Irish Election - Coverage of Irish Politics, News and Current Affairs

Over at the Property Pin they have been digging away at the proposals in yesterday’s budget for affordable housing provision. The website set up (homechoiceloan.ie) appears to suggest the government is steppign into subprime mortgages for those refused by banks and building societies as well as stipulating the houses purchased come from the 35,000-50,000 new, [...]

From RTE
New figures from property website Daft.ie show the average house price is now €312,500. It says an average fall of 3.8% in house prices was recorded between July and September.
This means that prices are down by almost 11% compared to the same period last year.
This is compared to a fall of 12% in [...]

With Gordon Brown’s one year stamp duty land tax holiday on properties costing £175,000 or less (up from £125,000), the differential between stamp duty on house purchases between the UK and Republic of Ireland is now even sharper.  The zero rate in Ireland is only up to €125,000 and then goes to 7%, the highest [...]

The time of the departure of Bertie Ahern has now been announced. What of his legacy, his place in Irish history? Here are some points that might be considered.

The bankers reassure us that “new lending continues to moderate in a mortgage market that is still growing in overall terms.”
Translated, this means that people, mostly young people seeking their first home, are flocking to buy houses at prices they regard as realistic. (Irish Independent editorial, 14 February, 2008)
So. The spinning continues.
The above quote comes [...]

What crisis? The construction sector completed over 78,000 residences last year which is a little above analyst expectation but below the 2006 figure of 90,000+. So are we all over-egging this a bit?

Newstalk’s Marc Coleman has a nice perch on the Financial Times comment page today to outline his fairly optimistic long-term view of the Irish economy despite the current property downturn.  His essential argument, to be outlined in more detail in his book, is that Ireland has two key assets for its long-term growth prospects: people [...]

The housing market is beginning to show initial and tentative signs of recovery, with prices expected to rise again outside Dublin before the end of 2008.
Since the reform of stamp duty by Finance Minister and Tanaiste Brian Cowen in the Budget on December 5, there have been initial indications that, although the slump has not [...]

More than 266,322 houses, flats and holiday homes lie vacant in the Republic — enough to house a million people, the Sunday Independent has learned. Housing Minister Batt O’Keeffe claimed two weeks ago that much of the present problems in the housing market was caused by rogue builders who are “sitting” on finished properties as [...]

The decision of first-time buyers to defer purchases has seen a boom in the rental market, with rents rising to an all-time average high of €1,400 a month nationwide.” (Irish Independent, 28 November 2007)
…Rents are strong in Ashbourne thanks to its relative proximity to the capital and the major expansion of retail business in the [...]

Last week I posted a survey of the first one hundred properties listed on Daft.ie for rent in Dublin, as taken from the Daft site on 30 November 2007. Below is a survey of the next one hundred properties taken on the same day. It shows that in two weeks:
17 out of 100 properties have [...]

Swiss bank loses €6.8bn over subprime crisis

Property in Ireland - its sale and rental - is not just a social issue, it’s a political issue. And it is covered by journalists as a political issue. Recently we saw a highly publicised campaign by the Irish Times and the Irish Independent to see stamp duty cut. The argument was that stamp duty [...]

After the 2007 Budget last December, Brian Cowen was called Santa Claus by those quick witted subeditors eager to fill a snappy headline. After all, the surprisingly large tax returns, mainly provided by the rampantly inflated housing market allowed him to provide a bumper ‘giveaway’ budget.
This year of course, with credit crunches and a collapsing [...]

While much of the media have been acting with glea and the other lot with denial there is a big issue that is being ignored. When ever I go home to my local to have a pint the conversation generally turns to construction. Now this is not a D4 type talk of interiors this conversation [...]

The Irish residential property market has now reached a turning point and already there are encouraging signs of a pick-up in activity, with sales enquiries through Hooke & MacDonald increasing steadily. This momentum will follow through into the autumn selling period, boosted by the resolution of the stamp duty issue and as the interest rate [...]