Rental market and housing crisis

Sir, – Overburdensome regulations, high taxation and ritual anti-landlord sentiment have truly come home to roost in Ireland, as eminently predictable by those monitoring the rental sector for evidence and hard facts.

Hooke & MacDonald correctly describe the current 2 per cent rent cap introduced in November 2021 as a “self-inflicted disaster” (“‘Unworkable’ rent cap threatens supply of homes, says report”, June 26th).

Unfortunately though, a key lesson in economics is that politics, or one’s political leanings, may influence opinions to the extent that even academics who simply do not want to believe a straightforward fact will not even contemplate it as a possibility. They are more likely to say that to claim that heavy regulations will drive investment out of the rental market is a “theory, or even opinion”. When regulations such as rent controls and eviction controls were heavily ramped up in Ireland, it was obvious to most economists and pretty much all industry participants that such regulations would drive investment out of the sector. Leftist social policy and housing academics refused to acknowledge this even as a risk.

Now the numbers speak plainly for themselves as rental supply reduces each year while the exodus of landlords and private investment continues. The private rental sector has had a complete collapse in investment over the past two years, to the point that Hooke & MacDonald’s research shows that the number of additional units supplied in Dublin by the private rental sector sector in 2021 was 4,670 units and this collapsed to just 314 in 2023 and that trend continues this year.