The eviction ban

In the entirety of Cavan county there are 13 places to rent on daft.

Limerick county has 26.

That's at every size and price range.

Are you suggesting that people should move to somewhere they can afford instead of breaking the law?

That's not going to be popular.

I own my house myself and my wife worked hard to get it, no bank of Mom & Dad in our world.

An opportunity has come up for me to go work in Australia, my wife's dream, I done the usual year away there 20 years ago.

We are now very reluctant to move due to the fear of not getting our home back when we return. Our plan was to go for a minimum of 2 years and maximum 4 years. My wife is that worried about renting out our home that we will probably have to pass up on the opportunity.

No the strand of the discussion I was engaging with was about larger corporate landlords and how they can be used, if regulated properly, to provide a stable rental market.

Yes, as portrayed in the media, small landlords leaving is the issue, but in the longer term, large numbers of small landlords might not be the best way to provide the longer term solutions we need as a country.

Nobody is saying that no houses exist for rent. What I said is that there's ridiculously few. If you wanted to rent a house tomorrow you could scour the whole country, send off loads of mails and get nowhere. It's not an option for people living in Dublin to decide they'll move to Cavan. There's nowhere near enough places and there's already people in Cavan looking to rent them.

And probably plenty more with local agencies? If you're willing to back that up with data I'll believe you. I can understand some places being rented by someone who knows someone, but if an agency is letting, they'll pop it on daft. I can't see why they wouldn't.

Yes the immediate short term issue is landlords leaving and evicting their tenants as they do so. But we also need to examine how we got into this situation and I would suggest the reason for that is the large numbers of small landlords. They should not be there in such numbers in the first place in my opinion. Rental properties should be provided by larger corporate entities, the LA in the case of social housing, and a relatively low number of small landlords.

The problem with larger corporate landlords is their preference for a significant number of units in the one area. They won’t be looking to replace the current model whereby there is rental accommodation in every town and village around Ireland.

If the renter is in a city or a large town, the corporate landlord has likely some presence there.

Supposing you live in Kilbeggan for example and due to family circumstances one parent needs to move out of the family home. Nearest large towns are Mullingar and Athlone, and let’s hope there is available accommodation there.

I get the attraction of corporate landlords, but one size does not fit all.

That is possible but there are huge shortages of accommodation in urban areas and many are living outside towns simply because they can't find anything in the town in which they live. Blocks owned by institutional landlords located in urban areas would provide accommodation for those people where they want to live and ease pressure in rural areas as well as road congestion.

The idea isn't that one size should fit all but rather that increasing supply in one area takes the pressure off other areas. The lack of large landlords that can handle changes of ownership without evictions and don't have relatives that want to move in, mean that long term renting becomes possible for those that need it. This means that small landlords can then offer short fixed-term leases such as the poster earlier who wanted to go to Australia for a year.

Why not have the pension fund invest in Ireland's future rather than REIT's? Its an investment with return I am talking about, not just building free houses

If you sign a contract on a year by year basis, you have to be aware that you will be eventually have to move on. Its not as though we have a spare house. Its our home. What would our alternative be? Never to come home? Let them keep our home?

I wonder how many times we are going to hear the utterly moronic claim that there is some huge black market of available rentals out there? That the thousands of homes needed are there if you just don't use Daft.

Such complete and utter bullshit, even from the usual shills.

I would also add, that you don't have to deal with an absolute avalanche of applications - it's actually quite overwhelming!

I last let about 4 years ago, and I had to take the ad down after about an hour before my inbox exploded. Everyone telling me their life story, and some attaching multiple references and employment details.

If I was re-letting, I would definitely be going down the word-of-mouth route.

It was really shocking to realise the lengths people were going to to get your attention somehow.