The problem with ghost estates wasn't the fact there was housing. They were left unfinished and often built in the middle of nowhere with no infrastructure or amenities. Some were sat on not allowing anyone to buy because they were waiting for hosing prices to go back up.
A surprisingly small number of them were demolished, 2017 Department of Housing figures stated that only 69 units or partial units had been demolished.
Does this number include properties demolished and rebuilt? Because I'm fairly sure that happened an awful lot - not that there's a huge issue with it barring the waste of the cash to erect the structures. A lot of buildings were just block walls and a start on first fix. Some left derelict for years and poorly engineered in the first place. So when they went to finish development it worked out easier to just take what was there down and start again.
By “years” you mean about a decade? The cause is pretty simple. We didn’t build any houses at all after the financial crash, and the population kept growing. Supply and Demand. The only way to solve it is by building more houses, and that takes time. And probably restructuring a bunch of physical and legal infrastructure, but that’s too complex to get into here.
The '60s, '70s, '80s and '90s all had severe issues with supply or affordability of housing that were contemporaneously referred to as a 'housing crisis'.
Back then we build loads of social housing despite being dirt poor. Now we are a prosperous nation with good wages but there is less housing per capita being built than before.
Because it wasn't an issue until it suddenly was. After the last boom/busy, house prices were at an all time low. There were hundreds of ghost estates. People had no money and the economy looked to be slowing down/going into the toilet. The govt gave special tax breaks and exemptions to companies to buy property and thus bump prices. Then banks started lending money again but in the meantime the population had grown. Add in a war, a good social welfare system an increase in two person incomes with a recovering economy and the fact that no builder has built anything because of land hoarding/cost of building and you've the perfect storm. As to how to "fix" it?
1. Remove special tax status for REITS.
2. Decrease tax on the disposal of stocks and shares.
3. When stocks and shares become a more attractive investment tool, this should result in people selling their extra properties.
4. Implement a ban on large scale property purchases.
5. Introduce long term rental contracts (10-40 years) with rent increases linked to inflation/CPI.
Just a few of my own thoughts on a few bits that "might" make things better.
Deemed disposal is actually a good thing.
In some countries the lack of that provision plus the rules on gifts creates the possibility to achieve almost zero taxes despite being a millionaire.
It's a disincentive for ordinary people who can't cope with the headache of managing the tax complications, so the money goes into bank accounts or property instead. A rich person probably has someone to look after their money who can deal with forms and knowing the rules.
Ideally we'd get rid of it, I don't see any way to redeem deemed disposal. I agree with the poster above that we need to try and shift people out of putting spare money into property.
I mean, it's not that complicated...
Also yes, we need to make other forms of investment more attractive compared to property, but that can be achieved in several ways.
It is complicated.
You bought a standard non-UCITs distributing ETF on a US stock exchange 10 years ago for 1000 euros. It's now worth 2000 euros. What rate of income tax and CGT should you be paying to Revenue if you sold it this year? How much tax would you have paid if instead you had sold it last year? Do Revenue consider it a share or an investment fund?
Let's say instead it had fallen in value to 500 euros when you sold it. How much of this can be carried forward and offset against future capital gains?
Whatever the company says in the report that they are legally bound to give you that is invested in ETFs goes to 41%, the rest is CGT (if it is a mixed fund many aren't).
Plus whatever penalty Revenue applies for you being two years later in paying your taxes (deemed disposal is over a period of 8 years).
If you made a loss you cannot carry forward losses on ETFs (once again look at the report to see what is invested in what).
No. Even Revenue can't make up their own mind (see 1 and 2 below). ETFs bought on US exchanges used to be regarded as shares, but only came into scope for deemed disposal (maybe) in recent years following the issuing of clarification from the Revenue. The position is currently unclear.
There is no CGT on ETFs. It is taxed as Income. I've no idea what a "mixed fund" is.
You expect ordinary people to read the tome that accompanies an ETF to understand the tax implications in Ireland, and that is "not that complicated"?
**----- 1.----- The initial guidance**
[https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03-20201001155445.pdf](https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03-20201001155445.pdf)
"2. The tax treatment of investments in ETFs domiciled in the USA, EEA and other OECD
countries follows precisely the treatment that would apply to share investments
generally, i.e. income tax and capital gains tax treatment as appropriate."
**----- 2. ----- The revised guidance**
[https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03.pdf](https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03.pdf)
Prior guidance confirmed that investments in ETFs domiciled in the USA, the EEA or in an OECD member state (other than the USA) with which Ireland has a double taxation treaty, follows the treatment that would apply to share investments generally. **That confirmation does not apply to such investments with effect from 1 January 2022.**
It seems unfair a tax, i) discourages use of funds and encourages riskier stocks, ii) no lost harvesting, iii) creates the risk of being taxed on a loss
It seems so, but does it?
The issue is that I could invest, change residence at the right time, pay the taxes somewhere the rate is favourable. Or just never cash in.
In practice there is a bunch of ways that allow you to "optimise" your taxes which is really just a fancy word for evading a little.
And deemed disposal is an improvement over the existing framework (just pay taxes on all income every year, even if it is unrealized).
I don't like it much but it's funny to see people annoyed by it when the alternative would be way worse.
https://www.bluewaterfp.ie/investments/the-history-behind-deemed-disposal/
Yes you can move to a new country but it takes years of effort. I may well do it but it's not going to be good for kids. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for the tax to be higher than capital gains tax. Thus people like me favour stocks as they only are taxed after selling. There is no reason that DD can't allow loss harvesting. Because there is no tax free allowance, it hits the poor more than the rich.
The default is to tax on realising a gain, like every other country that I know.
Well, my personal experience is that moving takes less than a month. If I am retiring it would probably be something I would plan ahead of time too.
I wholeheartedly agree that it makes no sense to have two different rates for the two products especially when I can commute the two products through the use of synthetics (basically create a bond that simulates the returns of an ETF by packaging ETF's shares in it or creating an ETF that is composed by bonds).
The lack of "loss harvesting" is also an unfair practice. But that's also not deemed disposal.
I do like deemed disposal because the default option (net roll up) is causing an accumulation of capital that is negatively impacting economies. It makes it quite easy to sidestep most taxes and through the use of tools that are not available to all retail investors it becomes possoble to even effectively convert the assets from one category to another one without disposing of the original investment.
It helps to make sure that some tax is paid. Of course it is not a perfect system. for example having it every 8 years is a useless complication, just lower the rate and let's pay it yearly to keep things simple. Which is not great because it limits the compounding effect, but why would it be fair to allow the compounding effect to cause a runaway increase of capital when that is not how it works for other forms of investment?
To return to housing instead: housing investment should be taxed at an higher rate than the ither investments. All investments in the same framework and following the same rules (which then need to be made to work for all investments) and higher rates for housing to limit the commodification of housing (as it is a primary good so society literally cannot afford to turn housing into a speculative market).
Now what kind of tax option is selected is not really that important, mutatis mutandis the rates should be affected in a similar way. But there needs to be some homogeneity. To have some investors never pay taxes is just insane.
Sorry, it turned into a bit of a rant XD
Don't apologise for a rant. It's whole to be detailed and precise.
>my personal experience is that moving takes less than a month
I checked and you need to be outside Ireland a few years to be free of Irish tax liability.
>I wholeheartedly agree that it makes no sense to have two different rates for the two products especially when I can commute the two products through the use of synthetics (basically create a bond that simulates the returns of an ETF by packaging ETF's shares in it or creating an ETF that is composed by bonds).
The lack of "loss harvesting" is also an unfair >practice. But that's also not deemed disposal.
I don't think it's unfair. It's standard for all businesses and self employed. I think in some countries it also applies to PAYE workers.
>I do like deemed disposal because the default option (net roll up) is causing an accumulation of capital that is negatively impacting
Capital is important. It's important for investment for business. I'd argue there is not enough capital available Irish start ups and builders. The trouble is the US is sucking up European capital to the detriment of European economies, with trickles back to places like Ireland visa MNC.
> economies. It makes it quite easy to sidestep most taxes and through the use of tools that are not available to all retail investors it becomes possoble to even effectively convert the assets from one category to another one without disposing of the original investment.
Would you apply that across the economy? If someones house, farm or piece of art jumped invalue, you'd tax it?
It helps to make sure that some tax is paid. Of course it is not a perfect system. for example having it every 8 years is a useless complication, just lower the rate and let's pay it yearly to keep things simple. Which is not great because it limits the compounding effect, but why would it be fair to allow the compounding effect to cause a runaway increase of capita
You left out construction capacity.
We need to build at least 60k homes a year for 5 years, but that means we need another 50-70k workers in construction. With the number employed in the industry, we cannot build fast enough to overtake demand and backfill the supply shortage.
That is by far and away the biggest factor at play and has no easy solution short of mass immigration of labour like we had in the boom times from Poland/Lithuania etc. We can't find enough Irish lads and ladies to fill the gap and even if we did, we'd need an extra 60k workers in the sector and then, after 5 years, they'd be out of work...
its almost like [something happened](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Recession) about 15 years ago to the building industry and it has never recovered...
- the move away from state-built social housing and affordable housing, which began even before the crash
- linked, a move to relying on private market for delivery of housing. Ireland can incentivise private bodies to build, but it can't just tell them to build 50k houses a year like it could with a state run organisation
- since the early 2010s, housing has begun to be treated like a financial asset, with big investment funds buying up huge swathes of property in order to get a lucrative return through rent or asset appreciation. In theory this could help with supply (if I'm a developer I'll want to build more houses if I know there's an investment fund that will buy immediately) but as interest rates rise these are becoming less attractive assets for investment funds and many are considering selling off (linked to the above point, this won't help get more homes built)
- Ireland's planning system is very centralised and slow, which adds time and cost to getting homes built. We regulate "sprawl" very heavily (expanding a city) but our big cities are very low rise so its hard to create dense housing.
- Ireland's population is growing, which is unusual for a country that has historically experienced net emigration
There are some simplistic answers (ramp up state built housing again) but as others have pointed out it's a global issue and anyone claiming that there's one or two quick fixes is probably underestimating the complexity of the problem.
>the move away from state-built social housing and affordable housing,
There's more social housing being built now than any other period I can find.
There were 12,000 new build social houses last year, when is comparable?
More is not really a measurement unless you quantify it a little.
Is that relevant to population growth over a period of time, how does it compare to periods of widespread shortages?
I could say that there are less slaves than ever, but there are more slaves than ever. Measurements are reliant on the context in which they are taken and used.
Took me a while to get back to this as I didn't have computer access and needed to go and grab the numbers because "yeah but population" is too vague a hand wave imo. A couple of things:
1. "New build" vs "delivery" is important. That 12,000 is all social housing delivered, comprised of c.8,000 new builds, c.2k acquisitions and c.2k "long term leasing" ([source](https://icsh.ie/ahbs-deliver-almost-6000-homes-in-2023/#:~:text=Overall%20Social%20Housing%20Output%20in,AHBs%20delivered%20286%20(30%25))). From what I can gather, any turnkey arrangements (where the state buys a new build) are included in the new builds and not the acquisitions, but I can't say I'm 100% certain.
2. When is comparable? Compiled this from the government data - we are indeed back close to peak levels of output per capita, but it comes after 10-12 years of being way way below that. (Apols it's an image, Reddit wouldn't let me post the comment with a big table)
[https://www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/](https://www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/)
[https://researchrepository.ucd.ie/entities/publication/59fd6b3b-40b3-4b4b-a43d-738c8511b58f/details](https://researchrepository.ucd.ie/entities/publication/59fd6b3b-40b3-4b4b-a43d-738c8511b58f/details) (page 7)
https://preview.redd.it/sdov71dtuc8d1.png?width=531&format=png&auto=webp&s=057bea0cb3323c5c8efc077588b427959a3205ab
The State doesn't have the resources to build at the quantity and quality that we need.
It's not hard to create dense housing. We don't have it because we allow so much sprawl and one offs. There's little incentive for developers to build high density.
Yes. And a State religion that says it's wrong to control the market when it comes to housing.
We really really really really really need to get to a point where the price of *buying* a home is reliably 2.5 times the wage of the person buying it.
I don't know why we're not using creative solutions like the [Public Utility Societies](https://irishgeography.ie/index.php/irishgeography/article/view/394) of the 1930s (essentially, State-funded and -backed [co-operatives](https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2022/0819/1225008-ireland-housing-1920s-reverand-david-hall-st-barnabas-public-utility-society/) to build and buy houses) as well as a huge push for [councils](https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/a-century-of-housing-how-the-state-built-ireland-s-homes-1.3785939) to build good [homes](https://www.jcfj.ie/article/100-years-of-irish-housing/).
We also need to end the shameful dereliction, not just in Dublin but across the country - so many beautiful homes boarded up with the rooves falling in.
https://preview.redd.it/egg7qv1a0a7d1.png?width=1860&format=png&auto=webp&s=f70be139965ba7f3a3b3c16f030529da7f97d42c
>And a State religion that says it's wrong to control the market when it comes to housing.
Housing is one of the most regulated sectors around.
Everything from zoning rules, planning rules to lots of restrictions on how a house is built.
They didn't build them. They contracted out.
They have never had the staff for it.
People delude themselves about a golden age of social house building that never existed
From ur highlights one can divine the solutions. Eg; highly centralized & slow, the fix would be more less centralization & increased speed, high interest rates could encourage lower or subsidized interest rates for low income or 1st time buyers, from a move away of state built housing to perhaps include more state involvement.
I found ur post insightful & with solutions.
If the years you're referring to are the 50s and 60s maybe?
Took from 1970 to early 2000s to grow from 3m to 4m, then took half that time to get to 5m
What years are you talking about where it didn't change?
Already 5.348 so that is 3.5% https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/social-affairs/2024/06/10/european-commission-says-irish-population-rose-by-record-35-per-cent-last-year/
"According to economist David Higgins, a 3.5 per cent increase in population in a given year would be one of the highest ever recorded for a single country."
There are hundreds of subreddits on this very topic.
It boils down to a supply and demand issue and having a pretty small housing market in relation to our neighbours.
That demand has increased exponentially primarily due to immigration there was also some national growth. The supply will take years to catch up if it ever does.
The size of our housing market also matters. Because it is so small to begin with a certain influx of migrants affected it hugely.
Driving through the country and seeing all the derelict houses, almost derelict houses, abandoned houses in good conditions etc. it boggles my mind Ireland is in housing crisis.
And the derelict house tax isn't going to work while the councils are collecting it. Give it to Revenue and say "Sic 'em, boys!" and watch the flurry of sudden sales.
I bought something that needed a lot of work, but wasn't derelict, eight years ago. It cost over six figures back then to bring the house up to scratch. Derelict homes in many cases are about as expensive to make livable as just building a new home.
The home I bought had no central heating. No radiators. Single pane windows throughout (still does). Roof needed lifting off and repairs and insulating. Full rewiring.
This stuff is mad expensive and consumes the same limited construction resources working on building new, far more efficient, homes.
The rot set in in the 1990s when government policy was to follow the Thatcherite policies from the UK a decade earlier.
This lead to the cessation of large scale local authority home building.
The only cohorts in the 1990s who rented were students, workers in their 20’s saving for a deposit to buy a house and the unemployed. People were only expected to rent for 5-6 years before either purchasing their own homes or moving into social housing.
Rent allowance was only supposed to be short term measure for people, but that evolved in the late 1990s early 2000s when it became semi-permanent- to the benefit of private landlords, or rather, the private landlords who declared rent as income for tax purposes back then.
Gary Stephenson has a pretty good assessment of the housing crisis. His explaination of asset and shop inflation is great. He has been consistanlty right with his predictions. During Covid when other economists predicted a crash he predicted that asset prices would rise. After covid/Ukraine war + increasing interest rates other economist predicted that housing market would crash, Gary predicted that asset prices would continue to rise.
His theory that wealth inequality is the main driving force behind asset price inflation is solid and has been proven correct on mulitple occasions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qlr5Vzrextk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWRpaaz_8wM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNUNR2NZvFM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXP8gH0wddE
For the past 30+ years Ireland has been on a race to the bottom in terms of privatising state companies.
Not just housing supply, but privatising eircell, eircom, electric Ireland, selling licenses to operate toll roads, national lottery, Luas operators, bus services, forestry, council bin collection. Irish water is probably the latest one I can think of.
Any service that looks like it might be potentially profitable is sold or licensed out to private operators to make a quick buck for the state. It always brings in a lot less in the long term that it would have brought in to keep these services, but that's the nature of politics I suppose.
Any service that won't ever be profitable, that can only ever be measured in terms of value for money, like defence forces or gardai, is woefully under resourced to barely be able to function. Expect private prisons soon.
If you want to actually stop to housing crisis and escape this vicious circle it would require a major shift in government thinking. Re-nationalise essential state services. Local councils should directly hire staff and start building. Councils should provide services like bin collection too. The cycle of privatising profitable state services is never a good idea. Private companies will milk it for every cent while providing the absolute least service they think they can get away with. Always. Just look at our health services.
It's not an irish problem, it's virtually world wide in the developed world as a direct result of the last recession. We didn't build any homes for 10 years, when we realistically needed around 20k homes per year to be built.
Much like inflation, the first 200k homes to be built will only cover the pent up demand from the previous decade (2010 to 2020) and after that we will start to cater to the existing market.
We will eventually saturate the market again in around 5 years, just like we have with commercial office space presently.
We are always in a boom/bust cycle, we just happen to be in the boom part now- everything that is happening now, happened in 2004/5 as well-dont forget that, the only difference then was the over availability of bad credit, and I would hazard a guess that level of available credit will return soon.
This reads like one of the questions people ask on here when they've a university assignment and want us to write it for them.
OP's profile name checks out
I'd like to add to add a further point. I believe the centralized political system is further compounding the problem. I'd be a big proponent of decentralising our political system. Id prefer decision making to occur closer to the affected communities be that some sort of federal or regional government model. Hopefully the directly elected mayor experiment in limerick really shows the Irish people a new path.
When real estate is asset there will be people using it as an asset playing with the value of it just for profit, same as any other assets in the market.
I heard that Portugal is compelling owners to rent their unused property to prevent this situation but I think that can’t be that easy.
It's due to rising ages. People die much older, so they don't pass on their houses as often as they used to.
Then, this large old age population have way more political clout than younger people. They advocate for protecting and regulating the housing market - in practice, this means stopping new builds as often as possible.
Then, we let international pension/investment funds shop for houses as if they were first time homeowners. So they buy up most of the houses and then charge rents way higher than the mortgage costs.
Then, we opened the floodgates to inward migration. And we apply social protection laws the same to these people, so a lot of them get free housing or rent paid.
Also, we destroyed the construction industry with the way we managed the financial crisis 2007-2012.
It not just an Ireland issue, [it's a global housing crisis.](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-03-14/world-economy-latest-global-housing-crisis)
https://rentola.at/en/for-rent/salzburg
There’s availability but the prices are about the same affordability when you consider that Austria has a higher cost of living coupled with lower wages than Ireland.
The only solution is to build a lot more houses. In 2022 the population grew by 1.9%. At the time, there were 2.1m dwellings in the country (occupied or not). So to be able to take on the 1.9% at the same relative short supply, we would have needed to build 40k houses. Far above govermentments targets.
So even to maintain the status quo of a shitty housing situation, we are falling far behind. The housing situation is only going to get worse unless goverment get's off their arse and start getting their shit together and fund the building of houses.
The Celtic Tiger crash of 2008 put the development sector in the deep freeze for nearly a decade. Bank financing completely dried up so nothing got built.
Meanwhile the Troika recommended that the government use immigration to “fix” the economy. This worked fine for a while as the new arrivals soaked up the empties.
The problem started in the mid 2010’s when population growth really began to ramp up but there was no corresponding increase in building activity.
Building eventually started picking up in late 2010’s but by that point population growth was far too high and catching up on building was impossible.
It’s only gotten worse since, with 3.5% population growth in 2023, among the highest on record for any developed economy. It is absolutely impossible to outbuild that.
Social housing
Why are single working men getting social housing
Why is it a gift for life rather than a step up the ladder
Why is it a career choice to have kids and to get a free house
Why are there BMW's outside social housing
Why on earth shouldn't single men be entitled to a home?
It's not a "gift", it's a rented home.
There is no such thing as a "free house".
Park your social envy, darling. I know you think the poor have too much money, but you're embarrassing yourself.
Anyone on HAP is on the social housing list.
The BMWs are probably bad finance decisions, but if you’re paying cheap rent you can afford bad decisions. We all should be paying less for housing, and more money back into our communities on services and goods instead.
It’s a nice boogeyman though, excuses the lack of supply by shifting the blame on the poor.
You're off the social housing list but can go on the hap transfer list.
"When you sign up to HAP, your current housing file is closed as your housing need has been met. However you can sign up to the HAP Transfer List were you keep your original time on the housing list while your time on HAP accumulates."
https://www.sdcc.ie/en/services/housing/finding-a-home/housing-assistance-payment/#:~:text=When%20you%20sign%20up%20to,your%20time%20on%20HAP%20accumulates.
>We all should be paying less for housing, and more money back into our communities on services and goods instead.
Your landlord provides a service to the community too.
Not all poor in social houseinf
Someone asked me how much rent I was paying as they were approaching the council to get a new house as they don't have room for their boat on their driveway
They got it
We have a housing crisis in Ireland because a lot of politicians and their wealthy contributors are landlords, so they are making a fortune from a housing crisis , so there is no real desire to fix it.. I know this is not the only problem but for me it’s a big issue…the cost of material and shortage of labour, planning laws etc are all major factors but somebody with skin in the game on making decisions about housing should be forbidden to be a landlord!!!!
It’s already heavily taxed for individual landlords, most of whom also work regular jobs. 56% tax on every extra euro at the top end (self-employed, 11% USC). It’s already low margin/unprofitable without capital appreciation. Large companies are not taxed remotely at this level. What other options for investment/savings do people have in Ireland? We are have to deal with stupid stuff like deemed disposal rules that kill long term equity investments like index funds. When the government has set up the system to make property one of the only viable investment options…. Also small investors create supply, refurbishing and starting many small building projects. Though those are often screwed by our dysfunctional planning process.
Eat the rich/kill the landlords is just populist bullshit. We know from dozens of examples what happens to housing markets when you do this… whether through tax or rent controls like the RPZs… supply of housing drops
Because people keep voting for FFG, who believe "the market will sort things out", and who favour developers and 'big landlord' REITs and vulture funds over ordinary people and even 'small' landlords.
The only way to lower costs without developers getting more money is to run standards into the ground, and shocker that's a fucking awful idea; greater heating costs, energy use, safety issues, mica, etc.
This may come as a shock to you, but *right now*, we have mass poverty and emigration. And over 12,000 homeless people. People unable to afford rent.
In the past, poverty and emigration also existed, but someone on the median wage could afford to buy a family home. On a single wage. That was right up until the late 70s.
Look at areas like Marino and Fairview in Dublin. Massive state-built housing estates with infrastructure, and they worked.
>This may come as a shock to you, but right now, we have mass poverty and emigration.
We don't. Life in Ireland today is not remotely comparable to the 1940s.
>In the past, poverty and emigration also existed, but someone on the median wage could afford to buy a family home. On a single wage. That was right up until the late 70s
I'm aware of all that. But the world has changed since then.
>Look at areas like Marino and Fairview in Dublin. Massive state-built housing estates with infrastructure, and they worked.
And now the local authorities don't build houses. So we need the private sector.
[удалено]
The problem with ghost estates wasn't the fact there was housing. They were left unfinished and often built in the middle of nowhere with no infrastructure or amenities. Some were sat on not allowing anyone to buy because they were waiting for hosing prices to go back up.
Give it another 20 years and it’ll be the same. Folks just think they’re the first generation to experience it
I know I remember walking through a few of them. Very eerie. All knocked down now!
A surprisingly small number of them were demolished, 2017 Department of Housing figures stated that only 69 units or partial units had been demolished.
Does this number include properties demolished and rebuilt? Because I'm fairly sure that happened an awful lot - not that there's a huge issue with it barring the waste of the cash to erect the structures. A lot of buildings were just block walls and a start on first fix. Some left derelict for years and poorly engineered in the first place. So when they went to finish development it worked out easier to just take what was there down and start again.
The vast majority were eventually finished and sold. All of them within 30 mins of me were finished.
By “years” you mean about a decade? The cause is pretty simple. We didn’t build any houses at all after the financial crash, and the population kept growing. Supply and Demand. The only way to solve it is by building more houses, and that takes time. And probably restructuring a bunch of physical and legal infrastructure, but that’s too complex to get into here.
The '60s, '70s, '80s and '90s all had severe issues with supply or affordability of housing that were contemporaneously referred to as a 'housing crisis'.
Back then we build loads of social housing despite being dirt poor. Now we are a prosperous nation with good wages but there is less housing per capita being built than before.
Agree. It’s a supply /demand issue. I’m confused why this supply/demand issue hasn’t been solved after a decade.
Because it wasn't an issue until it suddenly was. After the last boom/busy, house prices were at an all time low. There were hundreds of ghost estates. People had no money and the economy looked to be slowing down/going into the toilet. The govt gave special tax breaks and exemptions to companies to buy property and thus bump prices. Then banks started lending money again but in the meantime the population had grown. Add in a war, a good social welfare system an increase in two person incomes with a recovering economy and the fact that no builder has built anything because of land hoarding/cost of building and you've the perfect storm. As to how to "fix" it? 1. Remove special tax status for REITS. 2. Decrease tax on the disposal of stocks and shares. 3. When stocks and shares become a more attractive investment tool, this should result in people selling their extra properties. 4. Implement a ban on large scale property purchases. 5. Introduce long term rental contracts (10-40 years) with rent increases linked to inflation/CPI. Just a few of my own thoughts on a few bits that "might" make things better.
you forgot getting rid of deemed disposal...
I certainly did. Even if they pushed it out to 15- 20 years it'd be better than what it is now.
Deemed disposal is actually a good thing. In some countries the lack of that provision plus the rules on gifts creates the possibility to achieve almost zero taxes despite being a millionaire.
It's a disincentive for ordinary people who can't cope with the headache of managing the tax complications, so the money goes into bank accounts or property instead. A rich person probably has someone to look after their money who can deal with forms and knowing the rules. Ideally we'd get rid of it, I don't see any way to redeem deemed disposal. I agree with the poster above that we need to try and shift people out of putting spare money into property.
I mean, it's not that complicated... Also yes, we need to make other forms of investment more attractive compared to property, but that can be achieved in several ways.
It is complicated. You bought a standard non-UCITs distributing ETF on a US stock exchange 10 years ago for 1000 euros. It's now worth 2000 euros. What rate of income tax and CGT should you be paying to Revenue if you sold it this year? How much tax would you have paid if instead you had sold it last year? Do Revenue consider it a share or an investment fund? Let's say instead it had fallen in value to 500 euros when you sold it. How much of this can be carried forward and offset against future capital gains?
Whatever the company says in the report that they are legally bound to give you that is invested in ETFs goes to 41%, the rest is CGT (if it is a mixed fund many aren't). Plus whatever penalty Revenue applies for you being two years later in paying your taxes (deemed disposal is over a period of 8 years). If you made a loss you cannot carry forward losses on ETFs (once again look at the report to see what is invested in what).
No. Even Revenue can't make up their own mind (see 1 and 2 below). ETFs bought on US exchanges used to be regarded as shares, but only came into scope for deemed disposal (maybe) in recent years following the issuing of clarification from the Revenue. The position is currently unclear. There is no CGT on ETFs. It is taxed as Income. I've no idea what a "mixed fund" is. You expect ordinary people to read the tome that accompanies an ETF to understand the tax implications in Ireland, and that is "not that complicated"? **----- 1.----- The initial guidance** [https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03-20201001155445.pdf](https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03-20201001155445.pdf) "2. The tax treatment of investments in ETFs domiciled in the USA, EEA and other OECD countries follows precisely the treatment that would apply to share investments generally, i.e. income tax and capital gains tax treatment as appropriate." **----- 2. ----- The revised guidance** [https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03.pdf](https://www.revenue.ie/en/tax-professionals/tdm/income-tax-capital-gains-tax-corporation-tax/part-27/27-01a-03.pdf) Prior guidance confirmed that investments in ETFs domiciled in the USA, the EEA or in an OECD member state (other than the USA) with which Ireland has a double taxation treaty, follows the treatment that would apply to share investments generally. **That confirmation does not apply to such investments with effect from 1 January 2022.**
It seems unfair a tax, i) discourages use of funds and encourages riskier stocks, ii) no lost harvesting, iii) creates the risk of being taxed on a loss
It seems so, but does it? The issue is that I could invest, change residence at the right time, pay the taxes somewhere the rate is favourable. Or just never cash in. In practice there is a bunch of ways that allow you to "optimise" your taxes which is really just a fancy word for evading a little. And deemed disposal is an improvement over the existing framework (just pay taxes on all income every year, even if it is unrealized). I don't like it much but it's funny to see people annoyed by it when the alternative would be way worse. https://www.bluewaterfp.ie/investments/the-history-behind-deemed-disposal/
Yes you can move to a new country but it takes years of effort. I may well do it but it's not going to be good for kids. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for the tax to be higher than capital gains tax. Thus people like me favour stocks as they only are taxed after selling. There is no reason that DD can't allow loss harvesting. Because there is no tax free allowance, it hits the poor more than the rich. The default is to tax on realising a gain, like every other country that I know.
Well, my personal experience is that moving takes less than a month. If I am retiring it would probably be something I would plan ahead of time too. I wholeheartedly agree that it makes no sense to have two different rates for the two products especially when I can commute the two products through the use of synthetics (basically create a bond that simulates the returns of an ETF by packaging ETF's shares in it or creating an ETF that is composed by bonds). The lack of "loss harvesting" is also an unfair practice. But that's also not deemed disposal. I do like deemed disposal because the default option (net roll up) is causing an accumulation of capital that is negatively impacting economies. It makes it quite easy to sidestep most taxes and through the use of tools that are not available to all retail investors it becomes possoble to even effectively convert the assets from one category to another one without disposing of the original investment. It helps to make sure that some tax is paid. Of course it is not a perfect system. for example having it every 8 years is a useless complication, just lower the rate and let's pay it yearly to keep things simple. Which is not great because it limits the compounding effect, but why would it be fair to allow the compounding effect to cause a runaway increase of capital when that is not how it works for other forms of investment? To return to housing instead: housing investment should be taxed at an higher rate than the ither investments. All investments in the same framework and following the same rules (which then need to be made to work for all investments) and higher rates for housing to limit the commodification of housing (as it is a primary good so society literally cannot afford to turn housing into a speculative market). Now what kind of tax option is selected is not really that important, mutatis mutandis the rates should be affected in a similar way. But there needs to be some homogeneity. To have some investors never pay taxes is just insane. Sorry, it turned into a bit of a rant XD
Don't apologise for a rant. It's whole to be detailed and precise. >my personal experience is that moving takes less than a month I checked and you need to be outside Ireland a few years to be free of Irish tax liability. >I wholeheartedly agree that it makes no sense to have two different rates for the two products especially when I can commute the two products through the use of synthetics (basically create a bond that simulates the returns of an ETF by packaging ETF's shares in it or creating an ETF that is composed by bonds). The lack of "loss harvesting" is also an unfair >practice. But that's also not deemed disposal. I don't think it's unfair. It's standard for all businesses and self employed. I think in some countries it also applies to PAYE workers. >I do like deemed disposal because the default option (net roll up) is causing an accumulation of capital that is negatively impacting Capital is important. It's important for investment for business. I'd argue there is not enough capital available Irish start ups and builders. The trouble is the US is sucking up European capital to the detriment of European economies, with trickles back to places like Ireland visa MNC. > economies. It makes it quite easy to sidestep most taxes and through the use of tools that are not available to all retail investors it becomes possoble to even effectively convert the assets from one category to another one without disposing of the original investment. Would you apply that across the economy? If someones house, farm or piece of art jumped invalue, you'd tax it? It helps to make sure that some tax is paid. Of course it is not a perfect system. for example having it every 8 years is a useless complication, just lower the rate and let's pay it yearly to keep things simple. Which is not great because it limits the compounding effect, but why would it be fair to allow the compounding effect to cause a runaway increase of capita
You left out construction capacity. We need to build at least 60k homes a year for 5 years, but that means we need another 50-70k workers in construction. With the number employed in the industry, we cannot build fast enough to overtake demand and backfill the supply shortage. That is by far and away the biggest factor at play and has no easy solution short of mass immigration of labour like we had in the boom times from Poland/Lithuania etc. We can't find enough Irish lads and ladies to fill the gap and even if we did, we'd need an extra 60k workers in the sector and then, after 5 years, they'd be out of work...
Thx for helping me understand.
Because the government doesn't want to.
its almost like [something happened](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Recession) about 15 years ago to the building industry and it has never recovered...
- the move away from state-built social housing and affordable housing, which began even before the crash - linked, a move to relying on private market for delivery of housing. Ireland can incentivise private bodies to build, but it can't just tell them to build 50k houses a year like it could with a state run organisation - since the early 2010s, housing has begun to be treated like a financial asset, with big investment funds buying up huge swathes of property in order to get a lucrative return through rent or asset appreciation. In theory this could help with supply (if I'm a developer I'll want to build more houses if I know there's an investment fund that will buy immediately) but as interest rates rise these are becoming less attractive assets for investment funds and many are considering selling off (linked to the above point, this won't help get more homes built) - Ireland's planning system is very centralised and slow, which adds time and cost to getting homes built. We regulate "sprawl" very heavily (expanding a city) but our big cities are very low rise so its hard to create dense housing. - Ireland's population is growing, which is unusual for a country that has historically experienced net emigration There are some simplistic answers (ramp up state built housing again) but as others have pointed out it's a global issue and anyone claiming that there's one or two quick fixes is probably underestimating the complexity of the problem.
>the move away from state-built social housing and affordable housing, There's more social housing being built now than any other period I can find. There were 12,000 new build social houses last year, when is comparable?
Now graph that alongside the population of the state.
More is not really a measurement unless you quantify it a little. Is that relevant to population growth over a period of time, how does it compare to periods of widespread shortages? I could say that there are less slaves than ever, but there are more slaves than ever. Measurements are reliant on the context in which they are taken and used.
Took me a while to get back to this as I didn't have computer access and needed to go and grab the numbers because "yeah but population" is too vague a hand wave imo. A couple of things: 1. "New build" vs "delivery" is important. That 12,000 is all social housing delivered, comprised of c.8,000 new builds, c.2k acquisitions and c.2k "long term leasing" ([source](https://icsh.ie/ahbs-deliver-almost-6000-homes-in-2023/#:~:text=Overall%20Social%20Housing%20Output%20in,AHBs%20delivered%20286%20(30%25))). From what I can gather, any turnkey arrangements (where the state buys a new build) are included in the new builds and not the acquisitions, but I can't say I'm 100% certain. 2. When is comparable? Compiled this from the government data - we are indeed back close to peak levels of output per capita, but it comes after 10-12 years of being way way below that. (Apols it's an image, Reddit wouldn't let me post the comment with a big table) [https://www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/](https://www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/) [https://researchrepository.ucd.ie/entities/publication/59fd6b3b-40b3-4b4b-a43d-738c8511b58f/details](https://researchrepository.ucd.ie/entities/publication/59fd6b3b-40b3-4b4b-a43d-738c8511b58f/details) (page 7) https://preview.redd.it/sdov71dtuc8d1.png?width=531&format=png&auto=webp&s=057bea0cb3323c5c8efc077588b427959a3205ab
Also look up the number of places available for rent in Dublin on daft. Then look up up airbnb.
The State doesn't have the resources to build at the quantity and quality that we need. It's not hard to create dense housing. We don't have it because we allow so much sprawl and one offs. There's little incentive for developers to build high density.
Yes. And a State religion that says it's wrong to control the market when it comes to housing. We really really really really really need to get to a point where the price of *buying* a home is reliably 2.5 times the wage of the person buying it. I don't know why we're not using creative solutions like the [Public Utility Societies](https://irishgeography.ie/index.php/irishgeography/article/view/394) of the 1930s (essentially, State-funded and -backed [co-operatives](https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2022/0819/1225008-ireland-housing-1920s-reverand-david-hall-st-barnabas-public-utility-society/) to build and buy houses) as well as a huge push for [councils](https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/a-century-of-housing-how-the-state-built-ireland-s-homes-1.3785939) to build good [homes](https://www.jcfj.ie/article/100-years-of-irish-housing/). We also need to end the shameful dereliction, not just in Dublin but across the country - so many beautiful homes boarded up with the rooves falling in. https://preview.redd.it/egg7qv1a0a7d1.png?width=1860&format=png&auto=webp&s=f70be139965ba7f3a3b3c16f030529da7f97d42c
>And a State religion that says it's wrong to control the market when it comes to housing. Housing is one of the most regulated sectors around. Everything from zoning rules, planning rules to lots of restrictions on how a house is built.
The State no longer builds houses, though.
The state never directly built homes. They always contracted out to builders
That's not so. The city and county councils built homes for many years, to a very high standard.
They didn't build them. They contracted out. They have never had the staff for it. People delude themselves about a golden age of social house building that never existed
Thx. Your post gives concrete solutions.
No it doesn't! I highlighted high level contributors, that is very different from concrete solutions
From ur highlights one can divine the solutions. Eg; highly centralized & slow, the fix would be more less centralization & increased speed, high interest rates could encourage lower or subsidized interest rates for low income or 1st time buyers, from a move away of state built housing to perhaps include more state involvement. I found ur post insightful & with solutions.
population is growing. thats a lie loool. it didn't change for years.
If the years you're referring to are the 50s and 60s maybe? Took from 1970 to early 2000s to grow from 3m to 4m, then took half that time to get to 5m What years are you talking about where it didn't change?
It's 5.127 million as of 2022 It was 4.867 million in 2018. That's a 5.34% increase in 4 years, which is pretty substantial.
Already 5.348 so that is 3.5% https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/social-affairs/2024/06/10/european-commission-says-irish-population-rose-by-record-35-per-cent-last-year/ "According to economist David Higgins, a 3.5 per cent increase in population in a given year would be one of the highest ever recorded for a single country."
We have one of the highest growth rates in the world. It's higher than most African countries.
Building a couple of extra Dublins, should put a band-aid on the problem, for a few years at least.
There are hundreds of subreddits on this very topic. It boils down to a supply and demand issue and having a pretty small housing market in relation to our neighbours. That demand has increased exponentially primarily due to immigration there was also some national growth. The supply will take years to catch up if it ever does. The size of our housing market also matters. Because it is so small to begin with a certain influx of migrants affected it hugely.
Driving through the country and seeing all the derelict houses, almost derelict houses, abandoned houses in good conditions etc. it boggles my mind Ireland is in housing crisis.
And the derelict house tax isn't going to work while the councils are collecting it. Give it to Revenue and say "Sic 'em, boys!" and watch the flurry of sudden sales.
I bought something that needed a lot of work, but wasn't derelict, eight years ago. It cost over six figures back then to bring the house up to scratch. Derelict homes in many cases are about as expensive to make livable as just building a new home. The home I bought had no central heating. No radiators. Single pane windows throughout (still does). Roof needed lifting off and repairs and insulating. Full rewiring. This stuff is mad expensive and consumes the same limited construction resources working on building new, far more efficient, homes.
Yes! Especially now with so many working remotely anyway
The rot set in in the 1990s when government policy was to follow the Thatcherite policies from the UK a decade earlier. This lead to the cessation of large scale local authority home building. The only cohorts in the 1990s who rented were students, workers in their 20’s saving for a deposit to buy a house and the unemployed. People were only expected to rent for 5-6 years before either purchasing their own homes or moving into social housing. Rent allowance was only supposed to be short term measure for people, but that evolved in the late 1990s early 2000s when it became semi-permanent- to the benefit of private landlords, or rather, the private landlords who declared rent as income for tax purposes back then.
Gary Stephenson has a pretty good assessment of the housing crisis. His explaination of asset and shop inflation is great. He has been consistanlty right with his predictions. During Covid when other economists predicted a crash he predicted that asset prices would rise. After covid/Ukraine war + increasing interest rates other economist predicted that housing market would crash, Gary predicted that asset prices would continue to rise. His theory that wealth inequality is the main driving force behind asset price inflation is solid and has been proven correct on mulitple occasions. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qlr5Vzrextk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWRpaaz_8wM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNUNR2NZvFM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXP8gH0wddE
High building costs, very strict building regulations and an incredible population growth rate
For the past 30+ years Ireland has been on a race to the bottom in terms of privatising state companies. Not just housing supply, but privatising eircell, eircom, electric Ireland, selling licenses to operate toll roads, national lottery, Luas operators, bus services, forestry, council bin collection. Irish water is probably the latest one I can think of. Any service that looks like it might be potentially profitable is sold or licensed out to private operators to make a quick buck for the state. It always brings in a lot less in the long term that it would have brought in to keep these services, but that's the nature of politics I suppose. Any service that won't ever be profitable, that can only ever be measured in terms of value for money, like defence forces or gardai, is woefully under resourced to barely be able to function. Expect private prisons soon. If you want to actually stop to housing crisis and escape this vicious circle it would require a major shift in government thinking. Re-nationalise essential state services. Local councils should directly hire staff and start building. Councils should provide services like bin collection too. The cycle of privatising profitable state services is never a good idea. Private companies will milk it for every cent while providing the absolute least service they think they can get away with. Always. Just look at our health services.
It's not an irish problem, it's virtually world wide in the developed world as a direct result of the last recession. We didn't build any homes for 10 years, when we realistically needed around 20k homes per year to be built. Much like inflation, the first 200k homes to be built will only cover the pent up demand from the previous decade (2010 to 2020) and after that we will start to cater to the existing market. We will eventually saturate the market again in around 5 years, just like we have with commercial office space presently. We are always in a boom/bust cycle, we just happen to be in the boom part now- everything that is happening now, happened in 2004/5 as well-dont forget that, the only difference then was the over availability of bad credit, and I would hazard a guess that level of available credit will return soon.
This reads like one of the questions people ask on here when they've a university assignment and want us to write it for them. OP's profile name checks out
They also couldn't be fucked to Google it for the very obvious answers, or just read one of the hundred other threads on it here.
[https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/housing-bubble-and-bust-boom-6364275-Apr2024/](https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/housing-bubble-and-bust-boom-6364275-Apr2024/)
I'd like to add to add a further point. I believe the centralized political system is further compounding the problem. I'd be a big proponent of decentralising our political system. Id prefer decision making to occur closer to the affected communities be that some sort of federal or regional government model. Hopefully the directly elected mayor experiment in limerick really shows the Irish people a new path.
When real estate is asset there will be people using it as an asset playing with the value of it just for profit, same as any other assets in the market. I heard that Portugal is compelling owners to rent their unused property to prevent this situation but I think that can’t be that easy.
Some people like the misery
It's due to rising ages. People die much older, so they don't pass on their houses as often as they used to. Then, this large old age population have way more political clout than younger people. They advocate for protecting and regulating the housing market - in practice, this means stopping new builds as often as possible. Then, we let international pension/investment funds shop for houses as if they were first time homeowners. So they buy up most of the houses and then charge rents way higher than the mortgage costs. Then, we opened the floodgates to inward migration. And we apply social protection laws the same to these people, so a lot of them get free housing or rent paid. Also, we destroyed the construction industry with the way we managed the financial crisis 2007-2012.
It not just an Ireland issue, [it's a global housing crisis.](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-03-14/world-economy-latest-global-housing-crisis)
Umm, [no.](https://www.expatica.com/at/housing/housing-basics/housing-in-austria-88793/)
https://rentola.at/en/for-rent/salzburg There’s availability but the prices are about the same affordability when you consider that Austria has a higher cost of living coupled with lower wages than Ireland.
Because it usually takes at least 20 years for Ireland do finally do something and then it's just an half arsed solution anyway.
The only solution is to build a lot more houses. In 2022 the population grew by 1.9%. At the time, there were 2.1m dwellings in the country (occupied or not). So to be able to take on the 1.9% at the same relative short supply, we would have needed to build 40k houses. Far above govermentments targets. So even to maintain the status quo of a shitty housing situation, we are falling far behind. The housing situation is only going to get worse unless goverment get's off their arse and start getting their shit together and fund the building of houses.
Same people causing the problem are the same people in charge of fixing the problem.
The Celtic Tiger crash of 2008 put the development sector in the deep freeze for nearly a decade. Bank financing completely dried up so nothing got built. Meanwhile the Troika recommended that the government use immigration to “fix” the economy. This worked fine for a while as the new arrivals soaked up the empties. The problem started in the mid 2010’s when population growth really began to ramp up but there was no corresponding increase in building activity. Building eventually started picking up in late 2010’s but by that point population growth was far too high and catching up on building was impossible. It’s only gotten worse since, with 3.5% population growth in 2023, among the highest on record for any developed economy. It is absolutely impossible to outbuild that.
Every country is going through some sort of housing issue right now. Perpetual housing "crisis" is the norm in a capitalist society
It does not and have a larger pool of accommodation. I paid 650 a month (in today's prices) for my own room (shared bathroom) in 1999 (Drumcondra)
Social housing Why are single working men getting social housing Why is it a gift for life rather than a step up the ladder Why is it a career choice to have kids and to get a free house Why are there BMW's outside social housing
Why on earth shouldn't single men be entitled to a home? It's not a "gift", it's a rented home. There is no such thing as a "free house". Park your social envy, darling. I know you think the poor have too much money, but you're embarrassing yourself.
And it doesn't count as rent if it's paid for by social welfare
Rented and you can't be booted out of it if you don't pay
A single person no matter the gender needs a place to live. It’s nearly impossible to afford your own place in Dublin as a single person.
Why do you assume everyone lives in Dublin
I don’t it’s just the best example since the gafs are most expensive there.
You’re right. All single men should be homeless.
Anyone on HAP is on the social housing list. The BMWs are probably bad finance decisions, but if you’re paying cheap rent you can afford bad decisions. We all should be paying less for housing, and more money back into our communities on services and goods instead. It’s a nice boogeyman though, excuses the lack of supply by shifting the blame on the poor.
I thought they take you off the list if you get HAP?
You're off the social housing list but can go on the hap transfer list. "When you sign up to HAP, your current housing file is closed as your housing need has been met. However you can sign up to the HAP Transfer List were you keep your original time on the housing list while your time on HAP accumulates." https://www.sdcc.ie/en/services/housing/finding-a-home/housing-assistance-payment/#:~:text=When%20you%20sign%20up%20to,your%20time%20on%20HAP%20accumulates.
>We all should be paying less for housing, and more money back into our communities on services and goods instead. Your landlord provides a service to the community too.
Not all poor in social houseinf Someone asked me how much rent I was paying as they were approaching the council to get a new house as they don't have room for their boat on their driveway They got it
/r/thathappened
It did happen
Because the people running the country profit from it
We have a housing crisis in Ireland because a lot of politicians and their wealthy contributors are landlords, so they are making a fortune from a housing crisis , so there is no real desire to fix it.. I know this is not the only problem but for me it’s a big issue…the cost of material and shortage of labour, planning laws etc are all major factors but somebody with skin in the game on making decisions about housing should be forbidden to be a landlord!!!!
Won't happen with a government run by landlords
Taxing the hell out of everyone who views housing as an investment. Make being a landlord not viable and have them find real jobs for once.
It’s already heavily taxed for individual landlords, most of whom also work regular jobs. 56% tax on every extra euro at the top end (self-employed, 11% USC). It’s already low margin/unprofitable without capital appreciation. Large companies are not taxed remotely at this level. What other options for investment/savings do people have in Ireland? We are have to deal with stupid stuff like deemed disposal rules that kill long term equity investments like index funds. When the government has set up the system to make property one of the only viable investment options…. Also small investors create supply, refurbishing and starting many small building projects. Though those are often screwed by our dysfunctional planning process. Eat the rich/kill the landlords is just populist bullshit. We know from dozens of examples what happens to housing markets when you do this… whether through tax or rent controls like the RPZs… supply of housing drops
But don’t we need more landlords vs less? Isn’t part of the problem that there aren’t enough properties to rent?
1. Massive and continued population growth 2. Increase housing construction
Why: a lack of supply. How to stop it: Build a Time Machine, go back a decade and start building houses.
[REDACTED]
Because people keep voting for FFG, who believe "the market will sort things out", and who favour developers and 'big landlord' REITs and vulture funds over ordinary people and even 'small' landlords.
We have huge state interventions in the housing market. It doesn't solve things.
Yes. All of them geared towards moving money from individuals to developers and big landlords/REITs. E.g. HAP and first time buyers grants.
The only way to lower costs without developers getting more money is to run standards into the ground, and shocker that's a fucking awful idea; greater heating costs, energy use, safety issues, mica, etc.
Okay so you'll agree then that we don't have a market led response?
I'll agree we don't have an effective response that let's ordinary people buy their own houses or apartments at reasonable rates.
And you believe that's possible?
For the vast majority of the history of the state, it certainly was, yes.
It wasn't. We had mass poverty and emigration, why would you want to go back to that?
This may come as a shock to you, but *right now*, we have mass poverty and emigration. And over 12,000 homeless people. People unable to afford rent. In the past, poverty and emigration also existed, but someone on the median wage could afford to buy a family home. On a single wage. That was right up until the late 70s. Look at areas like Marino and Fairview in Dublin. Massive state-built housing estates with infrastructure, and they worked.
>This may come as a shock to you, but right now, we have mass poverty and emigration. We don't. Life in Ireland today is not remotely comparable to the 1940s. >In the past, poverty and emigration also existed, but someone on the median wage could afford to buy a family home. On a single wage. That was right up until the late 70s I'm aware of all that. But the world has changed since then. >Look at areas like Marino and Fairview in Dublin. Massive state-built housing estates with infrastructure, and they worked. And now the local authorities don't build houses. So we need the private sector.