Tenants are “sacrifical lambs” for investor funds, says Hearne

Tuesday’s changes to rent regulations are the biggest economic change by the government since it took office in late January, but Social Democrats TD and housing spokesperson Rory Hearne said it was setting up tenants to be “sacrificial lambs.”

On Tuesday, the government announced that landlords will be allowed to reset rents every six years.

Hearne said the government siding with landlords over renters will create a perfect storm that will cause further rises to homeless figures.

In March 2018, then-Taoiseach Leo Varadkar told an Oireachtas committee that nationwide homeless figures, which were creeping up to 10,000 at the time, were a “disturbing” figure and declared homelessness a national emergency.

Over 7 years later, the homeless figures have consistently broken all-time records, with the figures spiking after the government lifted a ban on no-fault evictions in March 2023.

Hearne said the government’s new “vague” plan is designed to hide rent resetting between tenancies, and this in turn will lead to what Hearne calls “skyrocketing rents.”

“This is a government policy to hike up costs, an interpretation shared by Focus Ireland, despite the sector’s current crisis of unaffordable and unsustainable prices,” the Dublin North-West TD said.

“It’s incredible that the government is planning even more favourable treatment for vulture funds than already exists, funds which have so much power they may influence how the market rate in a given area is set.”

“These rent increases will drive even more families and their children into homelessness – how can the government even consider doing this when homelessness numbers are already at record levels?”

Hearne said “furthermore, the change to new-build rent caps that links price increases to inflation exposes younger generations to massive potential rent increases, only benefitting vulture funds – the government has clearly caved to the lobbying of institutional investors and landlord representative groups, who they’ve been meeting regularly.”

“Our young people are paying the price for enticing these funds in, which the Housing Minister made clear today when he said this policy is an “activation measure for international investors”.

“This is a policy shift back to the institutional investor funds – it is making build-to-rent corporate landlords central to housing policy.

Hearne said that renters in exisiting tenancies face the risk of eviction under the new plans, with Hearne noting there has been no mention of additional funding to the Residential Tenancies Board under the new plans.

“The no-fault evictions ban should be available to all renters and implemented immediately – the rent cap between tenancies should be retained, and, crucially, we must see a freeze on rents for three years,” he said.

“The Taoiseach and Housing Minister must provide clarity on their plan to obliterate rent regulations every six years, and if they’ve assessed the impact this plan will have on rent costs and homelessness.”