What replaced Rent Pressure Zones?
A national system of rent control, in force since 1 March 2026. It caps increases at 2% or inflation, whichever is lower, and it applies everywhere rather than in designated areas.
Rent Pressure Zones ended on 28 February 2026. If you are checking whether an address is in a zone, that question no longer has an answer, because the cap does not depend on where the property is any more.
Work out what your rent can rise toHow it happened
10 June 2025
The construction start date that later mattered. New apartment schemes and student accommodation where building work commenced on or after this day are capped by inflation alone, with no 2% ceiling.
28 February 2026
Rent Pressure Zones were abolished. Whether an address sat inside a designated zone stopped deciding anything.
1 March 2026
A national system of rent control took over, applying to all private tenancies and to student specific accommodation everywhere in the State. Tenancies created from this date carry a six year Tenancy of Minimum Duration.
1 March 2029
The first date student specific accommodation may be reset to market rent, and then only once every three years.
What actually changed for a renter
Before, the cap depended on your address. A tenancy outside a designated zone had no percentage limit on increases at all. That is the substantive change: the protection now follows the tenancy rather than the postcode.
The cap itself is 2% or inflation, whichever is lower, once in any twelve months. In a year where inflation runs below 2%, inflation is the ceiling. Both figures are worth checking, because a landlord quoting 2% in a 1.4% year is quoting the wrong one.
There is one route around the cap and it is narrow: substantial change to the property. The bar for that is set out on the exemption checker, and most refurbishment does not reach it.
What changed for a landlord
Every private tenancy is capped now, including ones in parts of the country that were never designated. A rent review notice has to go to the tenant and to the Residential Tenancies Board on the same day, and a notice that never reaches the Board is invalid.
Resetting to market rent is available only for tenancies that began on or after 1 March 2026, at the end of a six year cycle or at the start of a new tenancy, and not where the previous tenancy ended through no fault of the tenant.
Questions people ask
- Are Rent Pressure Zones still in place?
- No. They were abolished on 28 February 2026. A national system of rent control replaced them the following day and it covers the whole country, so there is no longer any such thing as being inside or outside a zone.
- Did the cap change?
- The shape of it did. Rent can now be increased once a year by 2% or by the rate of inflation, whichever is lower, and that applies everywhere rather than only in designated areas. Inflation is measured by the Consumer Price Index.
- Does my old tenancy get the new rules?
- The cap applies to tenancies that began before 1 March 2026 as well as to newer ones. What does not apply to them is the reset to market rent, which is never available for an ongoing tenancy that began before that date.
- Is anything left over from the Rent Pressure Zone system?
- One thing worth knowing about. In an area that was designated a Rent Pressure Zone within the previous two years, rent cannot be reviewed until twenty four months after it was last set. After that first review the ordinary twelve month cycle resumes.
This is information, not legal or tax advice. Every figure here links to the source it came from, and that source is the one to rely on.