The owner of a thatched pub in Co Louth has said he cannot afford to pay his insurance premium, after receiving a quote of almost €20,000.
Stuart Carolan, who co-owns The Morning Star pub in the village of Tullyallen with his father Pat, said removing the thatch is the "last thing we want to do", but he is considering the options for his business.
He wants to highlight the challenges facing owners of thatched properties in Ireland.
With the costs so high, he said running the pub was now "more of a labour of love than an investment opportunity", he said.
The thatched building is hundreds of years old and has been a public house since the 1850s.
He described it as a tourist attraction and a hub for the village - hosting community, family and sporting events.
Mr Carolan said he has invested about €300,000 into the building to make improvements, including €60,000 to replace the thatched roof, but that insurance has steadily increased every year since they bought it.
"When we bought the pub in 2015, the insurance was in or around €5,000. After investing our money to safeguard and to upgrade and replace the thatch, to rewire the place, put all the fail-safes into place to reduce the risk of anything happening, the insurance went from €5,000 in 2015 to almost €20,000 this year.
"It has got to the stage now that it's not the cost. Most insurance companies won't even give a quote because of the thatch.
"I'm told that in 2015 there were six insurance companies in the Irish market insuring thatch properties and now I believe there's only two," he said.
He said other established companies that are insuring thatch properties do not take on new business and he criticised what he called a "lack of competition in the market".
Mr Carolan said the cost of keeping the thatched roof was hugely expensive.
"If I didn't have thatch on the roof, the insurance companies tell me that my premium would be €11,000 less every year and then the upkeep and repairs is another €2,000 less. That's €13,000 every year just to keep the thatch on the roof."
Due to the high cost, the publican said he was now considering all his options.
"We can't afford to pay it. We're still trying to recover from last year's premium," he said.
"The last thing we want to do is take the thatch off the roof. It's on the roof hundreds of years. But if we can't find a way of making it financially viable for the business, we're going to have to look at other options," he said.
The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage has said it was "aware of the current challenges relating to the cost and availability of insurance for thatched buildings".
Average of 14 thatch building fires per year
There are financial and other supports available for thatched property owners, however it seems that fire safety is one of the major influencing factors affecting insurance.
Mr Carolan said the issue around fire safety was "another frustration".
He said he had gone to "different lengths" and "done everything we can possibly do to reduce the risk of fire and yet the premiums have gone up and up and up".
Research carried out by the department found there was an average of 14 fires in thatched buildings per year in the five years to October 2022, and that during that time, the incidence of fire in thatched buildings in Ireland was around eight times higher than in England.
It also noted thatch owners in England do not have major problems accessing affordable insurance.
The research found the majority of fires in thatched buildings originate in the improper maintenance, design or use of the chimney - with solid fuel stoves presenting particularly high risks.
The department said that these findings suggest that straightforward measures, like not using wood burning stoves, could "very substantially reduce the incidence of fire in our thatched buildings".
"Aside from the obvious benefits of improved safety, it is expected that this will reduce losses and ultimately help bring insurance premiums down as commercial providers compete to win new business in the usual way," it said.
However, there are now indications that fire safety is beginning to improve.
A survey of local authority fire officers last November indicated the number of fires in the previous 12 months was down to six, only one of which resulted in a total loss.
Fall in thatch insurance providers since Brexit
The Department of Housing is engaging with the Department of Finance and the insurance sector to make them aware of the latest research in relation to risk and to identify and encourage potential insurance providers.
Insurance Ireland, which represents the majority of insurers in the Irish market, said that the number of providers offering thatched properties has declined since Brexit and that while cover under existing policies has been renewed for many years, it is difficult for new properties to obtain quotes.
It said this was due to "increased fire risk and poor claims experience presented by thatched properties", citing the research carried out by the Department of Housing.
The organisations said that the "risk appetite of insurers for thatched properties may improve if there is a demonstrable improvement in the fire risk and claims experience", but that they have not been comfortable in recent years to underwrite thatched properties "over and beyond" the ones they already have on their books.
Insurance Ireland welcomed the work of the Department of Housing to improve fire safety and said it was keen that the availability of insurance in the thatched sector increases.
"A sustained improvement in claims experience is key to that", it said.
'You can't really shop around'
A steering group on thatched buildings has been set up by the Department of Housing to examine all of the issues facing owners.
Jimmy Lenehan has been thatcher for more than 30 years and also lives in a thatched house himself.
He is the chair of the steering committee and believed it was of "paramount importance that the Government do what they can to save these buildings".
He said that insurance had become a "big problem", especially for new owners of thatched buildings.
"With the older age profile of thatch owners, some houses now are coming onto the market. If you try and buy those, both trying to get a mortgage and insurance on those buildings is prohibitive because any building over 100 years old, if it doesn't tick a box, the insurance people don't really want to know about it," he said.
Mr Lenehan agreed that while some people were lucky to be established with a long-term insurer, they do not take on new customers and that is restrictive for new owners.
"So there's a big problem there, as houses move from ownership, the insurance is lost on it and it's very hard to reestablish the insurance.
"You can't really shop around, you have to take whatever you can get and that means your insurance premium is probably going to be far in excess of what the normal house would be," he said.
The "glaringly obvious" reason for high insurance premiums was the fire risk, Mr Lenehan said.
"The thatch is combustible. They tend to be older houses. So the box of being both old and made from a combustible material doesn't help."
He said that following research by the Department of Housing, a fire advisory booklet has gone out to the 2,500 thatched properties around the country and an engineer was made available to visit properties to give on-site advice on fire mitigation and prevention.
"If we can stop thatched houses burning down, it'll make it easier and cheaper hopefully to start insuring the houses again," he said.
Mr Lenehan said that the steering group had made contact with insurance providers in Germany, Denmark and Holland to see if they can "entice them into the market", but that "as yet, it hasn't paid dividends".
While he considers the insurance options for The Morning Star, Mr Carolan has called for more supports for the owners of thatched properties, whether that is financial aid or advice and support.
He also called for more to be done by the Government to attract more competition into the insurance market.
"If these buildings are to survive and thatch properties are to be kept, there's going to have to be some intervention by someone to try and get more competition and get the premiums down," he said.
