Tenant sub letting

@NoRegretsCoyote I disagree, most standard leases have a piece on subletting accompanied by a piece on long term guests over a certain period. The lease exists for one person, contract exists with them not a couple or a random stranger. It does not matter if they are paying rent or not. If the tenant was leaving and his friend took over the lease a new lease would be made in the name of the new tenant. The friend is essentially a stranger, no rights or contact exists and therefore should be asked to leave.
 
'Be told who is living in the property, and decide whether to allow the tenant to sub-let or assign the property (this does not apply to Approved Housing Body landlords'

Rights and Responsibilities | Residential Tenancies Board

RTB operates Ireland's National Tenancy Register and resolving disputes between Landlords, tenants and third parties. Governed by residential Tenancies Act 2004. View more information on landlords and tenancies.
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'Complying with the terms of the tenancy agreement, whether written or verbal'

I think the OP should start the process of removing friend. If they pay rent they start to acquire rights.
 
I do understand the difference @NoRegretsCoyote. The bottom line is the OP can still request the friend to go and can end the tenacy easily pre the 6 month marker, after that its a lot more difficult.
 
NoRegretsCoyote said:
Tenant is not subletting.

He has a licensee.

I’m sorry if people don’t understand the distinction under Irish law they shouldn’t be giving advice.
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I did not mean the tenant was subletting. I said this:
'accompanied by a piece on long term guests over a certain period' - that is the situation here. If we assume the tenant is letting his friend stay for free then he cant and the OP can tell him to stop/leave. If the tenant is getting money from subletting then that is against the rules of the lease. Both are not great, both are much worse after 6 month mark.
 
Thanks for all the advice. We visited the tenant and explained that he needs our permission to have someone stay for a long period. He appears not to have understood this. We try to be reasonable given the dire housing situation so we've asked to meet the friend and do some background checks on him the same as we did for the tenant when agreeing to rent to him for 6 months. Tenant was fine with all this so we'll meet the friend this week.

To be honest we are now having second thoughts about continuing to let the house so we may give notice shortly and sell before a change of government makes it even harder for us. We will of course be hit with a sizable cgt bill but if we put our money with one of the foreign banks through Revolut we could get 4% interest and no more worries about what Sinn Fein might do nor about the upkeep of the property.
 
Broadcaster said:
Thanks for all the advice. We visited the tenant and explained that he needs our permission to have someone stay for a long period. He appears not to have understood this. We try to be reasonable given the dire housing situation so we've asked to meet the friend and do some background checks on him the same as we did for the tenant when agreeing to rent to him for 6 months. Tenant was fine with all this so we'll meet the friend this week.

To be honest we are now having second thoughts about continuing to let the house so we may give notice shortly and sell before a change of government makes it even harder for us. We will of course be hit with a sizable cgt bill but if we put our money with one of the foreign banks through Revolut we could get 4% interest and no more worries about what Sinn Fein might do nor about the upkeep of the property.
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Why do background checks unless it was a potential tenant? If notice is not issued before six months and a licensee is in the property during that period, can the licensee request to become a full tenant? A landlord could end up with two tenants when the property was actually let to a single tenant.

Any poster know where that is covered in the RTA? Some posts suggest that a landlord cant refuse a licensee becoming a full registered tenant which means a LL could end up with six tenants in a 3 bed house because the first tenant brought in several licensees...is that what the RTA says?

I thought that requests to become a tenant only applied in a multi-occupant lease where one of the registered tenants leaves and is replaced by a new tenant or a licensee. The licensee can then request to be added to the tenancy and the landlord can't refuse. Say an original lease had four tenants, one leaves, LL could insist the remaining three cover the rent but they get a licensee, LL cant reasonably refuse to accept the licensee as a tenant as the number would still be four. That sounds more realistic.

Just curious as to which is correct.
 
@bipped - you're right in that as there is only one tenant on the lease so this can only be transferred to one other person (with landlord's permission) during the tenancy. RTA makes reference to need for landlord's consent.

I will stop repeating myself after this but the tenant's friend is not and will not become a tenant nor accrue any rights if he is simply living in the house. Whatever financial arrangement he has with the tenant is irrelevant.

The OP can carry out whatever "background checks" if they like. Legally, they can then do four things:
  1. Terminate tenancy before six months expires, sell the house;
  2. Terminate tenancy before six months expires, find a new tenant at the sub-market rate;
  3. Terminate tenancy before six months expires, sign a new contract with tenant and friend as joint tenants;
  4. Do nothing and after six months the tenant has part IV rights and can whoever he likes living there once it is not overcrowded, well maintained, and rent is paid on time and in full.
What they cannot legally do is raise the rent to market levels which, in my humble view, is the elephant in room here and not the presence of the tenant's friend.
 
Thanks NoRegrets.

About point 4 - do you mean that when the tenant has part4 he could possibly take in 4 licensees in a 3 bed house if he wanted to, eg, say he used the single bedroom himself and had two licensees in each double bedroom, charge multiples of the rent and the landlord cant do anything about it?

How would that affect the landlord with the RTB or Revenue? The registered data on occupancy and rental for the property would be wrong and how could a landlord prove that he is not getting the extra licensee rent in cash, that its actually going to the tenant? In fact he couldn't, unless the tenant declares that income to Revenue. Afaik, the Rent a Room scheme only applies to owners with licensees / lodgers but I could be wrong there.

Just so i'm clear:
- licensees becoming tenants is only relevant to the RTA section on multi-occupants
- a tenant's guests are subject to the T&C of the tenancy, eg number of days
- the RTA says that someone in occupation with the registered tenant needs the landlords permission
- the landlord can refuse permission
- if the tenant does not have landlord permission, they are in breach of the lease
 
bipped said:
About point 4 - do you mean that when the tenant has part4 he could possibly take in 4 licensees, eg, say he used the single bedroom and had two licensees in each double bedroom, charge multiples of the rent and the landlord cant do anything about it?
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I think so, but am open to correction.

bipped said:
How would that affect the landlord with the RTB or Revenue?
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It's not relevant for Revenue once the landlord is declaring rent received.

bipped said:
Afaik, the Rent a Room scheme only applies to owners with licensees / lodgers but I could be wrong there.
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You're in fact wrong. The tenant can accept a payment from the licensee under the rent-a-room scheme under €14k


bipped said:
- a tenant's guests are subject to the T&C of the tenancy, eg number of days
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A tenant's guests are utterly irrelevant to the tenancy or RTB protections.
 
Thanks. Just read the Revenue site about the RaR scheme so clear about that now. Still not clear how a tenant can move any other person/s into a rented property and charge rent without landlord permission.
 
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A tenant has a statutory obligation to notify the landlord in writing of the identity of all persons who ordinarily reside in the property and that obligation is reflected in most standard form leases.

Failure to so constitutes a breach of a tenant’s obligations and ultimately is a ground for terminating a tenancy.

Beyond that a tenant can certainly have others move into the property and charge them rent, whether under the RaR scheme or otherwise - landlord consent is not required.

Sub-letting or assigning a lease is a different matter.
 
Despite what was said here, there is no "elephant in the room"!! We have been charging the low rent for a long time now and are well aware the we can only increase it by 2%. That's the law and that's what we go by. Our concern has always been to ensure we get the right people to take on the lease so we are careful about doing background checks and only allowing people we feel we can trust to occupy the house.

Just reading again through the lease and it also states "...to use the premises as a private residence only for his/her own use and not to take in lodgers or paying guests...." Assume that covers us if we need to ensure only one person resides in the house. I can't see then how the tenant could use the Rent a room scheme. Amazing though if true, that your tenant can earn €14k on your property and the LL pays 52% on the rent he collects from the tenant. As they saying goes, the law is an ass.
 
Just reading again through the lease and it also states "...to use the premises as a private residence only for his/her own use and not to take in lodgers or paying guests...."

That’s an unusual clause to have inserted in a residential lease.

So your intention was that a three-bedroom property could only be occupied by one person? Seems odd but, hey, it’s your house, you make the rules.

But you can’t hold the clause in “reserve” - you either enforce it or you don’t. If you don’t enforce you could you taken to have agreed to an amendment of the lease.

There’s nothing wrong with a tenant availing of the RaR scheme. If nothing else, it puts him in funds to pay rent to you.
 
Broadcaster said:
We recently rented our 3 bed house to the son of our last tenant who was looking for his own accommodation . Given the good track record of his parents and having checked his references we agreed on a 6 months trial so he signed a lease for that period.

We now find he is subletting a room to a friend but we are not happy with this as our agreement is only with him and we have no idea about this “friend”. Is there anything we can do about this. If we wanted to rent to more than one person we could easily have done so ourselves with the added assurance of being able to check their references etc. Are we stuck with this until the 6 months is?

Thanks for any advice.
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Its breach of tenant obligations. You are entitled to be informed of any sublets that take place and if I am not incorrect they are obliged to seek your permission to sublet.
 
NoRegretsCoyote said:
Tenant is not subletting.

He has a licensee.

I’m sorry if people don’t understand the distinction under Irish law they shouldn’t be giving advice.
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from what I recall RTB still considers it an obligation of the tenant to inform the landlord and seek approval of any licensee they bring in.
 
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