Improvements to Tenant Purchase Scheme welcomed

Change will come into effect from February 1

Changes to the Tenant Purchase Scheme which have been introduced by the Housing Minister and will come into effect from February 1 have been welcomed locally.

The change will change now enable pensioners to purchase their own Council home, and the level of income tenants will require to be eligible will be reduced from €15,000 to €12,500.

Prior to this decision persons, whose principal income is a pension payment, were not able to avail of the Tenant Purchase Scheme.

Cavan Monaghan Fianna Fáil TD Brendan Smith had consistently raised the need to amend this scheme through Parliamentary Questions in Dáil Éireann.

“I have a number of cases throughout the constituency where families have been tenants of Council houses for upwards of 30 years or more and were unable to purchase their own home,” he said, pointing to where the Programme for Government commits to maintaining the right of social housing tenants to purchase their own home.

“The Fianna Fáil Party has placed home ownership at the heart of Housing for All, our long-term housing policy to 2030.  Minister Darragh O’Brien has also committed to a number of other reforms of the social housing system.

“These changes will be progressed by amending the Housing (Sale of Local Authority Houses) Regulations 2015.  I know that many individuals and families throughout Cavan and Monaghan will welcome the Minister’s decision to improve considerably the existing Tenants Purchase Scheme”, stated Deputy Smith.