Rents rise in first three months of year, with average price surpassing €2,000 per month

'To let' signs in Dublin. All told there were just 2,300 homes available to rent nationwide on May, down 14% year-on-year as the situation concerning the acute lack of supply in the market continued to worsen. Picture: Artur Widak/NurPhoto

Rents rose at near-record levels yet again over the first three months of 2025, according to the latest statistics from Daft.ie.

The property website's new rental price report shows rents climbed 3.4% between January and March, one of the largest three-month increases seen within the past 20 years.

The average rental price across Ireland is now €2,053 per month, the first time the €2,000 figure has been breached, up from €765 in recession-era 2011 and close to 50% higher than before the outbreak of the covid pandemic in March 2020.

Ronan Lyons, professor of economics at Trinity College Dublin, said the “sustained increases”  in Irish rents are being driven by an acute and worsening shortage of rental housing.

“Unfortunately, changes made to rent controls in 2021 dramatically reduced the ability of Ireland’s rental sector to attract the capital needed for new supply, the ultimate remedy for the shortage,” Prof Lyons said.

The opportunity exists for the Government to reform those controls and facilitate the emergence of a new pipeline of rental homes. Nonetheless, further supports will be needed to encourage new rental supply outside of the greater Dublin area.

The latest figures show that, after rental increases had slowed in Dublin for several consecutive quarters after apparently reaching a plateau, rental inflation in the capital is now apparently realigning with the large-scale hikes being seen elsewhere in the country.

Rents in Dublin are now €2,540 per month on average — up 5.8% year on year — compared with €2,213 in Cork City, €2,304 in Galway City, and €2,405 in Limerick.

That Limerick figure represents a 20.4% increase on the same period in 2024.

All told there were just 2,300 homes available to rent nationwide on May, down 14% year-on-year as the situation concerning the acute lack of supply in the market continued to worsen.

That figure represents the third lowest total for May seen in 20 years, and is close to half the average availability seen during the period 2015-2019 — a time when the country’s housing crisis was already in full swing.

Last week the head of the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB) said the system of rent pressure zones (RPZs), which many expect the Government to scrap before the end of the year, are “showing benefits” for tenants across the country.

Rosemary Steen said she has written to the Housing Agency — which is charged with reviewing rent controls for the housing minister — to express the board's positive view of RPZs.