Get all the data you need about the real estate market in Ireland
This blog post covers residential rental yields across Ireland as of March 2026.
We look at the neighborhoods and property types that give investors the strongest returns, and the ones where the numbers are harder to make work.
We update this post regularly, so what you read here always reflects the most current data we have.
And if you're planning to buy a property in Ireland, you may want to download our real estate pack about Ireland.
A quick summary table
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Best rental yield in Ireland | Cork City Centre studio (7.2% gross / 5.4% net) |
| Weakest rental yield in Ireland | Dublin 4 three-bed house (3.8% gross / 2.1% net) |
| Average gross yield across Ireland | ~5.4% |
| Average net yield across Ireland | ~3.7% |
| Median purchase price in Ireland | ~€390,000 |
| Average monthly rent across neighborhoods | ~€1,850 |
| Average occupancy in Ireland | ~94% |
| Fastest Irish rental market | Cork City Centre and Dublin 8 (10 days average) |
| Slowest Irish rental market | Dublin 4 three-bed house (21 days average) |
| Highest occupancy in Ireland | Cork City Centre studio (97%) |
| Best value high-yield segment in Ireland | Small apartments in Cork, Galway, Dublin 8, and Castletroy |
| Yield gap between best and worst | 3.4 percentage points (gross) / 3.3 points (net) |
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Ireland neighborhoods and property types in 2026 ranked by rental yield
This table ranks the key neighborhoods and property types in the Irish residential market by gross rental yield.
For each neighborhood and property type, the table includes average purchase price, average monthly rent, gross rental yield, net rental yield, annual fees, average occupancy, average time to rent, main rental demand, main risk, and investment profile.
By the way, you'll find much more detailed data in our real estate pack about Ireland.
| # | Neighborhood | Property type | Gross rental yield | Net rental yield | Average purchase price | Average monthly rent | Ownership annual fees | Average occupancy | Average time to rent | Main rental demand | Main risk | Rental Investment Profile |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cork City Centre | Studio apartment | 7.2% | 5.4% | €250,000 | €1,500 | €3,800 | 97% | 10 days | City-centre young professionals | Older block service charges | Top Pick |
| 2 | Galway City Centre | Studio apartment | 7.0% | 5.2% | €240,000 | €1,400 | €3,700 | 96% | 11 days | Students and hospital staff | Seasonal tenant turnover | Top Pick |
| 3 | Dublin 8 | Studio apartment | 6.9% | 4.8% | €280,000 | €1,600 | €4,200 | 96% | 10 days | City-centre young professionals | Rent cap reset limits | Top Pick |
| 4 | Castletroy | One-bed apartment | 6.8% | 5.1% | €230,000 | €1,300 | €3,300 | 95% | 12 days | UL students and staff | Summer letting gaps | Top Pick |
| 5 | Cork City Centre | One-bed apartment | 6.6% | 4.9% | €285,000 | €1,575 | €4,000 | 96% | 11 days | Young professionals and graduates | Older stock refurbishment costs | Top Pick |
| 6 | Galway City Centre | One-bed apartment | 6.5% | 4.8% | €285,000 | €1,550 | €3,900 | 95% | 12 days | NUIG staff and graduates | Tight supply bidding risk | Top Pick |
| 7 | Dublin 8 | One-bed apartment | 6.4% | 4.7% | €330,000 | €1,760 | €4,300 | 95% | 11 days | Healthcare workers and professionals | High service-charge drift | Top Pick |
| 8 | Dublin 1 | Studio apartment | 6.3% | 4.4% | €305,000 | €1,600 | €4,300 | 95% | 11 days | IFSC workers and students | High turnover compliance burden | Strong Potential |
| 9 | Castletroy | Two-bed apartment | 6.2% | 4.6% | €285,000 | €1,475 | €3,600 | 94% | 13 days | Sharers near university campus | Student-cycle vacancy risk | Strong Potential |
| 10 | Cork City Centre | Two-bed apartment | 6.0% | 4.3% | €360,000 | €1,800 | €4,300 | 95% | 12 days | Two-income professional sharers | Rising apartment running costs | Strong Potential |
| 11 | Sandyford | One-bed apartment | 5.9% | 4.2% | €355,000 | €1,750 | €4,500 | 95% | 12 days | Tech workers near Leopardstown | New-build competition risk | Strong Potential |
| 12 | Dublin 1 | One-bed apartment | 5.8% | 4.1% | €360,000 | €1,750 | €4,500 | 94% | 12 days | Docklands young professionals | Block management cost inflation | Strong Potential |
| 13 | Galway City Centre | Two-bed apartment | 5.8% | 4.1% | €390,000 | €1,880 | €4,300 | 94% | 13 days | Professional sharers and couples | University-led turnover swings | Strong Potential |
| 14 | Castletroy | Three-bed semi | 5.7% | 4.0% | €375,000 | €1,780 | €4,700 | 94% | 14 days | Families and university staff | Bigger maintenance bills | Strong Potential |
| 15 | Dublin 8 | Two-bed apartment | 5.7% | 4.0% | €440,000 | €2,100 | €4,700 | 94% | 12 days | Professional couples and sharers | Stricter cost control needed | Strong Potential |
| 16 | Douglas | Two-bed apartment | 5.5% | 4.0% | €330,000 | €1,520 | €3,900 | 95% | 14 days | Airport and city commuters | Modest rent growth pace | Good Potential |
| 17 | Salthill | One-bed apartment | 5.4% | 3.8% | €350,000 | €1,575 | €3,900 | 94% | 14 days | Hospital staff and couples | High purchase-price premium | Good Potential |
| 18 | Sandyford | Two-bed apartment | 5.4% | 3.8% | €455,000 | €2,050 | €4,800 | 94% | 13 days | Tech couples and sharers | Service-charge escalation risk | Good Potential |
| 19 | Dublin 1 | Two-bed apartment | 5.3% | 3.7% | €450,000 | €1,980 | €4,800 | 93% | 13 days | Two-income city renters | Tenant churn and wear | Good Potential |
| 20 | Douglas | Three-bed semi | 5.2% | 3.7% | €430,000 | €1,850 | €5,200 | 94% | 15 days | Family tenants near schools | Slower re-letting than flats | Good Potential |
| 21 | Dublin 6 | One-bed apartment | 5.1% | 3.5% | €420,000 | €1,780 | €4,800 | 94% | 14 days | Professionals in south suburbs | Expensive entry pricing | Good Potential |
| 22 | Salthill | Two-bed apartment | 5.0% | 3.5% | €465,000 | €1,940 | €4,300 | 93% | 15 days | Coastal professionals and couples | Lifestyle premium compresses yield | Good Potential |
| 23 | Sandyford | Three-bed townhouse | 4.9% | 3.3% | €585,000 | €2,400 | €5,900 | 93% | 14 days | Relocating tech families | Townhouse upkeep costs | Good Potential |
| 24 | Douglas | Four-bed semi | 4.8% | 3.2% | €560,000 | €2,250 | €6,200 | 93% | 16 days | Established family tenants | Bigger capex on turnover | Moderate Appeal |
| 25 | Dublin 6 | Two-bed apartment | 4.8% | 3.2% | €560,000 | €2,250 | €5,200 | 93% | 15 days | Affluent professional couples | Price growth outruns rent | Moderate Appeal |
| 26 | Dublin 4 | One-bed apartment | 4.6% | 3.0% | €510,000 | €1,950 | €5,000 | 94% | 15 days | Embassies and corporate renters | Thin income margin | Moderate Appeal |
| 27 | Salthill | Three-bed house | 4.5% | 3.0% | €610,000 | €2,300 | €6,500 | 92% | 17 days | Affluent coastal family renters | High maintenance exposure | Moderate Appeal |
| 28 | Dublin 6 | Three-bed terrace | 4.4% | 2.8% | €760,000 | €2,800 | €7,000 | 93% | 16 days | Established family professionals | Expensive retrofit obligations | Moderate Appeal |
| 29 | Dublin 4 | Two-bed apartment | 4.3% | 2.8% | €760,000 | €2,700 | €5,600 | 93% | 16 days | Senior corporate renters | Luxury pricing limits yield | Moderate Appeal |
| 30 | Dublin 4 | Three-bed house | 3.8% | 2.1% | €1,200,000 | €3,800 | €9,000 | 92% | 21 days | Embassy families and executives | Very high capital tied up | Limited Appeal |
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Key insights about rental yields in Ireland
Insights
- Cork City Centre studios deliver a gross yield of 7.2%, which is nearly double what you get from a Dublin 4 house. Paying less for the property and getting similar or higher rent is what drives that gap.
- In Ireland, the jump from gross to net yield is large. A studio in Dublin 8 goes from 6.9% gross to 4.8% net, a drop of over 2 points once you account for service charges, LPT, insurance, and maintenance.
- Castletroy, near the University of Limerick, delivers a net yield of around 5.1% on one-bed apartments, which outperforms many Dublin neighborhoods at a fraction of the entry price.
- Across all 30 entries in this dataset, small apartments consistently beat larger family homes on both gross and net yield. Not one three-bed or four-bed property reaches the top ten.
- Dublin 4 three-bed houses sit at a 2.1% net yield. That is low enough that, after inflation, you could be making very little in real terms from rental income alone.
- The average time to rent is under 14 days in the best Irish neighborhoods. Vacancy is not the main problem for landlords here. Overpaying for the asset is the bigger risk.
- Galway City Centre one-beds yield 6.5% gross and rent in 12 days on average, yet the average purchase price is only €285,000. That is a strong combination of affordability and tenant depth.
- Sandyford performs well for tech-sector demand, but service charges pull the net yield on a two-bed apartment down to 3.8%, a clear reminder that newer developments come with higher recurring costs.
- Douglas, a suburban Cork area, gives steadier occupancy than its city-centre counterpart but loses yield quickly as you move from two-bed flats to four-bed houses, where the net yield drops to 3.2%.
- The gap between the best and worst net yield in this dataset is 3.3 percentage points. On a €500,000 asset, that difference is roughly €16,500 per year in income. Neighborhood and property type choice matters a lot.
- Salthill's lifestyle premium means you pay more for the address than the rent can justify. A three-bed house there yields 4.5% gross and 3.0% net, close to Dublin 4 territory but without the same resale depth.
- Ireland's rent pressure zone rules limit how much landlords can raise rent between tenancies in many of the highest-demand areas. That is why some strong occupancy markets, like Dublin 1, still carry a compliance risk that weighs on the investment case.
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About our methodology
Ireland does not publish a single official nationwide table of rental yields by neighborhood and property type. That means any honest estimate requires triangulating multiple authoritative sources rather than reading one government document.
We also believe it is important to show our reasoning. It is one of the ways we make our work solid, transparent, and rigorous, just as you will see in our real estate pack about Ireland.
First, please note that this data is updated regularly, so what you see here reflects the current values as of today.
In order to get reliable data, we applied a strict source filter. We only used authoritative, verifiable Irish sources, not random listings or unsupported figures. More on that point below.
For each neighborhood and property type, we then aggregated the freshest purchase price and monthly rent data available for the Irish market. When possible, we cross-checked multiple sources to confirm the same range.
This allowed us to estimate rental yield before costs. That is the gross yield, based on annual rent versus purchase price.
We then estimated rental yield after costs. That is the net yield, after recurring ownership and operating expenses.
These expenses vary by neighborhood across Ireland. That is why two areas with similar rents can still produce different net returns.
For example, apartment-heavy areas in Dublin often carry higher management and service charges, while older buildings in Cork or Galway may carry more maintenance or repair costs. In high-turnover areas near universities, vacancy and tenant-related costs can also be higher.
We also estimated ownership annual fees by combining the main recurring costs linked to each Irish property type. This includes Local Property Tax, management and service charges where relevant, insurance, and a maintenance allowance.
These estimates were not applied as one flat number across Ireland. They were adjusted by neighborhood and property type to better reflect local ownership conditions, including Ireland's apartment service charge norms as documented by the SCSI.
This table should therefore be read as a structured market estimate, not as an exact guarantee of future performance. Honesty, quality, and rigor are at the core of our work, and they are also what you will find in our real estate pack about Ireland.
What sources have we used to write this blog article?
Whether it's in our blog articles or the market analyses included in our real estate pack about Ireland, we rely on verifiable sources and a transparent methodology.
We also aim to be fully transparent, so below we've listed the authoritative sources we used, and explained how we used them and the methods behind our estimates.
| Source | Why it's authoritative | How we used it |
|---|---|---|
| CSO Residential Property Price Index (January 2026) | It is Ireland's official national house-price release, published by the Central Statistics Office. | We used it to anchor our March 2026 pricing to the latest official national and regional trends. We also relied on its Dublin versus outside-Dublin and house versus apartment splits to keep neighborhood-level estimates realistic. |
| PSRA Residential Property Price Register | It is the statutory register of residential transactions declared for stamp duty in Ireland, making it the most reliable transaction-level record available. | We used it as a cross-check on neighborhood pricing so the model did not rely only on asking prices from portals. We also used it to validate the price ranges we applied for each property type. |
| RTB/ESRI Rent Index (Q3 2025) | It is built from actual tenancy registrations and analysed by the ESRI, making it the most authoritative recurring rent benchmark in Ireland. | We used it as the core rent anchor for both new and existing tenancies across Ireland. We also used it to keep city-level rent estimates consistent with official standardised figures. |
| Daft House Price Report (Q4 2025) | Daft is Ireland's largest residential property portal, and its quarterly reports track real asking-price momentum at a local level. | We used it to cross-check current price direction and supply tightness in each submarket. We also used it to identify the neighborhoods and property types most relevant for residential investment in Ireland. |
| Daft Rental Report (Q4 2025) | As Ireland's largest portal, Daft provides one of the best real-time views of open-market rents and listing scarcity across the country. | We used it to cross-check rent pressure and listing availability in Dublin and the other major Irish cities. We also used it to infer typical time-to-rent in the tightest rental submarkets. |
| Sherry FitzGerald Irish Residential Market Update (Q4 2025) | Sherry FitzGerald is one of Ireland's most established residential agencies, with a long track record of credible market research. | We used it to cross-check regional price growth, transaction trends, and new-build delivery patterns around Ireland. We also used it to judge where supply is easing slightly and where rental competition should remain strongest. |
| GeoDirectory Residential Buildings Report (Q4 2025) | GeoDirectory is the main address database used for vacancy and housing stock analysis in Ireland, relied on by public bodies and researchers. | We used it to anchor occupancy assumptions and vacancy pressure across Irish neighborhoods. We also used it to justify faster letting assumptions in Dublin and other low-vacancy markets. |
| Revenue Ireland - Local Property Tax (2026) | Revenue is the official Irish tax authority, making its LPT guidance the definitive source for annual property holding costs. | We used it to include LPT in our annual ownership cost estimates for each neighborhood and property type. We also used it to ensure higher-value Dublin properties reflect a clearly higher tax burden in the net yield calculation. |
| Gov.ie - Rent Pressure Zones | This is the official Irish government summary of rent-control rules, which directly affects how much landlords can raise rents in designated areas. | We used it to reflect rent-reset constraints in our risk assessments for affected neighborhoods. We also used it to explain why high-demand areas do not always translate into the strongest income returns for landlords. |
| SCSI - Apartments and Service Charges | The Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland is the professional body for chartered surveyors, and its guidance on service charges reflects actual Irish apartment management practice. | We used it to apply more realistic recurring costs to apartments and multi-unit schemes across Ireland. We also used it to create a clear separation between apartment net yields and house net yields in the model. |
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