments, not houses, these would arguably be valid comparables when setting the rent level.
• Average rent across all the 146 properties: 1256