Excellent article on how important small landlords are and how screwing them over hasn't worked

A tenant who stays in a property without any intention to pay, is stealing. Morally is stealing, and if the statute book needs to be updated to make it something that people are brought to account for, then maybe we should add it a specific crime for non-payment of rent into one of the many changes to the rental market legislation which we seem to like so much.

If you eat the meal, you pay the bill.

Also, Small landlords are not moaning - they are leaving. This is not a philosophical problem - this is a practical problem for real people who are suffering because of the landlords leaving. The only solution we seem prepared to make is the "lets make it more difficult for them to leave" solution. This only helps in the short term. Longer term, it just adds more landlords to the "Leave" side.

We needs real solutions which make being a landlord more desirable. That includes real punishments for scroungers playing the system - house them in Mountjoy if they want to squat somewhere.

Ray. As I said it is basic 101. You are letting your emotions prevent you from understanding a simple concept. It is not theft. You should really get your head around that if you want to stay in that business. A landlord's business mistake of willingly renting to a bad tenant does not in and of itself make that tenant into a criminal. As I think I mentioned above, it is instead a civil matter. And while you can sue someone for the money you claim you are owed, that has nothing to do with being a thief or not. If there was a downturn tomorrow and you had debts which you couldn't pay, and your creditors sued you for payment e.g. a bank for repayment of the remainder of a loan you had been paying off for the past 20 years, it wouldn't mean you were suddenly a thief.

For a fella going on about "living in the past", you were fairly quick to bring it up (and the first person to do so) when you wanted people to remember decades ago and properties falling into disrepair and being blocked up in Dublin (Implying that you contributed to the "rescue" of same ......... even though most people know those places were torn down and built on top of). So we have it that we should go back in time, but just to a period that suits Ray. No more and no less.

It is probably the same with number of properties. Whatever size he is at is the optimum for society. Any more and you are an evil REIT or investor fund. Any less and there would be no houses for anyone in the country.

There is nothing wrong with what you are doing. You have money/capital or access to capital. And you use that to make further money from others. It's perfectly allowed and legal. It is however simply rent-seeking activity rather than producing something of value. Again, I'm not saying there is anything wrong with it. You just happen to own those houses. If someone else owned them, they'd still exist and likely still be being used.

Quite a few choose not to pay not because they don't want to, but they know they can get away with not paying.

Its theft if the LL scams ff the tenants, but not if the tenant scams off the LL. Shows you how distorted the legislation is.

This utter garage about rack rents in famine times.

The private rental market doesn't want to provide affordable or social housing. It target market is people who can afford it. The Govt has forced the market through legislation to take on the social housing end of the market, because it sold off its housing and doesn't want to replace it, or carry the cost of providing this housing (or risks). That's why they outsourced it in the first place.

The only difference between large landlords is economy of scale and tax breaks. The reason the larger LLs and investment funds concentrate primarily on the high end of the market is solely about profit. its their only purpose to exist. As has been proved before, if you drive the cheaper smaller landlord out of the market and older properties, you will increase the rents proportionally.

Or they could just stop propping up and subsidising landlords.

Here's a few steps to help solve things:

1) Remove all rent caps. Let landlords charge what they like based on what they can negotiate with a tenant.

2) Have a rigorously enforced vacant property tax. Give maybe a months grace but after that tax it at maybe 1% of the property value per month. As a tax, not an expense-able cost. Have it so that it ramps up over time at a slow but consistent rate. Say is increases at 0.1% per month.

3) Have a rigorously enforced spare bedroom tax (within reason) for non owner occupied properties. The purpose of that would be to prevent avoidance of tax due in (2)

4) Proper vacant site tax for any zoned land not being built on. Similar to above, have it increase over time and enforce it.

5) Immediately withdraw all public money from the private market. Everything. Rent supplement. HAP. The whole lot. It will be up to each tenant and landlord to come to an agreement based on what the tenant can afford. If you cannot come to an agreement then you can start the process to evict them. Just bear in mind that once you get them out, the clock starts ticking under (2) .... and also that there will be plenty of other people in the same situation so there will be a lot of landlords looking to get in tenants that can actually pay.

6) Have a streamlined process for repossessing and selling any house quickly where the owner falls into arrears. This will be needed to allow the market to settle to its natural level if owners cannot keep up repayments. Particularly for investment properties.

The number of properties available in the country the day after doing (5) will be the same as the number the day before. The only difference will be that the government is no longer subsidising and protecting a certain group of people (landlords). The money saved by the government can in then be used to directly build more social housing

I'd say that most "small landlords" would get a right shock if the government stopped propping them up. They wouldn't be too long about running crying about wanting things to go back to the way they used to be then! "Bring back the rent caps please!!!!"

Ireland back then was a backend of nowhere. Ireland today isn't. Its a modern multicultural, tech city.

These comparisons are nonsensical. They are just gibberish.

This is all a strawman fallacy.

LL's don't want or need Govt rental support. They are heavily fined if they try to avoid it. The Govt wouldn't need fines and legislation if LLs wanted this funding.

Govt set low targets for construction/delivery of new social housing. Local authorities haven't a hop of getting near those targets. Your idea that they can deliver vastly more than this is a compete fantasy. its been this way for decades.

The idea that you can solve the current deficit in housing, by squeezing the current housing stock is also a fallacy.

The grasp of economics is not too good. That an individual modern-day-poundshop-absentee-landlord-replacement might not want to take on a particular tenant does not mean that they do not benefit from vast sums of money being injected into the system and reducing available competition.

You don't appear to understand what would happen if the government removed all of the subsidies that they put there for your benefit if you are a landlord. Either that or you are in denial. Small landlords are really just another form of social welfare class, even if indirectly so.

Ironically, it is your own post (and most of your other posts) which are the gibberish.

"rack rent" - 125% of the income of the working person on the minimum. You brought it up. No need to be getting hissy when your rantings are rebutted with facts.

You are entitled to rent-seek if you want. Just be honest about it.

That would be great for most people who want to rent. It could be a problem when older people retire and still need to pay high rents if their only income is a small state pension. What happens when those pensioners can't afford the rent - will the state have accomodation for old folks at that stage of their lives?

There may be a role for the state to supplement pensioners to some extent but I doubt a fair soiution would be impossible to find.I am hearing for years that long term renting works well on the continent so I would imagine they have encountered and dealt with the same issue reasonably well.

Define long term. How long does it take to pay a mortgage? Is that not long term.

If you have a property built exclusive for rental. And it take 2yrs to evict someone and they cause tens of thousands of damage. It still won't be viable, or an attractive investment. if you make most of your money in capital appreciation, you might as well leave it empty.

Long term security means low risk. Not just for the tenant, but for whomever owns the property.

If you have to force someone to take subsidies, they don't want or need it. Not sure how this is so hard to grasp.

The Govt trying to enforce below market rates and failing, isn't propping up anything.

Again, it appears to be beyond your level of comprehension, but you don't need to have an individual SW tenant in order to be massively benefiting from the huge sums injected into the market by the State.

It's fine though. If you can't understand it, you can't understand it. Not my problem.

€897.02. That is the amount spent on housing (i.e. basically injected into the market) every single year for every man woman and child in Dublin city council. Average over the whole lot - not just those receiving anything directly.

includes:

€45.30 HAP.

€166.99 Long term rental

€363.18 "Homeless"

Take as much as possible of that 900 per person out of the market and let it find it its natural level. Politicians need to stop distorting the market and subsidising their "small landlord" buddies.