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.
Irish households hit by both unemployment and negative equity
My recent post on negative equity led to some discussions, particularly on irisheconomy.ie, about the financial (i.e. NAMA) and labour market (i.e. dole) implications of negative equity. Here, I use Live Register figures to work out which counties have been affected most by unemployment since the start of the recession. A group of counties from Laois up to Cavan appear worst affected, although all counties have seen unemployment at least double.
Unemployment in Ireland by county, April 2009 compared to 2005/2006
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.
As those who’ve checked out/had to put up with my many word clouds on various different topics from Wicklow genealogy to Barack Obama will testify, I’m always looking for new ways to present data and information. For those with similar interests, a useful tool in that regard is Manyeyes, a free data visualization service offered [...]
Recently, inspired by Irish Culture Night, I bought a copy of the O’Doyne manuscript, published by the Irish Manuscripts Commission in the early 1980s. The manuscript itself is in Marsh’s Library, Ireland’s oldest public library, and is dominated by documents relating to the lengthy legal battle between Charles O’Doyne (Cathaoir Ó Duinn) and his older [...]