Councils have ‘difficulties’ enforcing short-term letting rules, says Department of Housing

Current legislation to regulate the short-term letting sector was “not ideal” due to some “practical difficulties” for local authorities to enforce the rules, the Department of Housing has said.

Since 2019, property owners must apply to their local council for permission to let out their entire home, or principal private residence, for short-term lets of more than 90 days in total while they are away, or to let out a second property for short-term lets.

Speaking at a meeting of the Oireachtas committee for tourism, Terry Sheridan, principal officer at the Department of Housing, said the legislation was beginning to “have some, albeit limited effect” on the numbers of short-term lets advertised on online platforms.

“However, the Covid-19 pandemic, in early 2020, had a greater impact and resulted in large numbers of properties being temporarily withdrawn from the short-term letting sector and instead being offered as long-term rental accommodation (most frequently on contracts of three-six months) in order to generate rental income for property owners while the Covid-19 related travelling restrictions impacted on the tourism sector,” Mr Sheridan said in his opening statement.

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Mr Sheridan said this trend has been “reversed again”, with most of the properties that were operating as long-term rentals during the pandemic “having returned to short-term letting as the tourism sector and visitor numbers have recovered, thereby impacting negatively once again on the availability of accommodation in the private rental sector”.

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“It is conceded that those 2019 legislative provisions, as operated under the planning code, were not ideal primarily due to some practical difficulties in the enforcement of the provisions by the local authorities which, as I have indicated, were not helped by the onset of Covid-19,” he added.

Mr Sheridan said online platforms that advertise short-term lettings did not publish exact addresses until after a property had been booked, which was one of the difficulties local authorities encountered when trying to enforce the 2019 legislation.

Under proposed new regulations due to come into effect later this year, a short-term tourist letting register will be established, run by Fáilte Ireland.

Property owners offering accommodation for periods of up to and including 21 nights will need to be registered with Fáilte Ireland. The tourism agency is to monitor online platforms to ensure compliance with the obligation for advertised properties to have a valid registration number.

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These numbers will be linked to Eircodes, which will allow local authorities to more easily check whether the properties have the correct planning permission for short-term letting.

Both property owners and the platforms themselves could be fined for failing to comply with the new regulations.

Ten staff have been assigned to set up and maintain the register, with an allocation of €5 million, Fáilte Ireland said.

The tourism body said about 30,000 properties were advertised as short-term lets in Ireland, and it is thought an estimated 12,000 will be brought back into the long-term rental market under these changes.

Fergal O’Leary, head of registration and grading at Fáilte Ireland, said the tourism body will have authorised officers to ensure compliance. The officers will have similar powers to their counterparts in agencies such as the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission.

The officers will have the power to inspect properties, he said, adding it is “unlikely they will have to do this” due to the way in which the regulations will be implemented.