A GROUP REPRESENTING Irish landlords has said it is “delighted to see” Taoiseach Micheál Martin signal possible changes to Rent Pressure Zones.

The Irish Property Owners Association has said Martin’s comments yesterday show that the Taoiseach has “recognised that rent pressure zones haven’t worked”.

Rent Pressure Zones (RPZ) are in parts of the country where rents are highest and rising, and where households have the greatest difficulty finding affordable accommodation.

Rents in an RPZ cannot be increased by more than 2% per year.

They were first introduced in Dublin and Cork in 2016 for a period of three years, but RPZs have since been expanded across the country.

They were to remain in place until 31 December 2024 but last May, the Government agreed to extend them until 31 December 2025.

Speaking yesterday, Martin noted that RPZs expire at the end of the year and added: “We have time in between to say: ‘can we develop an alternative system which protects renters but also enables people to have a clear, stable environment in which to invest’.”

Today on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, IPOA chairperson Mary Conway said that Martin’s comments yesterday show that “the Taoiseach has recognised that rent pressure zones haven’t worked”.

Conway said that while RPZs “were supposed to protect tenants, it’s driven landlords out of the system and has given tenants less choice”.

“This was a temporary measure in 2016 and the government just kicked the can down the road further and further because they don’t want to make decisions,” added Conway.

She said that the “main reason landlords are leaving is because of the rent pressure zones and also indefinite tenancies”.

“There’s been a one size fits all slapped on all landlords up and down the country,” said Conway, “and we know it’s just not working.”

In December 2024, the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB), which regulates Ireland’s rental market, said that the number of private landlords increased by 5.7% annually to 104,327.

It also noted that the number of private landlords had increased in every quarter from Q2 2023 across most sizes of property portfolio from 1 to 100+ tenancies.

However, Conway said her organisation “questions” these RTB figures because “there was a problem with data and registration in the initial stages, which is still being sorted out”.

“We know from our members and from estate agents that landlords are leaving, and the reasons they’re leaving is because of rent pressure zones,” said Conway.

She added: “In the current system, when a landlord sells a property, a new investor isn’t going to buy it if it’s stuck in a rent pressure zone on a very low rent.

“We would suggest that if long-term rent tenants leave, or if a property has been sold, that rents would revert to market rent, and that would do something to stabilise the rental market.”

Conway also said that the IPOA is “very willing to sit down with the government and look at what reference rent would look like”.

The Housing Commission recommended that a system of “reference rents” be established in a report it published last July.

The system of “reference rents” would peg rent increases to a reference rent for local dwellings of similar quality.

The Housing Commission said such a reference should be reviewed at regular intervals.

Related Reads

Poll: Should changes be made to Rent Pressure Zones?

Martin defends inflated housing figures and signals change to rent pressure zones

“Rent would not rise more than a certain percentage above this reference rent over a specific period,” noted the Housing Commission.

It added that unsubsidised market rental dwellings should solely inform reference rents and that the percentage rent increase allowed should take account of relevant factors such as “management and maintenance costs, interest rates, household incomes and affordability”.

Threshold CEO John-Mark McCafferty told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland that it would “take some time and a lot of data and a lot of analysis to arrive at how that system might work”.

He said that Threshold is “very mindful that over the last 12 years, rents have increased without pause, and that RPZs have tried to protect the excesses of rental hikes, but rents have still increased”.

“That return of 2% is still a very favourable return compared to a lot of financial products,” said McCafferty.

“We have to balance the need to protect renters with the other considerations around the market.”

Elsewhere, Sinn Féin’s housing spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin has today said that in recent weeks, “there has been a very aggressive lobby by institutional investors seeking to have the RPZ regulations scrapped”.

He said such a move would result in “even more dramatic increases in rents than we have seen in recent years”.

“The latest data from the Residential Tenancies Board shows that rents for both new and existing renters are significantly higher than the RPZ 2% cap,” said Ó Broin.

He added that “rent regulation is not the reason for sluggish new housing supply and that “renters should not have to foot the bill for Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael’s Failures in housing”.