Housing and Ireland’s competitiveness jigsaw
Will the surge of properties on to the market push rents down?
The latest Daft.ie Rental Report shows that rents nationwide have been largely stable over the past twelve months. This post looks behind these top level figures and explores two issues in particular. The first is the stock available to rent in the cities across Ireland, and whether this will push rents down in coming months. The second is how far the rent-house price relationship has adjusted back to normality in the past four years… and how much more of an adjustment is needed. Read more
Two charts on the stock of property for sale in Ireland
Has the new year brought a change in the property market headwinds? Will first-time buyers waiting in the wings find themselves missing out if they don’t move soon? This post looks at trends in the total stock sitting on the market in both apartments and houses, across Dublin, in the other major cities and in the rest of the country. It also estimates the percentage of all properties currently listed for sale in each segment Read more
House prices in Cork: Rebel County by name, rebel county by nature!
This post continues the regional review of house prices with an analysis of four-bedroom homes in the different suburbs of Cork. It finds that Cork bucks the trend seen generally in the country and in Dublin and Galway cities that more expensive areas have fallen hardest. The largest falls in Cork have been in Glanmire. It then explores some of the likely explanations for these different regional trends. Read more
Up to 60,000 households threatened by negative equity and unemployment
Currently, up to one in four households with a mortgage is faced with negative equity. At the same time, one in seven is coping with unemployment. It is likely, then, that there are in the region of 20,000 homes faced with both negative equity and unemployment. If the Live Register reaches 500,000 and house prices fall another 25% in the next year, this figure could treble to 3.5% of all households. Read more
How much are rents falling around the country?
A review of the latest trends in Ireland’s residential lettings market, from the Q1 2009 Daft.ie Rental Report, including a map of the changes in rents by county. Read more
How many Irish homes are in negative equity?
Ireland’s property market is currently in rewind. Homes now are at March 2005 values – or July 2004, if asking prices are 10% above closing prices. Figures from daft.ie, the Census and the Dept of the Environment allow an estimate of both the number of homes now worth less than when they were bought – about 725,000, or 40% of homes – and how many of those are in negative equity -about 340,000, or 20% of homes. Read more