For a year, Miles felt nothing but dread and anxiety when going to his house. He would rather stay out with friends than go back. Once he was there, he hid away in his room. Miles, who would rather not be mentioned by his full name, is 30 years old, gay and trans and moved from Belgium to Ireland in 2020 for work. After a short time living in Belfast, he came to Dublin in the winter of the same year to work in customer service. The house he moved into would, however, not turn into a home for him. His story is an example of many struggling to find LGBTQ+-friendly housing.

He had to take the room under his dead name. Stories he had heard from other people having been denied a room when they explained they went by a different name stopped him from being open about his identity at first. “When I got there and was in the house with the key in my hand, I told my landlord I go by a different name.”

While he seemed okay with it and used Miles’ chosen name, the landlord explained that the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB) would not take chosen names for registering until they were a legal name on an ID, so Miles had to register with RTB under his deadname.

When Miles first met one of his three then-housemates in the kitchen later that day, he introduced himself as Miles, he/him pronouns. The conversation that followed was the start of a year-long denial of his identity.

“Oh, there’s a woman in the house now.”
“I’m not a woman.”
“What are you then?”
“I’m a man.”
“How do you have sex?”

It did not matter that Miles explained the situation to the people living in the house. “It was clear to me they saw me as a woman”, he says.

That one housemate especially would make his misogyny towards Miles omnipresent. Another housemate, who would use Miles’ correct pronouns and name, was a lot nicer to him and eventually offered to mediate between them. “The other guy didn’t accept me as a man, so he wouldn’t take any criticism from me.” Miles’ landlord did not want to get involved and just asked them to work it out between themselves.

One evening after four months living there, Miles heard a knock on his door. He opened it to see his third housemate, an older guy who, according to Miles, was often drunk. In that instance, he told Miles it was his birthday. “I said Happy Birthday because I was trying to be nice and then he pulled me in and tried to kiss me. Ever since that happened, I did not feel safe at home.”

The event took a serious toll on Miles’ mental health. He felt anxious and depressed, paired with the gender dysphoria he experienced. He isolated himself in his room to the point where he would not even go for walks or to the shops because he had seen homophobic graffiti on an electricity box in his neighbourhood. He took the Pride flag he had hung up on his window down and got his food delivered to avoid bad encounters on the streets.

After visiting his family in Belgium, he cried all the way back to the airport because he did not want to return to that house. However, giving up living in Ireland was not an option for him despite its precarious housing situation. “For all the issues we have, Ireland is still nice to live in and the people for the most part are sound”, he explains.

After having endured his situation for a year, Miles moved to a different house owned by the same landlord. He made sure to have his top surgery done before he moved in as he did not want a repeat of what had happened.

This cautiousness extends to Miles’ friends, whom he says he wants to protect from potential transphobic comments. “I don’t want there to be a chance for them to get hurt”, he says, explaining why he does not have his friends, who are mostly trans women, over at the new place he shares with five other people.

As a volunteer with CATU Ireland (Community Action Tenants Union), Miles has heard similar stories from other people, saying abuse was one of the main problems with finding safe and LGBTQ+-friendly housing. The situation seems to be the most precarious for trans people. “It is very much an issue that you don’t get treated like your gender, which I can imagine is even worse for non-binary people.”

One trans woman told Miles that she couldn’t start transitioning while living at home with her parents, but wasn’t able to find an apartment alone and didn’t feel safe sharing with others. Queer couples face issues, too. “No one will outright say anything, but you get a feeling. And it’s hard to prove that someone is discriminating against you based on gender, sexuality or name. They will just send an email, saying, ‘Sorry, you didn’t make it’, but you are never given a reason.”

Sadly, even when the landlords or subletters are part of the LGBTQ+ community, queer people can still face discrimination. “A gay landlord is still a landlord”, Miles quotes the famous sign pictured at San Francisco Pride in 1977. According to Miles, many students had reported exploitation by having to fulfil sexual favours in exchange for rent.

“People renting out seem to really take advantage of the fact that people are scared. Especially subletting puts you in a very dangerous spot.” Many then seem to get stuck in such exploitative situations because they have no other option at hand with so little on the market.

While CATU advocates for universal public housing with fairer rents, it also tries to support tenants in general with the struggles of the ongoing housing crisis. For example, they contact councils to see if they have any free social housing. CATU also set up an LGBTQ+ caucus in 2022 and has a group chat where queer people can support each other.

“Part of the reason why I’m with CATU is because I want a better world for others, not only for myself”, he says. The first time he ever felt powerful as a tenant was at a CATU protest, which he describes as one of his proudest moments.

 

Sieh dir diesen Beitrag auf Instagram an

 

Ein Beitrag geteilt von CATU Ireland (@catuireland)

If people find themselves in an unhealthy housing situation, CATU encourages them to move elsewhere if possible. “For me, moving out helped a lot”, Miles explains.

Miles also advises people to rent with a friend if possible and maybe send cis straight friends to house viewings. To be safe, looking up the landlord online and checking the papers can help, as well as making sure the landlord and the house’s address are registered with RTB.

There are also helpful websites called howmuchrent.com and ratethelandlord.org, which have reviews on specific landlords. Miles also refers people to CATU’s socials. “If a landlord had been particularly toxic or an issue for people, it will be on there”, he continues. “And obviously listen to your gut and only meet up with landlords in public.”

Regarding figuring out a housemate’s attitudes towards LGBTQ+ people and communicating one’s own queer identity, Miles says: “If you think you can trust the people, have a conversation in the kitchen and then drop, for example, that you have a partner.”

It might also help to introduce the topic by talking about queer artists, queer-related news or how housemates feel about the political situation in their country if they’re from outside Ireland. “Or you do it how I did with my parents first. I talked about a friend who was queer as an icebreaker to chat about. Then you can ask further questions”, Miles shares.

If people find themselves in a situation like Miles did, he advises that they remove themselves as much as possible by hanging out with friends or engaging in a hobby if moving out immediately is not possible.

“Get out and enjoy yourselves. Reach out to people around you or reach out to CATU…Get a community around you.” If people find themselves in an emergency situation, reaching out to neighbours or shelters might be an option, too.

While for Miles, if things got very bad he would be able to move back to Belgium, “For someone who doesn’t have that, it’s going to be very hard.” He continues saying: “Sometimes going stealth helps if you don’t know the person you are renting from or if you don’t have friends that rent with you, however painful it is for someone like me, and then feel it out.

“I don’t like going stealth and I don’t like going back in the closet but it’s easy to get stuck in Ireland in a very dangerous situation, which makes me sad. As much as I look like a cis man, I want people to know that I am trans. I do recognise the privilege that I have because I pass fairly well for a man. A queer man but a man. It’s a big part of who I am, and I worked very hard to get here.”

For more useful tips on finding safe, LGBTQ+-friendly housing check out the websites listed here, with additional information here on rooms available in Northern Ireland and Great Britain. You can also get in touch with the following organisations and social groups for support: Queer Housing Facebook groups nationwide, Aisteach Queer Housing Co-Op, or Belong To, an organisation providing support and information for queer youth aged between 13 to 24 across a range of issues, including LGBTQ+-friendly housing. To chat about accommodation struggles, reach out to their professional Youth Workers.

Other resources, not just for LGBTQ+-friendly housing, are Threshold (aid to prevent homelessness), Outhouse LGBTQ+ Centre, TENI (Transgender Equality Network Ireland), and LGBT Ireland.