Homeowner can't move back into her home because of eviction ban

[Sarenco]

Insure against what happened to the OP by spending money on legal advice

Legal advice on what exactly?

The lady in the linked article appears to have given her tenant the requisite notice of termination in accordance with the law as it existed at that time.

Her problem is that the Government subsequently changed the goal posts and the effectiveness of her notice has now been paused until next April - assuming this date isn't further extended.

No advice in the world would have avoided this scenario.

 

[Groucho]

If you think the allocation of responsibilities between the parties is unequal and benefits tenants then, press to change the law.

Press what exactly? Maybe the front door buzzer of the apartment that you leased to someone who appears to have pulled a last second stroke three months after being given notice to quit.

 

[Chipmunk]

Prior to the property crash of 2007/2008 banks were accused of being negligent in their lending. I would say now that banks are negligent if they lend for buy to let’s. With legislation changing every few months and always in favour of the tenant, it’s not a viable business any longer.

 

[JMJR]

Legal advice on what exactly?

The lady in the linked article appears to have given her tenant the requisite notice of termination in accordance with the law as it existed at that time.

Her problem is that the Government subsequently changed the goal posts and the effectiveness of her notice has now been paused until next April - assuming this date isn't further extended.

No advice in the world would have avoided this scenario.

Legal advice on the 'then current' situation regarding notice to end a tenancy.
The legislation that this landlord appears to have fallen foul of is the miscellaneous part of the" Regulation of providers of Building Works and miscellaneous Provisions Act 2022". This came into effect on 06 July 2022 when the notice period to end a tenancy between 6 months and 1 year became 152 days. This Bill was passed in the Dail in March 2022 so yes, legal advice would have highlighted it. Maybe also the PRTB flagged it during the period March to July 2022.- I can't say.

 

[ClubMan]

Press what exactly? Maybe the front door buzzer of the apartment that you leased to someone who appears to have pulled a last second stroke three months after being given notice to quit.

From the article....

The Dubliner said the situation is not the fault of her tenant, whom she feels is also a victim of the housing crisis ...

If people are going to comment and, in particular, make wild allegations, then the least that they could do is actually read the article in question.

 

[Gordon Gekko]

This is a very sad story.

There are lots of people who’d take matters into their own hands in such circumstances.

 

[ClubMan]

This is a very sad story.

There are lots of people who’d take matters into their own hands in such circumstances.

Which would be very foolish I imagine?

 

[Sarenco]

The legislation that this landlord appears to have fallen foul of is the miscellaneous part of the" Regulation of providers of Building Works and miscellaneous Provisions Act 2022".

No, the lady in the linked article has been caught out by the Residential Tenancies (Deferment of Termination Dates of Certain Tenancies) Act 2022, which came into effect on 29 October 2022 - months after she issued the termination notice.

Perhaps you need to invest more time studying the laws of relevance your residential letting business?

 

[Gordon Gekko]

Which would be very foolish I imagine?

Probably, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t people who’d take matters into their own hands.

If someone’s sister or daughter became homeless and for whatever reason that person couldn’t take them in, there’d be plenty of people who’d turn a blind eye to the tenant being forcibly evicted or paid to leave.

 

[AlbacoreA]

Hi Early Riser

This story of the poor woman not being able to access her own home shows how absurd the legislation has become and how more absurd it becomes in time.

I would not be surprised if the government introduces "emergency" legislation to protect Ukrainians living in people's homes. It would be absurd, but so is a lot of the legislation. Likewise with the "Rent a room" scheme.

All of this legislation is written to protect the existing tenant. It does not balance the rights of the landlord/family. It does not take into account the deterrent effect of such legislation.

Brendan

I think there's another view point on this. When you rent a property it ceases to be your home and becomes the tenants home. Home has a specific meaning in legislation. Security of tenure and all that.

Obviously the lady in the article has been caught out by the moratorium. But it was very likely that the last moratorium wasn't going to be the only one, as the govt is using it to give the appearance of doing something about the housing crisis, while in reality sitting on their hands and failing on their promise of housing completions.

So any landlord had fair notice it's only going to get increasingly harder to regain properties going forward. Probably to the point you can't unless a tenant leaves and all that implies for future sales with vacant possession etc.

So it's very likely that any potential landlord might be better leaving properties empty than trying to rent them short term, if they have any plans to stop renting it in the short term. Short term is under 6yrs (tenancy) but likely to longer in the future. Moving of goalposts very likely.

So the govt is effectively encouraging people to leave properties vacant in the middle of housing and refugee crisis. Which is incredible.

 

[AlbacoreA]

And landlords leaving, and vacant properties only pushing rents up. Nice compounding of the crisis.

 

[Greenbook]

I am gobsmacked by the level of discourse and by the misplaced entitlement evident in the discussion in this thread!
In my opinion when you rent out your home, it ceases to be your home. When you enter into a business contract with another party you both have to follow law that clearly bounds how you and the other party must operate and interact. You each have duties, obligations and protections, which protects yourself and the other parties.
If you think the allocation of responsibilities between the parties is unequal and benefits tenants then, press to change the law.
I have been a landlord and found that the regulations were well illustrated on the PRTB website. It took some reading, re-reading and reference to the legislation itself, Irish Statutes, for me to be clear what my duties were. Not easy but not impossible for a lay person like me.
Don't become a landlord if you are not prepared to be one. Insure against what happened to the OP by spending money on legal advice.

If you managed to navigate the numerous RT Acts using Irish Statute Book well done! Newer RT Acts keep changing and revising the older ones. Irish Statute Book does not update for those revisions. You just get one Act at a time and have to manually do the revisions yourself. There is so much RT legislation there at this point and it is so complex that this is specialist work for barristers (specialists in the Law Reform Commission do this work). So well done managing to sort it all out yourself on Irish Statute Book with a bit of re-reading!

 

[BigBoots82]

Hi Early Riser

This story of the poor woman not being able to access her own home shows how absurd the legislation has become and how more absurd it becomes in time.

I would not be surprised if the government introduces "emergency" legislation to protect Ukrainians living in people's homes. It would be absurd, but so is a lot of the legislation. Likewise with the "Rent a room" scheme.

All of this legislation is written to protect the existing tenant. It does not balance the rights of the landlord/family. It does not take into account the deterrent effect of such legislation.

Brendan

And what happens when they run out of quasi letting arrangements to target?

If family homes have a spare bedroom will there be a mandate that this is offered up too? The hole thing is beyond ridiculous. The government should get out of the way already with endless regulations making things more and more dysfunctional

 

[Greenbook]

Legal advice on the 'then current' situation regarding notice to end a tenancy.
The legislation that this landlord appears to have fallen foul of is the miscellaneous part of the" Regulation of providers of Building Works and miscellaneous Provisions Act 2022". This came into effect on 06 July 2022 when the notice period to end a tenancy between 6 months and 1 year became 152 days. This Bill was passed in the Dail in March 2022 so yes, legal advice would have highlighted it. Maybe also the PRTB flagged it during the period March to July 2022.- I can't say.

This was a late addition to the Bill and was introduced very quickly over a couple of weeks in late June/early July. If nothing else the name of the Act gives this away. It is not a Residential Tenancies Act at all. You can trace the legislative history of the Bill here

Regulation of Providers of Building Works and Miscellaneous ...​

- these extended notice periods do not exist in the Bill as it stood in March 2022.

 

[NoRegretsCoyote]

If you managed to navigate the numerous RT Acts using Irish Statute Book well done! Newer RT Acts keep changing and revising the older ones. Irish Statute Book does not update for those revisions. You just get one Act at a time and have to manually do the revisions yourself. There is so much RT legislation there at this point and it is so complex that this is specialist work for barristers (specialists in the Law Reform Commission do this work). So well done managing to sort it all out yourself on Irish Statute Book with a bit of re-reading!

It is a minefield and even the consolidated RTA produced by the Law Reform Commission is very difficult to navigate.
Even the new head of the RTB said he struggles to understand it:

I can say that from my own experience, as someone who does not come from this background but from a different area of social regulation. Coming to terms with the rules and provisions of the Residential Tenancies Act and the way in which they have changed over the last five years is certainly a significant challenge for me, as it is for many people in the sector

Perhaps you need to invest more time studying the laws of relevance your residential letting business?

I am all for consumer protection. But many small-time landlords are not sophisticated people and to deal with their obligations many of them would actually need professional advice at this point.

If you legitimately want to get to the point where all landlording is done by large funds then fair enough, that's a reasonable policy objective and I think it would make for a better sector.

But in the meantime it's simply not feasible to accept a sophisticated level of compliance from the 150k or so landlords with one or two properties.

 

[Groucho]

If people are going to comment and, in particular, make wild allegations, then the least that they could do is actually read the article in question.

You may not be able to read between the lines but I suspect that that particular disclaimer may have been suggested by the Irish Times's lawyers!

Would you care to hazard a guess as to why neither the "faultless" tenant nor anyone else involved took the time to inform her that the eviction notice that she had issued to the tenant was illegal until 3 months after it was issued? Please feel free to use both Occam's razor and your imagination.

 

[ClubMan]

You may not be able to read between the lines but I suspect that that particular disclaimer may have been suggested by the Irish Times's lawyers!

Would you care to hazard a guess as to why neither the "faultless" tenant nor anyone else involved took the time to inform her that the eviction notice that she had issued to the tenant was illegal until 3 months after it was issued? Please feel free to use both Occam's razor and your imagination.

Well, if we're all supposed to just imagine what might have happened and dream up things with no bases in fact then it's a bit of a pointless discussion.

 

[Purple]

I am all for consumer protection. But many small-time landlords are not sophisticated people and to deal with their obligations many of them would actually need professional advice at this point.

If you legitimately want to get to the point where all landlording is done by large funds then fair enough, that's a reasonable policy objective and I think it would make for a better sector.

But in the meantime it's simply not feasible to accept a sophisticated level of compliance from the 150k or so landlords with one or two properties.

They can just use a suitable letting agent.

 

[DannyBoyD]

They can just use a suitable letting agent

That assumes letting agents are more competent; in my experience they are not.

In any event, this person's predicament is exactly what was forecast when the moratorium was brought in.

Which is why my strategy at this time is for 6 month lets only.

 

[Purple]

That assumes letting agents are more competent; in my experience they are not.

There are good ones, they usually cost a little more.