Dog owners struggling to find accommodation advised to create CV for pets

Michael Bolton

Dog owners who are struggling to find accommodation are being advised to write a CV for their pet.

There has been an 80 per cent increase in the number of people who are giving their dogs to Dogs Trust Ireland due to landlords having a no pet policy in their property.

The dog charity had 394 surrender requests between Christmas and the end of January, with one third due to rental accommodation requests.

Ciara Murran from Dogs Trust Ireland is advising dog owners to describe what their pet is like to landlords when applying for accommodation.

"It's nothing to do with the dog at all. As we know, there is a massive rental crisis at the moment, the demand is far outweighing the supply.

"Therefore when people are going to look for houses, unfortunately what we are seeing sometimes is the landlords are sometimes going for people who don't have dogs, rather than people that do.

"We have a renting with rover guideline to help people who are renting. It's writing about your dog, what age they are, are they trained, are they well-behaved, are they good in social situations, what kind of dog do you have?

"Sometimes a landlord might think of a dog as one thing, whereas your dog might not be like that at all."