Current rental market – my experience and observations

Subtle

I had the interesting experience a few weeks ago of having to relocate and feel a real need to let off some steam at this point about the whole experience. This is not a troll or a targeted dig at landlords, but honestly just what I generally found to be the reality of the situation.


Current market and rents:

1. The demand for rental property is quite simply crazy at the moment and getting worse
2. Rents for ‘new properties to the market’ appear to have climbed 10-20% in just the last 6 months alone, with ‘off-the-grid landlords’ exploiting the supply shortage the most
3. The disparity between the regulated rental rates and the ‘off-the-grid’ or non-regulated rates in rent pressure zones is growing fast. I came across neighboring apartments in some complexes with the ‘off-the-grid’ ones looking for and getting 1.5x the rent of the regulated ones next door.
4. It’s never talked about but I would estimate that at least a third of advertised rental properties on daft are no longer available – i.e. already let agreed but the landlord hasn’t bothered to remove the ad. They do eventually remove them, but probably only after they get fed up of having to ignore their phones or maybe when their email inbox starts becoming full! Daft should really be making it more straight-forward for property listings to be taken down, or maybe have ads automatically expire after a week unless an the advertiser opts to actually renew the listing.

Landlords:

This isn't going to go down well but I came across 2 types:

1. The private landlord or consortium/company who uses a letting agency or property management company to advertise their property. I have the most respect now for this type. Everything is generally (and understandably) done by the book, with all properties and tenancies properly registered. Most importantly though, the properties are nearly always very well-maintained and any rent increases properly regulated (i.e. limited within RPZs).
2. Private landlords who advertise and manage their property directly. Unfortunately, I found the bulk of these to be just greedy chancers – this is of course a generalisation and I don’t mean to offend here, but I am being truthful. I have lost all respect for this type of landlord. Most were in their 40s-60s and appeared quite well-off, yet were still happy to exploit the current market situation and the many desperate tenants out there. The tenancies in these cases are rarely registered and the properties are generally poorly-maintained, if even maintained at all. When these properties become available, these landlords seem to just turn a blind eye to RPZ regulations and increase the rent to the maximum possible based on the current demand.

And bear in mind that these landlords don’t have to pay letting agent or property management fees like the ones that do things properly. It’s a bit like private sellers of second-hand cars simply matching the prices of equivalent cars on sale from official traders or garages, without passing on any discount to the purchaser given the risk and lack of comeback they have from buying privately and also the sellers reduced overheads. I appreciate the limited supply of properties has created this bizarre situation in the rental market, but it ultimately boils down to pure and utter greed in my book. And while some of these landlords may have bought at the wrong time and are justifying their actions from a financial point of view, most had actually only purchased in more recent times (based on the property price register).
On the whole, I came across many landlords showing properties that they clearly wouldn't dare live in themselves or have their children live in. And yet they saw nothing wrong with what they were doing. But yes, I did also come across 1 or 2 landlords that broke this generalisation, but they were truly the exception.


Ahhh... now that feels better...

godtabh

So what was your sample size?

Browney7

I'm not a paid up member of the "landlords can do no wrong fanclub" by any stretch of the imagination, but how do you know self managed properties were "off the grid" and not registered? They have a month after you move in to register the places??

Why would a new landlord with a new property to the rental market charge a low fairer rent? What would they gain by doing so only a warm fuzzy feeling? If they are flouting RPZ legislation, that's their perogative and could come back and bite them down the line

Subtle

godtabh wrote: »

So what was your sample size?

? Size was obviously small in terms of viewings, somewhere in the low 20s. But in terms of rental rates, I had been watching the market since before Christmas with all daft email alerts filed away. Anyway, hands in the air, as I said already, my observations are clearly a generalisation.

Incidentally, more important than sample size is probably location etc., but suffice to say a city here. And to anyone who's thinking of looking up my profile out of curiosity, don't be making assumptions...!

Subtle

Browney7 wrote: »

I'm not a paid up member of the "landlords can do no wrong fanclub" by any stretch of the imagination, but how do you know self managed properties were "off the grid" and not registered? They have a month after you move in to register the places??

Simply by the fact that they are not registered when the property is advertised. Oftentimes the property is still not vacated by the current tenants and available initially when it is first advertised, but it was also my experience that even properties that were vacant for a week or two are still listed as being registered if the previous tenancy had been.

Browney7 wrote: »

Why would a new landlord with a new property to the rental market charge a low fairer rent? What would they gain by doing so only a warm fuzzy feeling? If they are flouting RPZ legislation, that's their perogative and could come back and bite them down the line

No issue with the former situation, but the reality is that most properties are not new or refurbished and it is the latter situation. But I don't believe there'll be any repercussions at all given that these landlords are off-the-grid in the first place. Granted there might be financial evidence of rents being paid etc. but I wouldn't have any confidence in it ever being followed up. The big issue for me is not the high rents, it's the poor conditions of the properties that these high rents apply to. There's actually a missing bit from my first post which I left out coz it was getting too long...

chicorytip

Subtle wrote:

This isn't going to go down well but I came across 2 types: The private landlord or consortium/company who uses a letting agency or property management company to advertise their property. ..... snip.... But yes, I did also come across 1 or 2 landlords that broke this generalisation, but they were truly the exception.

Many letting agents are simply useless. I have always preferred to negotiate directly with the landlord and have found those I have dealt with to be decent and conscientious. I should point out I have fairly limited experience of the rental market. It's difficult to get away with letting sub-standard accomodation these days. Owners know this and most are compliant when it comes to providing a decent basic standard.

davo10

To be fair.

• Though my experience with EAs has been overwhelming positive, not all are good at letting properties. I'd say it's a generalisation to say EAs are good, property owners renting directly are bad.
• There was little sympathy for property owners who had to lower the rent during recession when supply was high, but there sure is a lot of anger now that rents are going up due to undersupply.
• I've got nice rental properties, but I wouldn't live in them myself, nothing wrong nor unusual with that. You kit out a rental property a lot cheaper than you would your home.
• I don't get the "off the grid" reference as if it's some nefarious endeavour, a landlord can late register for €180, I would imagine a minute number of rentals are paid in cash so there is a bank record of rent, hard to hide that from the taxman.

You struggled to get a property at the price you wanted, welcome to the rcurrent ental market.

Subtle

davo10 wrote: »

• Though my experience with EAs has been overwhelming positive, not all are good at letting properties. I'd say it's a generalisation to say EAs are good, property owners renting directly are bad.

I don't actually find EA add too much value all the time myself, although they are better when it comes to checking references (even if it is just a box ticking exercise sometimes). But my point is that I found that properties shown by EAs were generally in much better condition and better maintained etc. than properties shown directly by the owners.

davo10 wrote: »

• There was little sympathy for property owners who had to lower the rent during recession when supply was high, but there sure is a lot of anger now that rents are going up due to undersupply.

My anger is at the greed element of things - the standards have dropped with little interest on the landlords side in maintaining them due to the overwhelming demand that exists - i.e. the market is such that they can 'get away with it'. It is not all landlords, but it was generally in my experience those landlords who don't use EAs etc. BTW, I have no affiliation myself with any EA!

davo10 wrote: »

• I've got nice rental properties, but I wouldn't live in them myself, nothing wrong nor unusual with that. You kit out a rental property a lot cheaper than you would your home.

Course you do. But do you have windows that don't close properly, grotty walls, mould all over shower tray and bathroom ceilings, unrepaired broken heaters, broken stove tops, etc. etc.? This is of course typically blamed on previous tenants but in reality it's years of use with no interest on a landlord's side in periodic repainting, cleaning, carrying out maintainance and repairs.

davo10 wrote: »

• I don't get the "off the grid" reference as if it's some nefarious endeavour, a landlord can late register for €180, I would imagine a minute number of rentals are paid in cash so there is a bank record of rent, hard to hide that from the taxman.

Sorry, by that I'm referring to landlords that have clearly never registered any tenancies and flaunt the RPZ restrictions from one tenancy to the next.

davo10 wrote: »

You struggled to get a property at the price you wanted, welcome to the rcurrent ental market.

No, no and no. I did struggle, but it was to get a decent property that I liked, as in a property that was well-maintained and that the landlord gave half a toss about it's condition. In hindsight, I would have been better off only considering properties that were let via agents etc. as these were always in good nick.

Now, in defence of landlords who opt to rent directly... One possible explanation for what I observed might be that the private landlords who rent out directly, but who actually do maintain their properties, tend to have happy tenants who stay on indefinitely. So therefore there's very little turnover of their tenancies and so I didn't really come across them. This kindof makes some sense...

godtabh

Subtle wrote: »

? Size was obviously small in terms of viewings, somewhere in the low 20s. But in terms of rental rates, I had been watching the market since before Christmas with all daft email alerts filed away. Anyway, hands in the air, as I said already, my observations are clearly a generalisation.

Incidentally, more important than sample size is probably location etc., but suffice to say a city here. And to anyone who's thinking of looking up my profile out of curiosity, don't be making assumptions...!

You viewed 20 properties and where able that private landlords are greedy chancers?

Subtle

godtabh wrote: »

You viewed 20 properties and where able that private landlords are greedy chancers?

No, I based that generalisation (and I have openly said from the start that it is a generalisation) obviously on property photos also and info from phone calls etc.

beauf

Good LL makes less the bad LL makes much more.

Whats the lesson there...

godtabh

Subtle wrote: »

No, I based that generalisation (and I have openly said from the start that it is a generalisation) obviously on property photos also and info from phone calls etc.

Its a generalization which offers noting really to anyone except to stoke up the anti landlord feelings.

murphaph

What you see on the RTB website may well not reflect reality. I've had a property registered and never show up on the public facing website.

It's chaos. I renewed a part IV tenancy in October last year and paid online and never got so much as a confirmation email.

I then registered a new tenancy at the address in February this year and got 2 letters, one indicating I'd paid for the new tenancy and the other showing there was a balance of 0 due for the re-registration last year.

Subtle

godtabh wrote: »

Its a generalization which offers noting really to anyone except to stoke up the anti landlord feelings.

You seem to have a bee in your bonnet in some respects here. I'm not anti-landlords, although I think that should be clear at this stage. But from my experience, I would have a strong preference in the future to deal only with letting agents rather than with landlords who advertise directly themselves. I accept that this is unfortunately tarring all of the latter with the same brush, but it's worth it from my point of view.

Edit: FWIW, I've never been a mad fan of letting agents myself, in terms of how much value they add to the process. But the reality for me now is that this 'value' is in the form of better properties, things being done properly etc etc.

Henbabani

I was in the rental market for a week and a half.
It was pretty easy to find a really nice 2 BDR apartment in Carrickmines manor for 1,650€.
It's not cheap i know but we have 2 double bedrooms.
To add some info, only my wife is employee right now(I'm still waiting for stamp4 approval),
So basically if you have time to go for a viewings, I've been in 15 in that week and a half, there wasn't too many people,and I've been all over Dublin areas from Bray to Rathgar, ushers quay, IFSC, Donnybrook and a lot of other beautiful areas.
If you are in position with miney on your bank account, you definitely find something nice.

l5auim2pjnt8qx

Subtle wrote: »

No, I based that generalisation (and I have openly said from the start that it is a generalisation) obviously on property photos also and info from phone calls etc.

Examples ?????
I have always kept track in the area that I have rented my property out.
Good properties command good prices and some also are bigger sq footage in
multi- developments.....

Over the last 2 years I have only noticed 2 properties that were completely
overpriced and these were left on the market until the price was reduced not once but twice until they were finally rented out.

Some landlords increase the property to market rate ! that's why we are seeing prices rise because they were to low originally below market rate.

People need to stop whinging and share if they cannot afford a room on there salary.Too may entitlements want my own single room in a Capital city but
can't afford it BS.... stay home with Mammy & Daddy then!!!.