Cuckoo Funds Shifting Buyers towards Renting

Long-term pension funds are at risk with the aging population and increases in the rental market. The aging population is going to dry up pension funds because there will not be enough younger people to payoff older generations pension funds. Additionally, the expanding rental market will cause long-term retirees having trouble sustaining a comfortable lifestyle. Renting can be a great solution in the short term if someone is young, temporary, etc. However, not owning a home and having your mortgage paid off when you reach retirement ages can cause a lot of stress.

Cuckoo funds are contributing to this problem by spending approximately €2 billion on buying thousands of apartments and still have about €6 billion left to invest in the housing market according to global real estate advisor CBRE. Many consider Dublin to be one of Europe’s top markets for large, global funds to invest in.

There has been a dramatic shift from investing in Ireland’s commercial to residential property. In the first half of 2019, about 40% of commercial property investment is now being used for the residential …

Read More →

Affordable Rental Properties are Hard to Come by

Rental properties have provided the people of Ireland different options when it comes to living situations. People that cannot secure mortgages for various reasons and therefore are unable to buy a home look into the rental market.

A new Simon Communities Study has found that over 90% of homes available for rent within Ireland are not affordable for people with state housing benefits. The study indicates that the government needs to monitor and strictly enforce rent pressure zones, including the 19 new zones announced today.

The most recent publication of the Locked Out of the Market report found that approximately 8% of properties available on the market to rent were within the housing assistance payment limits. That percentage is drastically smaller compared to the percentage of the population that is using housing assistant payments.

The study found some alarming information that the government needs to take under consideration. Only one property was found available to rent within the Rent Supplement or HAP limits across all of the study areas for a single person. Additionally, only two unites were available within …

Read More →

Institutional Investors Hurting First-Time Buyers

Big time investors in the housing market are affecting first time buyers and their ability to purchase homes. Large scale investors are buying lots of hundreds of houses at a time and renovating them and re-selling them for profit. Home buyers are feeling the pressure and are unable to find homes in their price range. Fianna Fáil is calling on the current government to investigate the current tax incentives for investors and believes that could be a way to make significant changes.

The Department of Finance has agreed to do a review on how much institutional investors pay in taxes. However, Department of Finance has already begun releasing statements defending their current stance on taxes. They acknowledged that institutional investors only make up a small proportion of the housing market. A small proportion still can affect hundreds to thousands of people. According to Savills Estate Agents, approximately 3,000 properties were purchased in blocks by institutional investors last year. Many homebuyers searching for homes contribute large investment funds to increasing difficulty in getting a house.

Nicola McCann and her partner from …

Read More →

Is Long-Term Renting Sustainable?

Lifelong renting is becoming increasingly popular within Ireland’s largest cities. Influential Cork developer, Michael O’Flynn, talked about instances when he heard of people suggesting that up to 50% of houses should be rented. O’Flynn heavily disagrees with this statement and suggests that ideas such as economic and pension polices should be reviewed.

O’Flynn most recently addressed this issue during his discussion at the Institute of Professional Auctioneers and Valuers (IPAV). He set out to prove that retirees could not sustain a long period of renting properties and instead should have a house paid off to retire in. He asked the audience, “There are currently five workers for every pensioner, but the projection is for this to drop to two workers for every retiree by 2050. Have we considered how that will impact on pension income?” The renting model is not affordable for many classes of people and can cause severe economic troubles down the road when savings begin to dry up. Renting can be a great alternative for people moving to new areas or students and young adults in the …

Read More →

UN Sent Irish Government a Letter on Housing Crisis

The Irish government received a letter in March from the UN rapporteur, Leilani Farha, stating that, “housing in Ireland is moderately unaffordable.” The UN was using this letter as a wakeup call to the Irish government and made some very serious allegations. One of the allegations that the letter made was, “house prices are now approaching levels last seen at the height of the property bubble.” This statement relives a terrible time in the history of Ireland. The Irish government responded by saying that average households only spend one-fifth of their income on housing costs but acknowledged some prominent issues that need to be improved.

A couple of the top problems stated in the letter related to land hoarding and equity landlords. First, land hoarding occurs when investors will purposefully sit on a property to increase demand and lower supply in the area before selling/renting. This is causing major problems for citizens that are struggling to keep up with the increasing prices. The other problem is landlords, “have openly discussed policies of introducing the highest rents possible in order to …

Read More →

Single Parents and Migrants at Greatest Risk for Homelessness According to New Report

If you identify as either a lone parent, migrant, or a member of a traveling community then you are at greater risk of homelessness according to Focus Ireland. Focus Ireland conducted a report examining the drivers of family homelessness in Dublin. The overarching idea was many families are being evicted from private rental properties and unable to find another place to live causing homelessness. Many of these families have a long history with residing in the same apartment and should not be threatened with homelessness due to the rising property prices and shortage of availability.

Mike Allen, Director of Advocacy at Focus Ireland, appeared on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland to discuss his companies recent report. He was quoted saying, “the vast majority of the families surveyed had been living in the private rental sector without any problem until the crisis came along.”  Mike Allen has witnessed an increase in many property owners exiting the rental market especially those that are offering more affordable properties to rent. This is one of the many reasons contributing to the growing numbers of homelessness in …

Read More →

Regular wages and purchasing homes

In the current market, there is an increasing want and need for housing in Ireland, especially in populated cities such as Dublin. With this increasing demand, prices of homes and rent are rising each year. One problem that many soon-to-be or want-to-be home owners face now is the inability to effectively save for a home when they are paying high rent fees month after month.

The Central Statistics Office of Ireland notes that the average full time worker made around €45,611, while an average part time worker made around €16,600. Using surveys on these two numbers, we can say that the average worker in Dublin makes around €37,000 per year.

These numbers seem to allow a single person to be able to obtain a mortgage and afford a home, but if you were to add into the equation any additional expenses, such as children, rent or transportation, there would be a significant amount of money deducted from those average numbers.

The national average rent in Ireland is €1,122 per month. If you are interesting in living in Dublin, …

Read More →

Today FM The Last Word features Irish Mortgage Brokers talking about Ulsterbank loan sale

We were happy to take part in a conversation on the Last Word with Matt Cooper about the recent Ulsterbank loan sale, Karl Deeter was there for Irish Mortgage Brokers and Mick Barry TD was also part of the interview.

Read More →

Is the Housing Gap Increasing?

With an attempt to lift the housing market out of the current crisis it’s in, the Irish government is left to answer one very important question. Is the Help to Buy scheme even helping?

Or…is it worsening the gap of the home hunters who are looking for the ability to buy?

As what is already well known, house prices are soaring. Without the supply of housing increasing at any fast rate, this will continue to be the case.

Therefore, home prices are continuing to rise, much faster than incomes are rising, and the gap between available homes and affordable homes is continuing to worsen.

When looking at reports from CSO, the average wage in Ireland is €45,075 for a full-time employee. That number is, however, much lower as a median, where most of the working class clusters. The median is found at €28,500. A drastic difference and even more of a surprise when finding that, that means, nearly half the population is below that number.

This is where the Help to Buy scheme comes into play.

Introduced just earlier this …

Read More →
  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5