Money expert Eoin McGee advises landlords to leave property vacant for two years before renting to be ‘better off financially’

RTÉ presenter and money expert Eoin McGee has said landlords would be better off financially to leave their property vacant for two years before renting it to a tenant.

Mr McGee was speaking in relation to rent pressure zone legislation and said he had given the advice to a “handful of clients” since the start of the year.

Speaking on his Instagram account, Mr McGee, who is the host of RTÉ’s How to Be Good with Money programme, said: “I’ve crunched the numbers, and financially, you’d be better off leaving your rental property vacant for the next two years and then putting a tenant into it.

“This is the advice that I’ve had to give to about a handful of clients since the start of the year, where they’ve come to me with a unique situation where they’ve had a property rented out long term and the rent has been stuck in a rent pressure zone, they’ve had good tenants, they’ve been happy with everything.

“But the tenants are now leaving and they’re looking at what their rent is, which was controlled with by rent pressures zone versus what the market rent is, and there’s such a difference between the two of them, that when I as a financial planner crunched the numbers, like my job is, the advice I have to give them financially is if you can afford to keep it empty for the next two years, and then tag it to market rent, you’re gonna be better off financially.”

Mr McGee said he does not believe that the rent pressure zone legislation was designed in a way that “in the middle of a housing crisis, landlords are better off financially leaving a property empty, that makes no sense”.

“And I don’t believe that that’s what the legislation was intended to do. But that’s what it’s doing to some people. 85pc of rented properties in this country, are owned by landlords who have one or two properties,” he said.

“Some of these people will make the decision, ‘I just couldn’t do that. I’m not going to do that. We’re in a housing crisis. We’re going to rent it out’. Some people make decision, ‘I’m not going to do it, because I can’t afford to pay for the mortgage on a month to month basis by myself’.

“But big corporates, if they get caught in a position like this, it’s all maths for them, they’ll sit on it for two years if they have to, so they can take tag it to market rent. I listened to Claire Byrne on the radio this morning having a discussion about this.

“The whole legislation around rent pressure zones, or housing issue, it’s an incredibly complex issue. But don’t be penalising people who want to do the right thing. I don’t think that’s what the legislation is for and honestly, it’s madness, that we could be in the middle of a housing crisis and the maths are suggesting to any landlord to leave their property empty for two years, just to get around that legislation.”

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