HomeHak is a positive development for tenants

Despite all the difficulties in the market, landlords continue to invest in property.

Increases in rental values in Cork are due largely to new stock coming into the market, rather than rents being increased by the property owners. That is the general trend. 

It’s what happens when a property is being rented for several years at, for example, €1,000/month without changing. A new property comes on the market and it rents out at €1,8000/month, thus driving up the average by 40%.

“The whole rental market needs to be looked at anew,” says Patrick Drinan, owner and founder of HomeHak. The website is something very new in the rental market, bringing common sense and no small token of dignity back to a sector that had become characterised by brutal market forces.

“At the end of the day, it’s not about money, it’s about people, and this is a system that re-humanises the whole process,” adds Pat. “The whole process has been property-oriented since the dawn of the Internet: pictures of a property are put up on a property website and that draws thousands of people potentially interested in it.” 

That whole model, he says, is “completely dysfunctional, it’s not in the interest of tenants and it’s not in the interest of landlords. Tenants don’t want to be one of thousands of others directly competing with them, and landlords don’t want thousands of applications that they have to sift through.” 

HomeHak flips the traditional approach around, giving prospective tenants much more control over the process, including (very importantly) more control over the use of their personal data. It’s a strong new approach that’s rapidly gaining in popularity and one which just might bring sanity to the process of bringing landlords and tenants together.

Still a positive market for landlords

Despite all the difficulties in the market, landlords continue to invest in property. Bricks and mortar continue to be worth sinking one's money into. It’s a stable commodity and one that generates considerable income.

“Because the demand is so high, the likelihood of any major vacant period is slim,” says Cormac Aherne, Choices Property Management in Cork, “and even though RPZs have dampened the growth of rental values, they are increasing year-on-year.” 

The quality of management and letting services has never been higher and more professional, and in these highly regulated times, a management and letting agency is no longer a luxury but a necessity.

“All in all, the legal landscape in rental is shifting from a somewhat flexible situation of old to one of increasingly tighter rules,” says Orla O’Donovan of Trading Places. “The consequences of any missteps are sharper, and that’s where a good management agency comes in.” 

“I would like to see a completely open market (without rental controls) in an ideal world where there is much more supply,” says Pauline O’Sullivan of Prime Lettings, “but I can understand how that’s not achievable right now. We do need the measures currently while this supply problem is there.

“I would hope that by 2028, between the changes in legislation, the rent cap throughout the country and, with any luck, the supply levels that they’re promising, we’ll see a levelling scenario at that point. I do, however, think that you’ll have rent value increases in 2026 and 2027.”