The Government has signed off on an evictions ban to run from November to the end of March.
It will mean that if a tenant is issued with an eviction notice from next month to the end of March 2023, it cannot be implemented until April.
There will be exceptions for those who do not pay their rent or damage a property.
Taoiseach Micheál Martin said the proposed eviction ban was about getting the balance right and keeping a roof over those at risk of homelessness.
“We are coming into winter and that’s the context. There had to be lot of issues ironed out, not least legal underpinning of this. That had to be worked out,” Mr Martin said.
The Taoiseach said the Govt is committed to building more social houses as a long-term solution to the housing crisis.
The Chief Executive of housing charity Threshold has described the decision to introduce some sort of time-bound ban on evictions as “the least worst option“.
John-Mark McCafferty said the charity is seeing a doubling of tenancy terminations this year, with 462 being issued a month, compared to 263 in 2019.
The majority of these cases involve a landlord who wants to sell a property.
“There is low or no availability of any other alternative accommodation in the market,” Mr McCafferty said.
“So if someone gets a notice to quit even, those notice periods are longer now, they have no alternatives.”
