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Daft - Landlords are keeping properties active for months or years

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  • 17-04-2009 9:29pm
    #1
    bobbbb
    Closed Accounts Posts: 507 ✭✭✭


    I noticed a long time ago that the house im renting was still advertised on Daft.ie, even months after we moved in. I asked the landlord about this and he said he just keeps renewing the add on daft to save him putting it up and paying again.

    So i was curious and started using property bee to see if he was BSing me and there might be something sinister going on. Then i found that it seems to be common practice. Ive found loads of adds that are up for months or years. All that changes is the descripion and sometimes the price or the number of bedrooms in the same add.

    I reckon they are all at it.

    Now, this skews the number of places available to rent on daft, which im trying to get accurate figures on to help me decide whethr or not or when to buy a house. I think its sharp practise and Daft should prevent it.
    It actually makes it look like there are more properties available to rent than there really are.
    All they have to do is put a time limit on the add so that it cant be renewed after say 2 months.
    Otherwise figures based on Daft are useless to anyone. Even their own report is going to be wrong.


Comments

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    #2
    taz70
    Registered Users Posts: 154 ✭✭taz70


    It's an irritating practice, particularly for those looking for somewhere to rent. I've enquired about several places only to be told they've been rented but then they stay on daft for ages and ages.


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    #3
    gurramok
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,992 ✭✭✭✭gurramok


    bobbbb wrote: »
    I reckon they are all at it.

    Thats a big jump on assumptions
    bobbbb wrote: »
    Otherwise figures based on Daft are useless to anyone. Even their own report is going to be wrong.

    So you are saying, out of 22,500 gaffs for rent now, how much are skewed?

    I'd reckon a very small percentage as i've be following gaffs too and noticed the vast majority disappear of daft after a while with 'let or withdrawn' notices.

    Of course there should be a time limit to renew, hope Ronan Lyons is reading this thread.


  • Options
    #4
    Eglinton
    Closed Accounts Posts: 992 ✭✭✭Eglinton


    The sellers are at it too. Many of the ads when viewed using Property Bee are there for almost a year but the actual property is being changed on an ongoing basis. You can see when it changes but it certainly makes for more difficult analysis. I'm looking for a new rental at the moment and am finding the worst offenders are those with several apartments in the same complex. The address isn't changing but the actual unit is.

    The more obvious cases are when a price changes dramatically. 3.5 mill to 200K for instance.

    It's annoying. Definitely time for a 1 property rule and time limit per ad.


  • Options
    #5
    Rayan
    Closed Accounts Posts: 50 ✭✭Rayan


    They are doing it to try keep the rental market artifically inflated.

    That's my theory anyway !


  • Options
    #6
    am i bovvered
    Registered Users Posts: 1,102 ✭✭✭am i bovvered


    bobbbb wrote: »
    It actually makes it look like there are more properties available to rent than there really are.
    QUOTE]
    Rayan They are doing it to try keep the rental market artifically inflated.

    That's my theory anyway !

    Rayan, I disagree with you. How does it work when this practice makes it look like having MORE properties available to rent than there really are


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    #7
    JuliusCaesar
    Registered Users Posts: 4,882 ✭✭✭JuliusCaesar


    bobbbb wrote: »
    I asked the landlord about this and he said he just keeps renewing the add on daft to save him putting it up and paying again..

    What a ......banker. How much does an ad on daft cost? E20? :confused:


  • Options
    #8
    gurramok
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,992 ✭✭✭✭gurramok


    The genuine ones can be filtered through by common sense using the porperty bee toolbar.


  • Options
    #9
    jenizzle
    Hosted Moderators Posts: 6,817 ✭✭✭jenizzle


    taz70 wrote: »
    It's an irritating practice, particularly for those looking for somewhere to rent. I've enquired about several places only to be told they've been rented but then they stay on daft for ages and ages.

    I wouldn't mind them being rented out and staying on Daft - it's worse when the ad is then updated, so you can't even filter out the ones that have been sitting there a few weeks untouched!


  • Options
    #10
    20goto10
    Registered Users Posts: 1,210 ✭✭✭20goto10


    bobbbb wrote: »
    Otherwise figures based on Daft are useless to anyone. Even their own report is going to be wrong.
    This really gets my goat. Their figures are a reflection of data on the daft.ie website, they are not factual evidence of the state of the housing or rental markets. Lets take the latest shock horror headline: record number of rental properties on the daft.ie website somehow get translated into there are a record number of rental properties on the market. I don't think I need to explain the flaw in that. Another example, rents have fallen by 10% on the daft.ie website translates into rental market has fallen by 10%. The blindingly obvious flaw here is that daft.ie do not know the orignal rental value so how can they say it has dropped, they don't take into account that most landlords will set their sights high with the intenion of dropping and creating an apparent "bargain" and nor do they have the actual final rental figure negotiated between landlord and tenant.

    Using daft.ie as a baramoter is a risky game. You are guaranteed to miss the boat just as thousands of people using daft.ie and myhome.ie when selling their homes during the peak did.


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    #11
    gurramok
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,992 ✭✭✭✭gurramok


    20goto10 wrote: »
    This really gets my goat. Their figures are a reflection of data on the daft.ie website, they are not factual evidence of the state of the housing or rental markets. Lets take the latest shock horror headline: record number of rental properties on the daft.ie website somehow get translated into there are a record number of rental properties on the market. I don't think I need to explain the flaw in that.

    Did you know Daft has probably 80%-90%+ of the rental ad market hence they are a good barometer of the market in that segment.


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    #12
    bangersandmash
    Closed Accounts Posts: 686 ✭✭✭bangersandmash


    20goto10 wrote: »
    Another example, rents have fallen by 10% on the daft.ie website translates into rental market has fallen by 10%. The blindingly obvious flaw here is that daft.ie do not know the orignal rental value so how can they say it has dropped, they don't take into account that most landlords will set their sights high with the intenion of dropping and creating an apparent "bargain" and nor do they have the actual final rental figure negotiated between landlord and tenant.
    I think everyone is aware that such reports consider asking rents, just as property price reports consider asking prices. It's certainly not exact but it's the best we've go to go on and it does give an indication of the direction of the market. Are you honestly suggesting that tenants are paying more than the asking price in the current rental market? It's likely that Daft statistics are on the conservative side regarding both rent and price drops.

    With 177,566 properties currently advertised on Daft and even factoring in duplicates or already rented properties, I think it's safe to say that Daft is a representative sample from which we can draw these statistics. Unless you believe there are a few million other rental properties in Ireland that are being advertised by other means?


  • Options
    #13
    bobbbb
    Closed Accounts Posts: 507 ✭✭✭bobbbb


    20goto10 wrote: »
    This really gets my goat. Their figures are a reflection of data on the daft.ie website, they are not factual evidence of the state of the housing or rental markets. Lets take the latest shock horror headline: record number of rental properties on the daft.ie website somehow get translated into there are a record number of rental properties on the market. I don't think I need to explain the flaw in that. Another example, rents have fallen by 10% on the daft.ie website translates into rental market has fallen by 10%. The blindingly obvious flaw here is that daft.ie do not know the orignal rental value so how can they say it has dropped, they don't take into account that most landlords will set their sights high with the intenion of dropping and creating an apparent "bargain" and nor do they have the actual final rental figure negotiated between landlord and tenant.

    Using daft.ie as a baramoter is a risky game. You are guaranteed to miss the boat just as thousands of people using daft.ie and myhome.ie when selling their homes during the peak did.


    You make good points. DAFT really need to look at this. I dont understand how they havent noticed this. Its very easy to run statistical reports on their database to identify these problems and eliminate them.
    Accuracy is the name of the game.


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    #14
    Rayan
    Closed Accounts Posts: 50 ✭✭Rayan


    am i bovvered wrote: »
    bobbbb wrote: »
    It actually makes it look like there are more properties available to rent than there really are.
    QUOTE]



    Rayan, I disagree with you. How does it work when this practice makes it look like having MORE properties available to rent than there really are

    I know I should have explained clearer. I was referring more to the rental price. If they have 10 of those "fake" rental properties advertised in the same apartment block, say at €1100/month. When a "real" property becomes available in that block - they are more likely to get €1000-€1100/month as opposed to the true market value which might only be €800-€900/month.

    Most people base good rental price value by comparing the property they're interested in to similar ones in the area.


  • Options
    #15
    Kelter
    Closed Accounts Posts: 393 ✭✭Kelter


    In fairness to daft it is a website that only claims to advertise property, not be a thermometer for the housing market. I mean it can be used as a trend, and even allowing for the errors you point out it does that, but it never claimed to be giving statistically accurate measurements.


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    #16
    gaius c
    Registered Users Posts: 3,528 ✭✭✭gaius c


    Rayan wrote: »
    am i bovvered wrote: »

    I know I should have explained clearer. I was referring more to the rental price. If they have 10 of those "fake" rental properties advertised in the same apartment block, say at €1100/month. When a "real" property becomes available in that block - they are more likely to get €1000-€1100/month as opposed to the true market value which might only be €800-€900/month.

    Most people base good rental price value by comparing the property they're interested in to similar ones in the area.

    Seems an odd one as seeing more available properties is going to make prospective tenants expect lower rents.

    My own experience: emailed about an apartment last Friday and was told that it was gone. I then noticed that it was renewed every day since (even over the weekend) and the price dropped this morning so it's clearly still available.

    Thanks to Sharper for giving me a link here from the pin.


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    #17
    Kipperhell
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,477 ✭✭✭Kipperhell


    Kelter wrote: »
    In fairness to daft it is a website that only claims to advertise property, not be a thermometer for the housing market. I mean it can be used as a trend, and even allowing for the errors you point out it does that, but it never claimed to be giving statistically accurate measurements.

    Daft have release press statements and the MD has been on the radio many times stating how the figures indicate what is happening in the housing market. It may not state itself as perfect data but certainly makes a big deal out of the reports suggesting how relevant they are.

    Considering it has been used by RTE in reports on the property market it does make a very unreliable source of data used to promote a website have the air of reliability.

    AS for the OP comments about landlords it is a big jump and I see no logic in why anybody other than letting agents would keep ads up indefinitely. Many agents get a discount to use the site based on volume of have a set amount of ads for a set fee so probably just use the spots they have. They probably use it to gauge prices too hence no place to rent but the price goes up and down in the ad.


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