The Property Services Regulatory Authority should be abolished or amalgamated into another agency, writes JACK FAGAN

WITH MORE than 500,000 people now living in apartments in Ireland, the Government is finally getting around to introducing safeguards for those who have bought into these developments. More than two-and-a-half years after setting up the Property Services Regulatory Authority (PSRA), a bill to give it legal status and another one dealing with multi-unit schemes are slowly making their way through the Oireachtas and with any luck should become law before the Government runs out of steam.

The first mistake the Government made was to set up the PSRA at all, given that the Law Reform Commission had made it clear that there were already a sufficient number of regulatory bodies in the public service to implement the new laws. The politicians took little notice of that recommendation at a time when exchequer funds were at an all time high and the economy was booming.

The PSRA has had a relaxing 32 months to settle into Navan’s newest – and best – office accommodation backing on to the shopping centre and, with eight staff in situ, headed up by a senior civil servant, there is still no indication when it might be empowered to start kicking ass in the property industry.

But then again with the property market on the floor and staff numbers dwindling by the week, the once urgent campaign to regulate estate agents and managing agents hardly seems a priority any more. Irrespective of the market conditions in the real world, the staff of the new Navan quango are sitting tight after escaping the attention of the McCarthy Report. But with the Government under continuing pressure to cut State expenditure immediately, surely it cannot allow the PSRA to duplicate the functions of regulatory bodies already operating back in Dublin.

Only last week, four State agencies were amalgamated to cut expenditure. These were the National Building Agency, the Homeless Agency, the Affordable Homes Partnership and the Centre for Housing Research which employ more than 100 people. If the PSRA is left to its own devices you can rest assured that it will rapidly build up staff numbers in keeping with a grand old tradition in the public service.

Irrespective of whether the PSRA is around for much longer or not, the interests of apartment owners will be greatly strengthened once the new legislation is signed into law. It will also hopefully keep a tighter rein on some of the more notable managing agents whose services and charges have become highly contentious. With money getting tighter, apartment owners have begun to keep a closer eye on the ever increasing range of charges, including those for “maintenance visits” to apartment sites. In other cases the agents opt for a percentage of the overall cost of looking after a scheme. It follows that the higher the overheads, the greater the fee, so the agent is not unduly concerned with keeping overall costs down.

Agents generally expect to retain the management of a development on a long term basis once they move in but, with a new recommendation in the legislation that agreements should be renewed at least every three years, this will invariably mean that the owners will seek alternative quotations from competing agents. This could well mean a change of agent every few years.

The new legislation should do much to end some of the questionable practices by a few of the agents. For a start, agents will not be able to award contracts to service providers they have an interest in. And, says the PSRA, any property services provider found to be involved in an illegal activity, like kickbacks, can be fined up to €250,000 or have their licence suspended or revoked. Breaches of the legislation can also result in a property services provider being fined up to €50,000 by the courts and imprisoned for up to five years. With any luck that should soften the cough of any agents tempted to take kickbacks from garbage collectors, plumbers, electricians or others who provide the same service on several estates. At last we seem to be getting somewhere.