FIANNA Fáil TD Willie O’Dea is pushing the government to continue the Tenant in Situ Scheme, which allows housing agencies to buy rental properties from private landlords who are selling with a view to keeping tenants in their homes.
The scheme can be accessed by a private tenant who has received a valid notice of termination and is at risk of homelessness because their landlord is selling.
Speaking to the Limerick Post this week, Deputy O’Dea said that the Tenant in Situ Scheme provided a housing lifeline for many tenants locally and across the country who would otherwise have faced eviction.
“The scheme was funded until the end of 2024 and, in a reply to a recent parliamentary question to the Minister for Housing, I was informed that any decision in relation to a further extension of the Tenant in Situ scheme into 2025 is a matter for the new government,” the Limerick politician confirmed.
“I personally know of several people who will be made homeless if this scheme is not extended soon, therefore, I am calling on the Minister for Housing to provide the necessary funding to extend the Tenant in Situ Scheme as soon as possible,” he added.
In response, Minster for Housing, Local Government, and Heritage, James Browne, said that it is a matter for individual local authorities to identify suitable acquisitions in line with local circumstances and their social housing allocations policy.
“Local authorities take appropriate steps to ensure that their first response will be to support households to prevent homelessness in cases where tenants have been served with a notice of termination by their landlord. A local authority will assess the options available in each case and decide the appropriate action,” the Minister said.
“In discussions with individual local authorities in the closing weeks of 2024, every effort was made to ensure that each authority was facilitated in completing and recouping the costs of their 2024 acquisitions in line with the government decision and their individual allocations which were notified to them in March, 2024. My department is currently working with local authorities to collate the Q4 2024 social housing statistical returns,” he concluded.
