The Dublin housing crisis has hit hard all over the county, causing the prices of homes and rent to skyrocket. These high prices have given many people looking for housing no choice but to resort to home or apartment sharing so that they can afford the monthly payments.
As a full-time, successful employee, it can be hard to find a place that has every aspect on your wishlist due to both lack of supply and prices that rise with every additional feature. Finding a place to live within budget and within expectations can be very hard to do.
One group of people that has an extremely hard time being able to afford suitable housing is those who have come over on a student visa. Many young people and adults are drawn from their respective countries to Dublin so that they can attend university or english school. Although there are exceptional resources all across the city for this, one must thoroughly weigh the costs and benefits of living in a city as expensive as Dublin.
After having the opportunity to talk with a few English school students living in Dublin, I was given quite a few insights into the prices that they pay to stay in Dublin and continue their education.
Most students who come to study will have no choice but to have their passports stamped with their local immigration agent that indicated that they are participating in a class that is registered on the Interim List of Eligible Programmes. This stamp notifies possible employers of what you are allowed to do given the conditions of the visa and your stay.
Students with Visas are only permitted to work 20 hours a week, which can be very difficult. If you are an adult coming to Dublin to study english, it can be assumed that your verbal communication skills are not as good as other people who may be competing for the same job as you.
With this slight disability to land a job and expensive prices all around, many immigrants struggle to find a place to live that fits all of their wants and needs. People are usually forced to overcrowd apartment spaces in order to make the area affordable enough. According to a few Brazilians I talked with, bed rooms sometimes packed, sometimes housing as many as six people.
Most of these greatly packed rooms are all that students can afford at their ridgid hourly work schedule. Overall, the inability for people to find resources that they can afford is something that should be acknowledged by the local government and put on their to-do list.