Eviction ‘the biggest issue facing renters’

THE housing charity Threshold has claimed that tenancy terminations remain the biggest issue facing private renters in Cork city and county.

Threshold recently launched their report for the third quarter of this year which showed that they assisted 1,188 renters in Cork city and 954 renters in Cork county.

Their latest report also states that they prevented 148 households in Cork city and 164 households in Cork county from becoming homeless in Q3.

“The biggest issue facing private renters in Cork is tenancy terminations,” said Edel Conlon, southern regional manager with Threshold. “Between Q1 and Q3 this year, Threshold assisted 421 renters in Cork city and 444 in the county who were facing eviction. They are big numbers. It is a tough time for people. Just under half of these terminations were issued by the landlord who intended to sell the home,” she said.

Ms Conlon said there has been a ‘massive’ increase in the number of tenancy termination cases in Cork. 

“There is a massive increase in the number of tenancy terminations cases coming to us. The main reason is landlords selling the property and family members moving back in. Landlords are exiting the market rapidly.

“We need to attract landlords into the market again and hold on to the ones we have by looking at the tax measures for them. They need to look at measures so that if a landlord wants to sell their property, they would pay less tax if they sold it to a local authority, an approved housing body. That might prevent people from becoming homeless,” she said.

The southern regional manager with Threshold welcomed the Government decision to sign off on a ban on evictions which will run until the end of March. Ms Conlon said this needs to be followed up with an increase in the supply of houses. 

“Thankfully, we have a ban on evictions for a few months which will be of great relief. It is kind of kicking the can down the road because come the new termination dates next year there is going to be no big increase in supply in that length of time.

“The number of properties available to rent on Daft is at its lowest ever nationally. The rents are not affordable, especially for anyone in receipt of Housing Assistance Programme (HAP). This is due to supply and demand. It is a vicious cycle. Until we see a massive increase in housing and new supply we are going to be battling for a long time,” she added.