Tips to Finding a Place to Live in Dublin
Hi y’all! I know it has been a hot minute since I did a post on Dublin (since November for those of you keeping track) but I am back! Finding an affordable place to live in Dublin can be difficult. That said, I have been so fortunate and not had too much trouble in finding affordable places in nice areas of town but that is not always the case for everyone.
I wish I could be more helpful in finding an apartment right when you are moving over but I do not have the experience of that situation (shout out to student housing!). I have lived in 3 separate places in Dublin at this point though and have some advice on finding accommodation here that I think will be useful no matter what your situation when it comes to either finding accommodation or moving.
When I moved to Dublin, I was living in student accommodation on the campus of my university. I had my own little room and bathroom and shared a living space and kitchen with 5 roommates who each had their own room and bathroom too. Because I was only planning on living in Ireland for the year of my degree this was a great option for me at the time. It also took the stress of trying to find somewhere to live out of the equation of an already massive move.
Once I decided to stay in Dublin for another year, I had to find somewhere to live off campus and I was STRESSIN’. I had heard horror stories of people trying to find places to live and knew the rent some of my friends were paying (or their parents were) and I could not afford such high costs on my entry-level salary. I ended up lucking out that my friend’s roommate needed someone to take her lease over right around the time I needed to be out of my campus housing. I was living in a TINY box room and sharing my bathroom with one other girl but for €492 per month but I was in no position to complain. While this apartment eventually ended up being a nightmare living situation (in more ways than one) it did give me somewhere to live for 16 months.
I knew I wanted to move out of the nightmare apartment I was living when my lease was up but just leaving accommodation in Dublin is not that easy. In America when a lease is up you pretty much know you’ll be able to find somewhere else to live whether it is renting a room or home privately or at an apartment development. Apartment complexes aren’t really a thing here because pretty much all rentals are privately owned so leaving secure housing is a bit of a risk.
My biggest piece of advice for finding accommodation in Dublin is to start looking weeks (even months) before you are going to be wanting to move. This gives you an idea of what is out there in your budget. I did this while I was still on my lease in the nightmare apartment so I could try and get out as close as possible to the date my lease ended. I’ll be honest and tell you that my lease wasn’t up until mid-January and I signed the lease for the apartment P and I are in now on the 19th of December which meant I was essentially paying rent twice in December. I hated where I lived so much though that I was willing to do this and had set money aside knowing that could be a possibility. It was costly, especially for the time of year it was but it was so worth it to me. We have happily been living in our apartment for over 3 years now with no plans to move anytime soon (thankfully)!
Once you are ready to make moves the two top ways to find accommodation are:
DAFT – This is the most popular place to find accommodation in Ireland. When I started looking an apartment for P and I, I downloaded the Daft app and I set up notifications to be alerted when a property in our budget and the locations we wanted were listed. I would recommend doing this too so you can be the first to know about places available in your budget/areas you are interested in
NETWORKING – This is obviously how I found my first place out of student accommodation but let me remind you, Ireland is SMALL. Someone is bound to know someone who knows someone who is looking for a roommate. I see people even tweeting out rooms they have available sometimes. Other times I see people tweeting out rental criteria they are looking for. Don’t discredit who you know and who they might know!
You’ll also want to make a list of what you are looking for in your accommodation. What is important to you? Do you want 2 bedrooms (good luck!)? Do you want to be close to work? Do you need a parking space? Make your list of what matters but also know you will have to make compromises. Some of the things I took into consideration when looking for our place were:
BUDGET – Obviously this is the most important factor when looking for a place to live. P and I knew the absolute highest we could go and didn’t even entertain looking at anything more than that.
LOCATION – We are southsiders! It doesn’t make sense for us to live northside when my job is on the southside and pretty much everything we do is. We also wanted to be somewhere we could easily get into the city centre of Dublin.
PUBLIC TRANSPORT – I really wanted to be somewhere that I could take only 1 bus or the Luas to work. When we moved into our place, I wasn’t driving yet so being able to get to work easily was something that I really wanted.
A few other tidbits…
First and foremost, DO NOT TRANSFER MONEY BEFORE YOU HAVE MET THE PROPERTY MANAGER/LANDLOD/ETC. AND SEEN THE ACCOMMODATION. There are plenty of scams being run out there so do not get taken advantage of! If something looks too good to be true, it probably is. When I was looking for our place I would see ads for 2 bed/2bath new build apartments in the nicest areas of town for €1200. As soon as I saw these ads, I reported them because they were clearly a scam.
You will have to pay a deposit when you sign your lease. The deposit amount is the same amount as your monthly rent. Start saving ahead of time so that you will have this ready to go! Knowing how much you can afford will allow you to set this aside with as little stress as possible. You will also need your first month’s rent so keep that in mind when saving.
Make sure your landlord registers you with the RTB. The RTB is the Residential Tenancies Board. This is SO important for them as landlords to be registered and for you as a tenant. The RTB is used mostly for resolving disputes between landlords, tenants and third parties. When my landlord tried to stiff me on my deposit when I was leaving, I was able to contact RTB to help with the issue. Come to find out though my landlord didn’t register any of his tenants and ended up getting into a lot of tax trouble – should’ve just given me my deposit back! Renting in Dublin can feel like you have no options or rights, but you do and the RTB is a great resource should you run into any issues when renting.
All this said, you can find accommodation in Dublin, but I would say to keep your expectations low. It isn’t a task for the faint of heart, but you can do it!
If you have any questions on any of this let me know here or send me a DM on Instagram!
Author’s Note: This post was originally published on my old blog in February 2020.
*all images original to Alexandra Furbee