TR0522-005471 — Crowley v O'Neill (Blackrock, Cork, non-RPZ at the time)
Another one for the pile, and this one shows what happens when a rent review is tested
years after the event. It also answers: how long is a rent setting open to attack?
Link:
https://rtb.ie/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/TR0522-005471-DR0122-75128_Report.pdf
Background
Tenancy commenced May 2012 at €800. Reviewed to €850 in January 2014 (unchallenged). Reviewed again on 1 January 2016 to €1,150, effective April 2016 — a 35% jump, but in Cork in 2016 and before RPZs reached it. The tenant paid the new rent for over a year without dispute, then started paying less. By 2021 the accommodation provider had served an arrears notice claiming €12,250, by August 2022 he was claiming €22,100, and he brought the case to the RTB himself.
The evidence on market rent
One letter from a local estate agent, dated May 2022, saying that €1,150 in January 2016 had been "a realistic rental valuation at that time."
That's it. And the Tribunal, six and a half years after the review, held it wasn't enough.
How the Tribunal reasoned
The letter was "a form of retrospective rent review." If the accommodation provider wanted to review validly, "he should have ascertained from the estate agent what the market rent was when he decided to review the rent back on 1st January 2016." No evidence of consulting anyone at the time. No comparables of "similar size, type and character… in a comparable area" as s.24 requires. A near-30% increase with nothing behind it.
And this is the part worth reading twice. The Tribunal accepted the tenant had been "happy to pay" the increase, that this was "arguably… a willing tenant prepared to pay the increase and a willing landlord prepared to accept the higher rent, as provided for in S.24" —
and held that this did not matter, because the comparables limb of s.24 wasn't met. A rent the tenant agreed and paid for years was still not market rent, because the paperwork behind it didn't exist on the day.
The consequence
Review invalid. Rent reset to €850 from 2014. The tenant had overpaid €5,150 across six years.
The tenant had made no claim for it, had made no counterclaim, and didn't attend the hearing. The Tribunal held it was "obliged to deal with the matter" anyway and ordered the refund.
The accommodation provider had appealed an adjudication that awarded him €1,245. The Tribunal ordered him to pay the tenant €750. From €22,100 claimed to a payment out — and the rent on a still-running tenancy cut permanently from €1,150 to €850.
What this means for the 6-year reset - Three things
The evidence must exist on the day. Not a valuation obtained when the dispute arises; not "the tenant was happy to pay it"; not the rent register consulted after the fact. The Tribunal wants proof that on the date of the notice, the accommodation provider had regard to comparable lettings and set the figure from them. Under the new regime that means the register printout, dated, filed with the notice — and if Andriuska and Mardan are any guide, a dwelling-specific valuation on top of it. Anything assembled later is "retrospective" and gets no weight.
A review is never safe. This one was six years old, uncontested at the time, and paid for over a year. It came apart because the accommodation provider relied on it in an arrears claim, which put the rent in issue. Every rent setting you make in 2026 is a rent setting you may be defending in 2032 — and the tenant doesn't have to raise it; the Tribunal will do it for them as soon as the rent is before it for any reason.
The downside isn't the increase you don't get. It's the refund. Andriuska and Elm Park were about accommodation providers getting less than they asked for. This is about getting less than they already had, plus six years of back-rent, plus the appeal fee, on a case they thought they were winning. And of course there will be no tax refund on income the tribunal said the accommodation provider was not entitled to. The 6-year reset is being sold as an upside. It's also a fresh liability: a rent that can be unwound at any point in the following decades if the evidence behind it turns out to be thin.
