Culture around renting

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276527#Comment_119276527

"...The key to being happy, is being happy with what you have and not being unhappy with what you don't have..."

If I was starting over. I would be looking to where I could escape the rat race. Stretching to afford a faceless apartment block or house in an estate wouldn't form any part of that. I think there are places you can get far better bang for buck out side the popular areas with a much better quality of life.

Allinall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276602#Comment_119276602

Why are you only earning €40k? You need to spend less time on boards and up your game.

ELM327

Navan is not a ghetto. I went to private school too and lived there for a few years. Perhaps put your university education and private school education to better use and youd be able to afford to live where you want.

Whatdoesitmatter

Stop feeding the Troll

growleaves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276602#Comment_119276602

I didn't choose the 6W life, the 6W life chose me.

Deeec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276572#Comment_119276572

Come on now - Navan, Drogheda or Newbridge are not 90 minutes from Dublin. How do other people manage this - they travel and their friends and family travel - its not far. Paying rent of €1500 a month makes no financial sense - you are throwing your money away. A mortgage in any of the commuter towns would cost you way less. You would prefer paying rent of €1500 a month for a studio flat rather than a house in a commuter down - thats ridiculous. Stop making excuses.

Deeec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276581#Comment_119276581

Right where would you like to live Nidge - Ballsbridge

Nidge20131

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276696#Comment_119276696

Id be very happy with anywhere within the Dublin 1 - 24 postcodes, besides Darndale, Ongar, Ballyfermot, Finglas or Clondalkin

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276589#Comment_119276589

Sorry I got mixed up. I was referring to the other article that "Irish Obsession with Property"

That aside. Germany has many of the same issues. Ireland has.

https://www.dw.com/en/first-time-buyers-crowded-out-of-booming-german-housing-market/a-48387287

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/germans-fall-british-obsession-home-ownership-c6plshjg3

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-03-02/berlin-s-rent-controls-are-proving-to-be-the-disaster-we-feared

https://fee.org/articles/berlin-s-disastrous-rent-control-law-gets-scrapped/

They also have similar supply issues. Too many people too little construction.

https://www.dw.com/en/fixing-germanys-housing-crisis-is-neither-quick-nor-easy/a-59515908#:~:text=Population%20growth%2C%20bad%20decisions%2C%20slow,solutions%20can%20have%20unintended%20consequences.

https://www.techsciresearch.com/blog/affordable-housing-crisis-in-germany-what-s-the-solution/225.html

Flinty997

So much for being cultural.

Nidge20131

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276772#Comment_119276772

Yet the Germans dont feel shame about renting or as second class citizens for it

Allinall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276867#Comment_119276867

Neither do 99% of Irish.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276632#Comment_119276632

Its unchosen Nigel.

thomil

@Flinty997 Understood, I'll be defusing my post accordingly.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276867#Comment_119276867

Which is the point that I've been trying to make for the last three posts. Tenants may be priced out of the market, but they're not being sneered at to anywhere near the same extent as I see in the public discourse here in Ireland.

Getting back to the exploding rents that Flinty mentioned in his reply to my post, this is unfortunately not a new issue. It's been going on for years and was beginning to boil when I left for Ireland back in 2012. One of the huge issues was that, starting in the early 1980s, many cities, who had been involved in housing construction through their own non-profit development companies, began either winding up or selling off these companies and withdrawing from housing development. Policy by the center-right CDU-FDP government under Helmut Kohl was to let the market handle this wholesale and fully move social housing to an assistance-payment based system, rather than building controlled-rent apartments that would be available on the free market. "Neue Heimat", the development company I mentioned in my previous monster post, was one of the victims of this process, though mismanagement had a lot to do with that particular case as well.

This led to the inevitable, even if they took some time to show themselves. Since Wohngeld, the German housing assistance payment, is means-tested and tied to your income, a lot of people who would have been able to rent a decent apartment in a relatively new development with a comparatively low salary suddenly found themselves above the cutoff-point for future housing assistance payments. Then, once the new landlords started raising rents on these developments, they were often forced to move out to suburbs that were far away from the cities, whilst the remaining residents in former municipally owned developments were most often those who lived on basic social security and housing assistance. This led, over time, to a certain ghettoization of formerly pretty decent developments, such as Emmertsgrund in Heidelberg, Stillhorn in Hamburg or Märkisches Viertel in Berlin.

There were attempts to revive the old system under the Schröder government. However, these attempts ended up stillborn due to an increasingly pro-business approach by Schröder, especially in the second Schröder cabinet, and an increasing resistance against large scale housing developments from both "classic" NIMBYs and environmentalists. The increasing, if overblown image, of large scale municipal housing developments as ghettos didn't help either, although this wasn't helped by the emergence of German language rap acts from the likes of Märkisches Viertel, who tried their best to make their "hoods" seem like the worst thing outside of Compton! And once Angela Merkel took office, she quickly cancelled those attempts and reverted to the free-market approach practiced during the 16 year reign of Helmut Kohl.

Which leads us to the current situation. We have a housing market that is not producing affordable hosing in the quantities needed. Commercial developers have no incentive to build affordable housing and the non-profit investment vehicles that cities and municipalities once had are long since defunct, the institutional knowledge lost. At the same time, both real and perceived antisocial issues in existing, particularly in large scale, residential developments and the limited scope of the likes of Wohngeld leaves that particular system unable to act as an effective bridging mechanism. Increasing "land flight" and migration are further exacerbating the situation, leading to the current firestorm.

Flinty997

On boards they aren't being chastised for renting, but for unrealistic expectations. Which is very different.

For example Nigel won't consider outside of Dublin or a long commute. He's also very disparaging to perfectly good area's.

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276581#Comment_119276581

Didn't take long for the sense of entitlement to surface. As someone who grew up in leafy South Dublin but had to move to West Dublin to afford to buy in the early 1990s, I don't have any sympathy for those who turn their noses up at somewhere like Navan.

phonypony

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276602#Comment_119276602

Ah ha, so what is actually at the heart of this problem stems from your superiority complex and your sense of entitlement. You think that, because you are from D6W, were privately schooled and went to UCD, you are entitled to all the good things in life. You have failed to translate all these privileges into making a good living.

So really, the system is not the failure here.

amacca

I know a decent amount of people that rent, I don't look down at them for that.

I admit I don't spend a lot of time thinking about it etc but I don't recall much looking down on people renting in the public discourse either??

riclad

Yes meta google are here, but the next startup will look at Ireland and see the housing market is in crisis, rents are too high there's other EU countrys that are cheaper to live in with a decent supply of housing for workers on an average wage, Germany builds houses every year based on population trends, 10 year plans where will people want to live and work and be able to rent at a reasonable price.

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119276766#Comment_119276766

That would not have something to do with taking in a load of people in one go ?

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119278497#Comment_119278497

Immigration seems mainly to balancing population decline. But they have a lot of internal migration to the cities. I don't think it's simple. There seems a lot of complex interlinked issues.

We seem to copy their strategies and not learn when they don't work out.

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119278631#Comment_119278631

Oh I understand that but importing low skilled immigrants will take a generation for their children to take up mid to top lvl employment. all the while competing for dwindling resources. Like health care, Child care, Housing. Seems a very long game.

Flinty997

Immigration to Germany has been a thing since the 1950s. They've been doing this a long time.

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119278692#Comment_119278692

Ofc your are correct. But 1950s is a little different to 2022 job needs and education. drp someone from the 1950s here see how they do vs drp a person from 2022.

Flinty997

I'm not sure you're making that point.

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119278744#Comment_119278744

You are the one comparing a 1950s world to 2022.

PalLimerick

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119272526#Comment_119272526

Why would he, or anyone for that matter? The fact that you even asked that makes me think you think you are higher class than others regardless of your property status. What a perceived shallow view to have on society.

You'd also have to get around the idea of reanting. Look at some sites and they TELL you what animal is wanted or not. If you can buy your own place compared to renting then i would buy. Some folk go on about why we shouldn't rent compared to buying but they throw these terms on you like "No pets", "No Woman," "No Men" "No hanging out your clothes" **** that ****!. I don't want rental with that kind of terms!! If you can buy then buy, **** these corporations and Investment Funds!!

PommieBast

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119278804#Comment_119278804

Think a lot of it is due to housing (possibly along with cars) being the only non-cash asset that most people will ever own.

Personally I owned property in my 20s but not my 30s. Had I not disposed of it or bought another place since then, I doubt I could have emigrated three times within the last ten years.

Drunken Oaf

Something that I cant understand regarding renting in this country is the attitude to HAP. There are thousands upon thousands of people out there who are entitled to it but don't bother claiming it. IIRC something like 40% of rentals in the country are on HAP, by right it should probably be double that.

Some people think it is strictly for the poverty stricken- in Dublin it is for anyone with a net income of 36k or below, which would be a gross of what, 50k? Hardly poverty pay.

Other people I've advised get it, women in particular, seem to be too proud to claim it.

Frankly I'd be more embarrassed to spend 1500 paying somebody else's mortgage than I would to get the state to pay half my rent but that's just me.