My husband and I are considering of a 3 - 4 month rental in Ireland for Autumn 2024. I've done some research and so far am only turning up holiday homes, short term rentals, student accommodation or luxury homes that are in excess of $10,000/month. We are open to houses or apartments
I've have been looking at flat.io, airbnb long term stay listings, property.ie and some other websites. We would like to be near either coast in a city or town with bus transport as we do not plan to have a car. I think what we need to find are some local property/real estate agents.
Does anyone have any personal experience with this or suggestions on the best way to find furnished 3/4 month rental?
Thanks!

Pick a couple of towns of interest and look up local realtors to call, or contact a local tourist bureau.


google search is your friend, as is your phone.

Thank you for the quick reply

One thought is try a search online for house-sitting. We did it for about a year (lots of house-sits covering a wide area) and there were tons of people advertising for house-sitters. Mostly because of wanting pets looked after but sometimes just for security or to take care of the garden. That was in Australia so it may be entirely different in Ireland but worth checking. In Australia I do see long house-sits, for months at a time.

Also you could look at aparthotels, they would probably give you a good rate for a long stay. I don't know Ireland at all but ideas are Citadines, Adagio Aparthotel, Ascott serviced apartments. These may not be in Ireland but it's a start. Once we found a good furnished apartment for a long-term rental on Gumtree. That was in London. (Be a bit cautious/wary with Gumtree.)

I guess you have visas already or maybe you don't need them?

Thank you for all the suggestions. Visas are not a problem, but thanks for the reminder. We have explored house sitting/pet sitting and are familiar with how they work. We used pet sitting services years ago when we had our own own pets and it worked out well. The issue in Ireland is that those housesits tend to be in the winter, when they go to warmer climates like Australia. We would like to go in Autumn after the high tourist season but before it gets dark and cold. I think the apartment hotels might be the best option and I will keep looking in that category. We have seen some in Ireland, but have been put off by the reviews, as it seems they are often filled with bachelorette/bachelor parties at the weekends. Thanks for the tip on Gumtree, I'm sure I start looking at them that similar types of services will popup in my search. Thanks again for taking the time to reply.

I'd look at each town's tourist office

eg
https://www.purecork.ie/stay/categories/self-catering

Thank you for the link. I think this could work for us. I will do as you said and search different towns individually. Thank you again.

The website www.daft.ie is good for rentals. If you're looking at suggestions on where to rent, take a look at Waterford. It's an overlooked area of the country, the beaches are wonderful, lovely scenery and some fantastic restaurants. Try Dungarven or Lismore to get the ball rolling!

Thank you very much for the reply. We've been checking daft.ie and flat.io regularly and haven't seen anything that works for us. I think we will need to keep checking regularly on that as I'm sure things go quickly. Waterford and Dungarven are on our list as they have good bus service and are fairly big towns, especially Waterford. We are pretty open on towns and either coast, we just haven't seen anything that works as of yet. Thank you again for taking the time to reply. I'm amazed at all the replies and information that's been shared.

I live in a town (in the US) that has a lot of 1 week to 1mo rentals in the summer - and I know if someone asked if they could rent longer the owner would figure something out...

You might not find anything online that is listed as open for 3-4 months, but if you find something that strikes your eye contact the owner and ask.....
The key is to talk to people, who know people, who know people..... hence the suggestion to contact the local tourist bureaus - leverage their network.

I've been taking the listings at face value, but thanks for the idea to reach out to the owner/lister or Tourist office etc and see if they are flexible about extending the rental period. Excellent idea.