Average rent over €1,200 per month
The average rent in Ireland rose to over €1,200 per month last year, with renters in seven counties spending more than €1,000 monthly.
The average rent rose by 6.4% in 2019, according to the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB) rent index — the lowest annual increase since 2014.
Five new areas have been designated as rent pressure zones, bringing the total to 47, with rent rises capped at 4% per annum.
These include Mallow, Co Cork, and Killarney, Co Kerry, as well as Athy, Co Kildare, Tullamore, Co Offaly, and Mullingar in Westmeath. The latter two saw average rents increase by more than 19% in the last year.
In Dublin, rent is now €1,716 per month, up 5% year on year, the lowest rent increase in the city since 2013. Outside the capital, standardised rents are €922 on average — a 7.6% increase — but seven counties have average rents of over €1,000 per month: Cork, Dublin, Galway, Kildare, Louth, Meath, and Wicklow.
Three others — Kilkenny, Laois, and Limerick — are between €900 and €999.
The rental market varies broadly. In Dublin, rents are now 32% higher than the Celtic Tiger peak and less than 10% of new tenancies were for under €1,000 per month.
In comparison, two-thirds of rental agreements in the rest of the country are under €1,000 per month. Some 59% of renters in Dublin pay above €1,500 per month, with just 6% of renters elsewhere doing so.
In Cork City, rents rose 6.8% to €1,207 per month.
In the cities, Waterford saw the biggest rise in 2019 at 7.9%, though it was starting from the lowest base.
Rent in Galway city was up 5.7%, with Limerick up 2.7%, the lowest of the cities.
Padraig McGoldrick, interim director of the RTB, said they are “encouraged” by the slowing of increases, “showing signals of stabilisation in urban areas”.
He added that the report reflects “a very different world to the one we are living in today” and that Covid-19 represents new challengers for renters and landlords.
