LAST UPDATE | 24 May 2022

THE GOVERNMENT WILL not be opposing a Sinn Féin bill that seeks to penalise rental advertisers like Airbnb from hosting non-compliant short-term rental ads. 

The bill would require estate agents and online platforms to only advertise properties that are compliant with the Planning and Development Act.

Under rules introduced by previous housing minister Eoghan Murphy TD in 2019, property owners letting a property are required to apply to their local authority for ‘change of use’ planning permission. 

Under the rules, an annual cap of 90 days applies for the renting out of a home and homeowners can only rent out their homes for 14 days or less at a time.

Exemptions to the rules are possible but it is intended that exemptions cannot be granted in areas designated as Rent Pressure Zones. 

The maximum fine for non-compliance with planning breaches is a €5,000 fine or six months imprisonment but Sinn Féin’s Eoin Ó Broin TD said today that one of the “missing pieces” to the legislation was the lack of penalties for advertisers as well as the property owner.  

Ó Broin said it is “not acceptable” for companies like Airbnb to “profit from law breaking” by allowing non-compliant short-term rental ads on their platforms. 

Eoin Ó Broin TD made the comments today as he tabled a bill that seeks to issue spot fines to advertisers that host non-compliant ads. 

“It will be a very, very simple thing to do. Simply create an offence under law to advertise properties without either an exemption or planning permission, and give local authorities the power to issue spot fines for every day a property isn’t complying with planning law,” he said. 

We do not believe it’s acceptable for platforms like Airbnb, or anybody else, to not only to facilitate law breaking but to profit from it.Given the escalating crisis in the private rental sector and the continual loss of long term lets we think it’s time for them to get tough with Airbnb and other platforms. We’re not proposing to change the regulations at this point in time. We just want them enforced.

Ó Broin added that only the minister has the power to set the level of fine but that any penalty should be “at least above the amount of money the platform would make on a daily basis if the property was to be let out”. 

At a Cabinet meeting today, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien secured agreement that the bill would not be opposed. A government spokesperson said: 

We are not opposing this Bill as the government’s Housing for All plan contains a specific action (Action 20.4) – to “develop new regulatory controls requiring short-term and holiday lets to register with Fáilte Ireland with a view to ensuring that houses are used to best effect in areas of housing need. 

The government has said that legislation to underpin this new registration system could be implemented this year with Fáilte Ireland being given additional funding to design and establish the system.   

The issue of short-term lettings has gained additional attention in recent weeks as the number of long-term property to rent has hit an all-time low. A report from Daft.ie noted that there were just 1,397 homes available to rent on 1 February nationwide. 

By comparison, estimates from website Inside Airbnb have shown there were more than 15,000 Irish properties listed on Airbnb on a day last week. 

In a statement to The Journal however, Airbnb said that recent analysis comparing long-term rental supply with Airbnb listings “uses a flawed methodology and scraped data to make misleading claims”.

Airbnb says that its listings in Ireland include “a segregated part of someone’s home, converted barns, yurts and other types of spaces not suitable for long-term housing”.

Airbnb also said that it supports “better regulation in Ireland” and has promoted the 2019 regulations to property owners using its site “to boost awareness and compliance with the rules”.

Derek Nolan, Airbnb’s head of public policy in Ireland said:

The majority of hosts are regular Irish families who typically share their home for around three nights a month, and over a third say the additional income is an economic lifeline. We take local housing challenges seriously and want to be part of the solution.

Nolan, a former Labour TD, added: “We welcome regulation and want to work together on rules, which is why we have had active discussions with the government on how to implement a registration system. This will help everyday families benefit from visitors to their communities while clamping down on speculators and bad actors.”

Darragh O’Brien

Minister O’Brien has pledged to table intentions to address the question of short-term lettings in the coming weeks. 

Speaking on RTÉ he said that while the 2019 regulations are “strong” he does not believe they are being “adhered to”.

“Very shortly I will have additional legislation that I am bringing forward in this space,” he said.  

If someone is going on holidays and lets out their home for a couple of weeks or lets out their room, that shouldn’t be an issue, but the idea that we have a situation where we have multiples of short terms lets versus long terms in all our major cities is not a sustainable situation.

“I am concluding work on some quite significant amendments in that space which I will bring in before the summer recess.”

O’Brien said that the government needs to do more than what Sinn Féin is proposing. 

“A fine isn’t going to do it,” he said.

They (Sinn Fein) have not done the work for me on this but I welcome any realistic proposals that can help the situation. I intend to go further than that.What I will bring forward will be more significant than the opposition who haven’t raised this issue in a couple of years.What I will propose will go significantly further than that.

Asked today about O’Brien’s pledge to address the issue, Sinn Féin’s Ó Broin said: “I welcome any action by the government to address this issue, I would remind people that Darragh O’Brien promised last August to do this and he has yet to do it. So we judged on the merits of the proposal when it’s published.”