Yesterday the Government announced, following pressure from Michael Healy Rae (on whose support Government relies) that it would no longer pursue a ban on so-called “short term rents” for towns with a resident population of fewer than 20,000 people. Justifying the u-turn, Minister Peter Burke told Ellen Coyne of the Irish Times that “Government was trying to be “understanding” towards smaller towns that were in high demand for tourism but suffered from a lack of tourist accommodation.”
Implicit in that is that the ban on short-term rents of the kind pioneered by AirBnB will go ahead in our larger towns and cities. This will mean bans on Airbnb in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Waterford, Kilkenny, Drogheda, Dundalk, Swords, Navan, Bray, Ennis, Carlow, Tralee, Newbridge, Letterkenny, Portlaoise, Balbriggan, Naas, Sligo, Kilkenny, Athlone, and Wexford Town. If you own property in those towns or cities, pretty soon you will be banned from renting it out on a short-term basis.
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