Rent cap exclusion for half of Cork town

Thousands of homes in one of the country’s largest commuter towns have been excluded from the latest rent-cap zone measures, because of electoral boundary anomalies.

The affected area in Carrigaline, Co Cork, is in Housing Minister Simon Coveney’s own constituency, where half of the town is now classified as a rent-pressure zone (RPZ), and half is not.

Amid fears that the anomaly could further distort the rental market locally, Sinn Féin TD, Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire, led calls last night for new regulations to bring the excluded areas of the town into the new RPZ.

“This is absurd and is bound to cause distortion and will lead to two different housing markets in one town of 16,000 or so,” he said.

Mr Coveney approved 23 new RPZs on Thursday, based on municipal district boundaries in large urban areas on the outskirts of Cork, Kildare, Meath, and Wicklow, where rent rises will be capped at 4%.

This followed calls for more areas to be designated RPZs, after government moves before Christmas to cap rents in Dublin and Cork.

However, the new RPZ in the Ballincollig-Carrigaline municipal district splits the town of Carrigaline.

Properties south of the Owenabue river, which is in the Bandon-Kinsale municipal district, will not be included in the RPZ.

Average monthly rents in Carrigaline are around €1,000, with some properties commanding between €1,200 and €1,400.

The municipal district’s boundary anomaly also affects Ballincollig, splitting a large housing estate where monthly rents have also soared to just over €1,000, with some properties getting up to €1,500.

“This is problematic, and it will create major confusion, and very probably distortion,” Mr Ó Laoghaire said.

In Carrigaline, he said landlords who own property north of the river, including Heron’s Wood, Waterpark, and Owenabue Heights, can’t increase rent by more than 4% per year.

“However, south of that line, including Forest Hill, Clevedon, and Wrenville, landlords can put in place whatever increases they want,” he said.

“People aren’t all that aware of what ‘municipal district’ they are in. As far as they are concerned, they are living in Carrigaline, or looking for property in Carrigaline.

“But different rules now apply either side of the Owenabue, and people will be confused, and rents in the southern end may see greater increases.”

A spokesperson for the minister said decisions on RPZs are a matter for the Residential Tenancies Board, but he expects that the RPZs will have a general impact on neighbouring areas outside the zones, and that landlords with property close to, but outside RPZs, are unlikely to increase their rents.