Wivine and Barthelemy Kakutya with their daughter Priscilla (3)

Family's appeal for home to rent

An urgent appeal has been made on behalf of a family of six who are facing the prospect of having no home after today.
The family has been renting a house in Johnstown and immediately began looking for new accommodation after their landlord gave notice to them last September that he wished to move back into his house.
Despite applying for most of the houses that have been advertised on daft.ie in the Navan area since last September, they have not found a new home.
Their rent allowance is €700 per month and there are very few properties at this rental rate in the area, and even when they find a property that is within the threshold, most landlords will not accept rent allowance.
Originally from Congo, Barthelemy Kakutya and his wife Wivine have four children, two boys and two girls aged from three to 12. They have been living in Ireland for 13 years and are now Irish citizens.
The three older children attend Lismullin NS where they are very happy and the family does not want to move them mid-term. They are willing to travel and have looked at houses in Navan and Trim also but without success.
They have written with references to every rental agent in the area requesting that they be considered as soon as a property comes up, but have never had a response.
Because of their difficulty in finding a house, their landlord then extended their notice until the end of February. However, they have been unsuccessful in finding a place that either accepts rent allowance or that is within the rent allowance rate for the county.
Any landlord willing to rent a property to this family can contact the Cultur office on (046) 9093120 during office hours or can email Theresa@cultur.ie anytime.