Homelessness in Mid West jumps by a third with 516 without a home in Limerick

THE NUMBER of families homeless in the Mid West has jumped by a massive third since last year.

And the number of homeless children in Limerick and Clare has also shot up by almost one quarter, with 589 adults and 232 children now depending on emergency accommodation to save them from sleeping on the streets in both counties.

Of those adults homeless, 516 were in Limerick and 75 were in Clare.

That’s according to the latest official figures from the Department of Housing, which outline 147 families in the Mid West in emergency homeless accommodation at the end of July.

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In the same month last year, there were 517 adults, 110 families, and 191 children accessing emergency accommodation.

This equates to a 33 per cent hike in the number of homeless families, a 21 per cent increase in the number of children homeless, and a 13 per cent increase in adult homelessness in the region.

This past June, there were 151 homeless families and 237 homeless children, this came alongside 510 homeless people in Limerick in June and 79 in Clare.

Nationally, the number of people experiencing homelessness in Ireland has risen for the seventh consecutive month this year, with 16,058 people recorded in emergency accommodation in July 2025. 5,014 are these are children.

Ber Grogan, executive director of the Simon Communities of Ireland – who has the Simon Mid West branch operating locally – hit out that “there are more people in homelessness than ever before. There are over 5,000 children whose lives are being impacted by trauma.”

“Who cares? The Simon Communities of Ireland cares, and we are calling on government, policy makers, landlords, all of the key stakeholders to show they care too.”

Mr Grogan said that “Ireland is a wealthy country with thousands of vacant homes. Ireland’s largest private landlord, Irish Residential Properties REIT (I-RES), reported profits of €16.3million in the first half of 2025.”

“This rise in corporate landlord profits highlights the stark imbalance between housing as a source of profit and the worsening human cost of homelessness. We cannot continue with business as usual while homelessness keeps rising. The time for action is now.”