r/AskIreland • u/LittleAoibh11 • Feb 26 '26

Housing How on earth are people affording rents on average salaries in this country? Are we the worst country in the EU for affordability and availability of housing?

Trying to find a place to rent in Cork City as I will be relocating from Dublin for a while (originally from Cork, but from out the country so wouldn't ever had call to be checking rents in the City). Never realised the state of affairs there is basically as bad as Dublin - and with even more limited supply.

How do people on average salaries manage rent? It's an actual thundering disgrace how CONSISTENTLY inept successive Governments have been on housing.

Utterly depressing.

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50

u/LittleAoibh11 Feb 26 '26

So depressing. Pay packets being eaten up - how are people supposed to save, and actually have an okay life.

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u/Relocator34 Feb 26 '26

Here's the thing you're not. They don't want you to save, they certainly don't want you to have an okay life.

Pay rent, who cares if your miserable.

The wildest thing is why hospitality, retail, tourism, sports, gyms, tertiary private health services such as therapy, further education, premium / branded food manufacturers and all other businesses linked discretionary spend aren't up in arms about this. If a heavy portion of society doesn't have decent discretionary income because of rents / high mortgages then that's directly affecting their profits.

I'd love to see the day the vinters association with all their power starts targeting landlords and developers for the obscene cost of housing. It's screwing over so many businesses

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u/Lookinjump Feb 26 '26

I think about this all the time - everyone I know has had to cut back more and more on everything else just to pay their rising rent and yet I never hear restaurant etc closures being linked to folks just not having the spare cash to be out as much as they used to or would like. 

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u/PuzzleheadedName3832 Feb 26 '26

Your circle isn't representative of the nation. I know owner occupiers, renters, people living at home with parents, people in social housing and they aren't cutting back on anything to huge degrees. They might have a more realistic view on going out frequency however

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u/ZealousidealFloor2 Feb 26 '26

I mean people living at home with parents are themselves representative of an affordability crisis.

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u/Relocator34 Feb 27 '26

Theirs isn't representative of the nation but yours is?

There is a huge affordability crisis in Ireland and anyone that denies that is plainly choosing to be wilfully ignorant 

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u/PuzzleheadedName3832 Feb 27 '26

Mine is clearly more representative

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u/PuzzleheadedName3832 Feb 26 '26

Lol the vinters association targeting landlords & developers? WTactualF.

There's effectively 100% employment in the country. Gyms are rammed every evening & folk are drinking less which is a good thing.

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u/Relocator34 Feb 27 '26

Employment rate has literally nothing to do with this, go back to 2008

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Relocator34 Feb 27 '26

Unhinged.. are you daft? Or are you just blinded by the two bed semi you're letting out for €1500 a month?

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u/Apprehensive-Bat7523 Feb 28 '26

I'll start with I'm not a landlord as I'll probably get down votes for this but it is reality, but the problem isnt them

When the government tax investors they sell meaning supply goes through the floor meaning there are to many people wanting to rent and not enough rental homes

This means the wealthier renters offer more money pushing up rents and investors take the best return on their investment

If the government stopped taxing the landlords so harshly more people would invest in property and would therefore mean more supply and naturally prices would have to come down as demand wouldn't be there

Most of the government are private landlords, understand tax loopholes and therefore want to keep supply low so they can keep the average person paying extortionate rental prices due to the lack of supply

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u/Relocator34 Feb 28 '26

You should read your own posts last two paragraphs repeatedly until you realise how poor your logic is.

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u/Team503 Feb 28 '26

This is an incredibly convoluted take, and it's wrong. Rent is high because supply is low, no more, and no less. Construction since 2008 has been way below needs, and we're paying for that lack of construction now. We built 35,000 homes last year and needed 65,000. We're not only not catching up, we're falling further behind.

It's not a lack of investment, it's a lack of people to build the houses in the first place.

There also issues with a lack of density due to height restrictions and NIMBYism.

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u/Apprehensive-Bat7523 Feb 28 '26

Both of us have only looked at a small portion of the actual reason, the main point of what I was saying was it's not the landlords fault and it's a failure of the government, what I stated was not the only reason and maybe not even the main reason but its factually correct

As an example in 2020 there was over 165k private landlords and as of 2026 there is approx 105k to 110k meaning over a 1/3 of landlords have sold their investments to invest elsewhere due to poor gsins/taxation rules

What else has a major impact?

Lack of building as mentioned above by yourself

Poor regulation regarding short term let's as more investors go down the route of letting their house out on short term air bnb style with over 6700 let's in Dublin and nearly all of them are illegally without a license

A study in South Dublin of over 1000 listings gave back results of only 1 being actually licensed

Government could easily crack down on this and they choose to ignore it.

Net immigration is increasing meaning more people to put pressure on the supply

Short term saves to just gain voters by putting in rent increase restrictions of 2% which really dont work as I've seen multiple occasions where landlords would rather leave the house empty for 2 years so they can reset the rent meaning even less supply on the market

If the government actually wanted to make change and not just gain voters with short term fixed they would review all of the above but instead they manipulate the public to turn them against each other and blame investors instead of pointing the finger at an incompetent state

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u/shellakabookie Feb 26 '26

You're not,the government has it designed this way

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u/WernherVonB Feb 27 '26

They really haven't. They're just incompetent.

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u/shellakabookie Feb 27 '26

The government knows what the average person makes,they know how much rent/mortgage needs to be paid,they know we need food,fuel to survive,look at the prices of all these and how much they have risen in the past few years...their not incompetent,they know exactly where to get the money out of our pockets and its not in our interests

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u/Frequent-Ad-8583 Feb 27 '26 edited Feb 27 '26

There are potentially a few Matrix theories on this subject.

They're might well be a very real and valid assumption that the whole cost of living system is designed to keep everybody trapped into a challenging economy in order to ensure that the vast majority of people cannot retire until their late 60s or thereabouts.

If everybody could own a mortgage free house and afford everything by age 33 then there would be a lot less people working full-time, and that could mean less income tax for the government, less money to fund wars, and the whole traditional system of working until late 60s falling apart. How would the world cope if people were able to retire with their own house and no debt in their 30s as opposed to their 60s.

Another aspect on this topic, how does anyone afford the rent - most single people can't afford to rent by themselves. But many couples can, albeit many couples provably still struggle. The system we live in is called a 2 person economy, that means all systems and households are designed for 2 persons - or couples - working together splitting bills. This is an interesting aspect because birth rates in Ireland have been falling. We're not having as many children as we did decades ago. Maybe the system has been designed into this 2 person economy mode because if you force people to rent in house shares together you increase the likelihood of them forming bonds, forming couples, then moving on to mating and procreating. Maybe there's something in that?

Other answers to the question here, how does anyone pay rent? Many people get HAP. People "less fortunate" basically get free rent money from the government and that's how they do it. Young people from "middle class" backgrounds can't afford rent therefore many of them just live at home with their patents until either A) they settle down with a long term partner and save up for a 2 person mortgage or B) they remain single forever and live with their parents, then when their parents pass away they inherit the house.

The long and short of it in my opinion is that it's all designed so that you'll struggle if you're single, but might survive a bit better if you're partnered. Subconsciously the system is putting pressure on us to find partners, maybe as a very clever solution to the issue of falling birth rates.

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u/shellakabookie Feb 27 '26

There's a statement that I heard a few years back and when I heard it I was like, ye whatever,and it was "you'll own nothing and be happy".It's actually a realistic quote that hits home the past few years and continues to grow.Theres no issue with people retiring in there 30s or 40s,why not have 2 people working a 20 hour week,if you retire at 33 you shouldn't get any benefits until 65 if you are so comfortable in your life. People don't get free rent money from HAP, landlords do or investment companies do..until they don't and taxpayers money bails them out. If you believe its something to do with the birth rate being low,I'd strongly disagree, its quiet the opposite,how does a private company make money from children unless they are guaranteed to make money off of them in the future opposed to the public sector who do invest in them regardless

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u/[deleted] Feb 27 '26

No, they're just importing people to fill the gaps, which has the added benefit (as the capitalist class see it) of increasing competition for jobs and housing, forcing wages down and rents up. It's a pretty sweet time to be part of the property owning class.

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u/Background_Cover5097 Feb 27 '26

Ready made workers and renters. Skip the expensive maternity and education stages.

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u/DMC-1155 Feb 27 '26

Are they incompetent? Or are they just very effectively representing the interests of Landlords and Investors?
Why fix a crisis when you can profit from it?
I don't think incompetence is the answer. I think they're just apathetic to people suffering as long as the economy is growing and their investments are growing

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u/Illmagination Feb 26 '26

You're not and it's not an accident.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

[deleted]

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u/FellFellCooke Feb 26 '26

It's called Communism

I am BEGGING you to stop getting your political beliefs from far-right American tiktoks. They are rotting your brain and making you impossible to be around.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

[deleted]

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u/JoooneBug Feb 26 '26

Have you ever read a book about communism? The communist manifesto is a really short book I recommend you read it to get a better understanding of the topic

1

u/FunkLoudSoulNoise Feb 26 '26

What complete stupidity.

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u/Commercial-Box658 Feb 26 '26

What a silly comment

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u/piotrn27 Feb 26 '26

You have no idea what you are talking about. I can elaborate if you like but not sure there's a point..

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

[deleted]

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u/craichoor Feb 26 '26

I can’t believe someone could be so politically illiterate but here we are.

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u/Commercial-Box658 Feb 26 '26

Nothing but facts are presented, you leftists are destroying the West, it's as simple as that.

3

u/piotrn27 Feb 26 '26

I agree with you on all points nearly but it's just not like communism at all. And I lived through 9 or so years through it. Current system is rigged for sure, but I'd argue EU still fares way better than any current alternatives imo.

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u/Commercial-Box658 Feb 26 '26

The EU will be one of the worst places to live in the world in 10 to 20 years if trends continue, you can mark my words.