{"id":287356,"date":"2026-02-08T13:45:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T13:45:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/287356\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T13:45:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T13:45:20","slug":"limerick-council-tenants-distraught-after-facing-rental-bill-of-up-to-e20000","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/287356\/","title":{"rendered":"Limerick council tenants &#8216;distraught&#8217; after facing rental bill of up to \u20ac20,000"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>SOME council tenants in Limerick are facing one-off <a href=\"https:\/\/www.limerickleader.ie\/section\/460\/property\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">charges<\/a> of up to \u20ac20,000 in rent leaving many \u201ccompletely and utterly distraught\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s according to Sinn Fein City North councillor Sharon Benson, who raised their plight at this month\u2019s local authority meeting.<\/p>\n<p>In 2023, council wrote to its 5,000 tenants carrying out a \u2018global rent review\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>READ MORE:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.limerickleader.ie\/news\/visual-arts\/2005655\/limerick-designer-unveils-immersive-lived-in-home-concept-at-copenhagen-fashion-week.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Limerick designer unveils immersive, lived-in home concept at Copenhagen Fashion Week<\/a><\/p>\n<p>This takes place on a periodic basis when the council looks at all its homes at once, and decides whether -and by how much &#8211; to change the rents.<\/p>\n<p>People renting are asked to submit details of their income to inform the review.<\/p>\n<p>But Cllr Benson said it was only mid-way through 2025 that local authority bosses actually got back to many tenants, leaving some facing thousands of euro in back-pay.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you got a letter in 2023, and your income had just gone up \u20ac100 a week, you\u2019d submit those details, you think \u2018great, that\u2019s that box ticked\u2019. Then you don\u2019t hear anything, you forget about it, keep paying your rent. Then you\u2019d get a letter in the door saying it\u2019s taken council 18 months to calculate your rent and now you owe us a year-and-a-half worth of arrears,\u201d said Cllr Benson.<\/p>\n<p>She acknowledged council are not asking for full amounts upfront, instead getting people to put a payment plan in place.<\/p>\n<p>But she feels the tenant should have been given more consideration in the process.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe council is only seeing this as a process in their system. They are forgetting about the tenant getting the letter in the door. I had one girl and she was in absolute bits. She was completely and utterly distraught,\u201d Cllr Benson added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere seems to be zero thought for the tenant. It\u2019s enough to shock anyone, it\u2019s enough to cause health problems to anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>She brought the matter up in the context of the council\u2019s audit review, which was before members for approval this month.<\/p>\n<p>In response to the issue, council director general Dr Pat Daly wrote the local authority is focused on improving the collection of housing rents, in particular outstanding arrears.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cProgress continues to be made in the setting up of payment plans for those in arrears, which were the subject of rent reviews.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SOME council tenants in Limerick are facing one-off charges of up to \u20ac20,000 in rent leaving many \u201ccompletely&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":287357,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,807,61,60,1396,14563],"class_list":{"0":"post-287356","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-housing","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-limerick","13":"tag-limerick-city-and-county-council"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/287357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}