Update 8.30pm: The Cork apartments at the centre of an alleged “mass eviction” was on the market earlier this year listed as earning €676,000 per annum with “strong potential to increase annual rental income through refurbishment and active asset management”, write Stephen Rogers and Niall Murray.

“Substantial” refurbishment and renovation is the reason being given by its new owners for telling the residents they need to leave.

Termination letters received by the impacted residents, as raised in the Dáil by Mick Barry TD and seen by the Irish Examiner, state: “The following works will be carried out. The installation of new fire doors, the refurbishment of all common areas, installation of new flooring throughout common areas and apartments in the building, refurbishment and redecoration of apartments and installation of new kitchens in apartments”.

70 households given Notices to Quit at Leeside Apartments Grattan St/Bachelors Qy, Cork city. These evictions must be stopped. The Minister for Housing must close the loophole in the law which allows this. — Mick Barry TD (@MickBarryTD) November 15, 2017

The property at the intersection of Bachelor’s Quay and Grattan St in Cork City is comprised of 78 apartments (175 bed spaces) and a private car park with 32 spaces.

A brochure at the time it was for sale — guided at €7.75m and with an 87% occupancy rate at that point — stated that “ in recent months, as apartments have become available, management have not re-let the properties to allow for new purchasers to carry out renovation works”.

The termination letters, signed by a Peter Horgan on behalf of Larea Fa Fund Ii Designated Activity Company (DAC) who are listed as the “landlord”, also said no planning permission was required for the work.

The company is listed as having two directors, David Cullen and Tom Maughan, and has an address in Molesworth St in Dublin 2.

The letters did say the residents would be offered the opportunity to reoccupy the property if it becomes available for re-letting within a period of six months from the expiry of the period of notice required “or if a dispute in relation to the validity of the notice was referred to the (Residential Tenancies) Board under part 6 (of the Residential Tenancies Act) for resolution”.

The tenancies are terminating in early 2018 with residents given the “whole of the 24 hours of the termination date to vacate and give up possession of the property”.

The Cork apartments at the centre of an alleged “mass eviction” was on the market earlier this year listed as earning €676,000 per annum with “strong potential to increase annual rental income through refurbishment and active asset management”.

Earlier: The Dáil has heard 70 households are being told to quit an apartment block in Cork city because the landlord wants to carry out refurbishments.

Solidarity-People Before Profit TD Mick Barry says residents of the Leeside Apartments on Bachelors Quay have received letters ordering them to leave their homes.

He was one of several opposition TDs calling for an end to the loophole allowing landlords to evict tenants on the grounds that refurbishments are needed.

Deputy Barry says many of the families living there are now facing the threat of homelessness.

"We have young families, they have kids," he said.

"They have kids that go to school in the vicinity of the apartment block.

"One family I spoke to pay €700 per month rent. [The family] has gone out and started to look for alternative accommodation. The prices being asked: €1,000, €1,100, €1,200, €1,300."