Long term leases in Louth ‘handed back in very poor condition’ say council

By Olivia Ryan, The Drogheda Independent

Louth County Council are moving away from long term leases, due to the extensive work needed once houses are handed back.

Dundalk councillors heard at their December meeting of a change in approach by the council’s housing section to long term leasing.

Cllr. Marianne Butler asked how many houses the council will be retrofitting under the EERP, the energy efficiency retrofit programme, and if there was a location for these houses.

She welcomed a property in Dundalk having been repaired and allocated under the Repair and Lease Scheme, but asked if a tenant going into a property under this initiative would expect to be given a thirty year lease.

“If they are put up on the Choiced Based Letting (CBL) system are we saying it is a repair and lease house, and if it is for a fixed duration tenancy, albeit a long one?”

Cllr. Shane McGuinness said he had received a lot of enquiries about Gort na Glaise, an estate which was built over twenty years ago, and if it could be added to the energy retrofit programme.

"When can these people expect that their windows will be replaced? Some of them are actually falling out of the frames. It is in a really bad state.”

Cllr. Sean Kelly said councillors had an opportunity last year to provide input on the areas they felt needed to be added to the retrofit programme.

Some areas were clearly in need of attention, he added “given the age profile of the estates.”

He asked if councillors were able to have the same dialogue with the retrofit team again ahead of next years scheme.

Declan Grimes, Senior Engineer (Housing) at Louth County Council told the meeting the local authority expected to get the allocation from the department at the end of December.

He added they had been given the green light to go ahead with sixty percent of their allocation last year, which was 140 houses.

"We have put in a proposal with significant increases in the number of units that we want to retrofit next year.”

He said it was anticipated that Louth would get additional funding next year, and increase their capacity to deliver on the retrofit programme.

He added that the council have retrofitted over 700 houses since the scheme began.

In terms of ‘Repair and Lease’, there weren’t many applications under this scheme, said Mr. Grimes.

The council are moving away from long term leases, he added, as in recent years “properties were handed back to us in very poor condition.”

The cost of refurbishing these properties to bring them back to good condition was eating into the housing maintenance budget, he explained.

The council are now “reluctant to get into long term leases at all.”

He added that it was hoped a lot of the housing demand would be met by direct build, rather than the repair and lease scheme.