If Edna O’Brien had not shared a flat in Dublin’s North Circular Road, we might never have had Baba and Kate and the messy lives of The Country Girls. If John McGahern had not lived in a bedsit in Clontarf we might never have had the complexity of sexual initiation under rainy lamp-posts of My Love, My Umbrella. If Patrick Kavanagh had not had a flat in Pembroke Road, the ardent grief of On Raglan Road might never have gripped generations. All were culture shocks and were born of a simple, societal necessity: leaving home and moving into a flat.
Without this basic rite of passage the canon of Irish literature would have been smaller. So many classics of the past half-century were seeded in seedy bedsits. But it wasn’t just writers and artists who sought the freedom of the flat: leaving home for rented independence was an important rite of passage, a chance to escape the parental gaze, experiment with identities, and live on beans and toast. In short it was a prelude to the business of life. And it’s disappearing.
Several reports in the last week confirm the erosion of this time-honoured progression. An ESRI report on Ireland’s housing market found that more than a quarter of 25-34 year olds in Ireland live with their parents. Ireland has the lowest share of single adults under the age of 40 living outside their parents’ home in the EU. They are not leaving home.
The Simon Community’s recent quarterly Locked Out of the Market report finds that while there was marginally more rental accommodation available this year than last, only 50 of these properties in the 16 towns and cities studied were eligible for those on Housing Assistance Payment, a requirement for many young adults in search of accommodation.
The lack of rental accommodation is a critical backdrop to the untold misery of homelessness in Ireland. It is true that young adults living at home have roofs over their heads; but that is a relativist argument. Simply put, two wrongs don’t make a right: there is no hierarchy of wrongs, only degrees. There are significant social dimensions to the disappearance of flatland, which could have far-reaching consequences. Besides, as with all social upheaval, the ripple effect sweeps others in its wake and other rites of passage are lost.
These are bleak figures. But they are not mysterious. Another set of statistics casts a glaring light on this void: four out of 10 properties sold in the last quarter of last year was by a private landlord. That is an exodus, by any standard.
There are many reasons for this but one offered by property agents is landlords’ fear of Sinn Féin. It appears that the closer we come to a Sinn Féin-led government, the quicker private landlords seek the road out.
The lifting of the eviction ban debates of earlier this year saw most parties concede that lack of security of tenure was an injustice: most of their policies now propose ameliorations. All parties, except for Fianna Fáil – which along with Aontú is the only party to specify protections for landlords too – propose longer or indefinite leases.
Sinn Féin goes further. By removing conditions such as selling or refurbishing a flat or providing accommodation for a family member as reasons for ending a lease, Sinn Féin’s proposals make it almost impossible to terminate a contract. It essentially means that property would have to be sold with tenants in situ, an infinite lease as opposed to an indefinite one.
Tipping the legislation so far in this direction makes the possibility of a fair deal for tenant and landlord more remote. And landlords are asserting the one thing that democracy precisely allows: self-interest.
All property is theft was an old agitprop slogan of the far left. Despite Sinn Féin’s newfound pragmatism, it still seems to hold sway. Mary Lou McDonald, the Sinn Féin president, strongly disputes that the party’s policy is the reason for the landlord exodus, claiming it is caused by landlords coming out of negative equity. But a policy that affects the potential value of a property, such as selling with sitting tenants, was always going to strike terror into the hearts of landlords.
[ Irish house prices set to rise by 2% amid lack of supply, say estate agentsOpens in new window ]
One way or another, the private rental market is being destroyed. And with it, another time-honoured rite of passage. That of the parents who have worked hard to raise their children to responsible adulthood, who might have been looking forward to a little freedom, from work and family duties. Or who might, heaven forfend, have been planning a little experimentation with life choices – artistic, literary or nomadic.
These would-have-been empty nesters now find themselves in nests full to the brim. And the chicks are big and awkward and they don’t just live at home, many work from home. This is bound to feed intergenerational tensions. The increased isolation of their offspring is an added anxiety for parents. There is a slowly dawning recognition that this is storing up social problems, as yet unspecified, for the future.
The rites of passage to adulthood and to eldership are time-honoured for a reason: life moves and changes. Patrick Kavanagh said it best: “Snatch out of time the passionate transitory.” In short, the flat or bedsit.