No HAP properties available to rent in Waterford last month

There were no HAP properties available to rent in Waterford in December, latest figures show. 

There were only 41 properties available to rent for people reliant on the Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) scheme last month, with just one available at the standard HAP rate, The Simon Communities latest 'Locked Out of the Market' report has shown.

Waterford was one of 16 housing areas surveyed which was found to have no HAP properties available to rent. 

HAP is paid to nearly 60,000 people on low income to help them rent a home privately.

The report, carried out by the Simon Communities, looks at the rental market over three days, four times a year.

Forty of the properties, 24 of which were located in Dublin, fell within discretionary HAP limits, while just a single one-bedroom property in Kildare was available under the standard rate.

The report finds that there were 757 properties available to rent over the three days last month in which the survey was carried out – up 93% on the 392 properties available during the previous report.

Eleven of the 16 areas surveyed had no properties available to rent in any household category within standard or discretionary HAP limits.

These were Athlone, Cork City Centre, Cork City Suburbs, Galway City Suburbs, Galway City Centre, Co. Leitrim, Limerick City Suburbs, Limerick City Centre, Sligo Town, Portlaoise, and Waterford City Centre.

The report notes that Ireland has witnessed record high numbers in homelessness for five consecutive months. 11,542 people were living in emergency homeless accommodation in the last week of November 2022 according to recent figures from the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

There were 141.27% (145 people) in one month and a 26.85% increase (9,099 people) since this time last year. 3,494 of these were children.

“Our most recent report sees a small increase in the number of properties available for those on HAP. There were 35 in the last report and now 41. While any improvement in the context of the current crisis is welcome, it is sadly not possible to call this an improving situation. The frontline experience of the Simon Communities working across Ireland, supporting people to move on from homelessness, reflects this," commented Executive Director Simon Communities of Ireland Wayne Stanley.

"The Government has taken the important and welcome step of bringing in the moratorium on evictions. Actions taken while this moratorium is in place will go a long way and what we need to see is momentum on the provision of secure affordable accommodation to those in homelessness throughout 2023.

"In the short term, we need to look at the allocation of current local authority housing. If we are to ensure secure affordable homes are in place to address the homelessness crisis, we need to see the full potential in modular build, in vacancy and dealing with dereliction delivered on and brought into the public housing system," Mr Stanley said.