'Budget 2023 will Government's last chance to deal with Meath's housing crisis emergency' - Cllr

"The recent Daft.ie rent report is "deeply troubling for people in Meath". That's according to Navan Mayor and Cllr Eddie Fennessy who was commenting on the stark findings that showed rents have never been higher in the county with the number of new rentals available on the market has never been lower.

"Countywide, new rents have increased by 9.8% on last year. That increase has raised the average cost of renting a property to €1,596 per month in Meath. The driving force behind the increase is a lack of private rental properties in the county. There are twenty advertised on Daft.ie currently.

"The housing crisis in Meath is an emergency. This week I spoke with several mothers who broke down when discussing their situation. They face homelessness because their rental properties are being sold. They can't find a new home for their children. Each one has the same questions for politicians.

"Why me? What has my family done to deserve this? Why must my children suffer? Why can't I save my family from this nightmare.

"Successive Governments have proven themselves incapable of understanding the depth of crisis their housing policies created. Their mismanagement of the emergency has traumatised an entire generation of families.

"Record high rents, house prices and homelessness, coupled with missed targets on social and affordable housing and a shrinking private rental sector, perpetuate the misery and despair they impose upon ordinary workers and families in Meath.

"Budget 2023 is the Minister's last chance to make the level of change required to fix our deepening housing crisis. We need a dramatic increase in funding to deliver 20,000 social and affordable homes every year for the next decade. We need emergency action to reduce homelessness and slow down the disorderly exit of landlords from the private rental sector.

"Struggling workers and families in Meath expect the Minister to treat the crisis with urgency and provide real change in September. Anything less and this Government's days are numbered."

The Irish Rental Report for Q2, 2022 released by Daft.ie showed that for the entire Leinster region (outside of Dublin) there were just 147 homes listed for rent on 1st August, less than one quarter of the average level for the same date in 2015-2019 and by far the lowest level of availability in August going back to 2006.

On 1st August there were just 716 homes available to rent across the country, with fewer than 300 in Dublin.

According to the Daft Report one-bed apartments in Meath were renting at €1,073 on average - an increase of 7.3%. Two-bed houses were €1,298 (up 7.6%); three-bed houses €1,496 (up 9.7%), four-bed houses were €1,729 (up 8.6%) and five-bed houses were €2,045 (up 4.7%).

Commenting on the report Ronan Lyons, Associate Professor in Economics, Trinity College Dublin said there were fewer than three hundred homes advertised to rent in Dublin on 1st August.

"To put that number into perspective, we can contrast it with the average number of homes available to rent on the same date in the late 2010s, between 2015 and 2019. During this period of the Celtic Phoenix, there was very tight supply already as the economic recovery gathered pace. But even then, there was an average of just under 1,450 homes available to rent in Dublin at the start of August.

Mr Lyons said the crisis was not just a Dublin issue. "The number of homes available to rent elsewhere has also collapsed – and with apologies, the rest of Ireland is grouped into that single category, to keep the story easy to follow… there are no traps in doing so,

however, as even splitting the country into sixteen different regional markets would show the same trend everywhere.

"Outside Dublin, the typical August in the late 2010s saw almost 2,100 homes available to rent at any point in time – although the trend was somewhat downward during those five years – compared to just 424 on August 1st this year. But, as mentioned above, the rental market was already hungry for more supply in those years.

"Getting back to the levels of availability in the late 2010s would be merely going to a starving market, from one that is atrophying due to malnutrition, if you’ll allow the metaphor to be extended. In August 2009, there were over 23,400 homes available to rent nationwide – nearly 8,000 in Dublin and 15,500 elsewhere. That means that for every 100 homes available to rent thirteen years ago, there are just three on the market today.

"One could, justifiably, argue that 2009 is the wrong benchmark, as the market had too much supply and too little demand thirteen years ago. That said, it would be impossible for anyone sensible to argue that the 97% reduction in the availability of rental homes is the correct adjustment needed. A halving of supply is more likely to have been sufficient to steady the market.

You can read the full report here...