Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 15 July 2025

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage

Issues Facing the Residential Rental Sector: Discussion

2:00 am

Mr. Patrick Davitt:

We are referring to some sort of incentives to get landlords into the marketplace. Tax is the big thing at the moment, so if someone bought a property, he or should could get a tax allowance every year on the property for a number of years. There are many ways we could do this. The Department of Finance could come up with a way to do it, perhaps something not unlike section 23. The incentives do not have to go on forever. They have to go on until such time as they do their work. Section 23 went on forever and a lot of people felt it could not be changed. An incentive is required until such time as it does its work and gets landlords into the marketplace. It can then be wiped out and there is no problem.