Daft Property - Irish Property News

Ireland plans drastic cuts to prevent debt crisis... Ireland is to demand pay cuts for civil servants and public employees to prevent the budget deficit soaring to 12pc of gross domestic product by next year – becoming the first country in the eurozone to resort to 1930s-style wage deflation to claw back competitiveness. "We will take whatever decisions are necessary," said premier Brian Cowen. The Taoiseach yesterday denied reports that he invoked the spectre of the International Monetary Fund to terrify the trade unions into submission. But the threat – uttered or not – has been picked up nevertheless by labour leaders. "The IMF's normal prescription in such situations involves mass dismissals and pay cuts, along with cuts in pensions," said Dan Murphy, head of the public service union, who accepts the need for draconian retrenchment. The budget deficit will soar to 9.6pc of GDP this year as property tax revenues collapse. It is so far above the EU's Maast

Warning that house prices may fall by 80%... HOUSING MARKET: IRELAND WILL see more demolition than construction of houses over the next decade, as the economy struggles to recover from the collapse of the housing market and the emergence of “zombie” banks , UCD economist Morgan Kelly told the conference. In a presentation that drew several collective intakes of breath, Mr Kelly predicted that house prices would fall by 80 per cent from peak to trough in real terms. “Construction, but not demolition, of residential and commercial property will fall to zero for the foreseeable future,” he said. Low levels of education among those employed in construction – where worker numbers peaked at about 280,000 – meant retraining would not be straightforward. Recovery will be slow: “It has taken us 10 years to get into this situation – it will in all likelihood take us 10 years to get out of it.” Mr Kelly said he had been hailed as being extremely prescient as a result of his warnings in relation t

Ireland: Testing Times... How do we cope with recession? Valerie Shanley hears from leading experts and thinkers... In with the old, out with the new. But if we started 2008 as slightly mangy Celtic Tigers, who are we now as we venture a toe into 2009? The collapse in our economy has left an entire section of society feeling much poorer – especially those with big houses and share portfolios in Irish banks. Gone are the days when estate agents could tell you that the first thing new owners of a house should do on moving in was to rip out the designer kitchen the previous owners had only recently installed and replace it with another. Because gone are many of those estate agents. If the masters of no universe are having to re-evaluate the way they look at themselves, what about the rest of us? Even though most people were observers, as opposed to participants, in the ostentatious wealth of 'the boom', there was a positive, knock-on effect in confidence generally. Looking around,

More price cuts as season starts... There will be a drop in the supply of houses new to the market in 2009, but sellers are still having to cut prices - again... THE DUBLIN property market has opened with price cuts at all levels of the market, as sellers digest news of the country's deteriorating finances and economists' gloomy forecasts. Estate agents are taking a fresh look at their stock and advising sellers to reconsider prices. The reassessment is going on at all levels of the market, according to Peter Kenny of Colliers, where notable price cuts include €130,000 off a three-bedroom penthouse in a development at Old Conna, Riverdale, on Dargle Road, Bray, Co Wicklow. The 130sq m (1,400 sq ft) apartment with river views has has been reduced from €560,000 to €430,000. Colliers has also dropped the price of a four-bedroom semi at Burnaby Mill in Greystones from €720,000 to €580,000 in an effort to attract buyers, while in Dún Laoghaire, Gunne has just dropped the price of an

Can we remake Ireland's future? The year ended with the certainty that the global crisis is not a short-term glitch, and that Ireland is suffering more than most. Will 2009 bring the shift in Irish political culture needed to bring us back from the brink? LATE LAST YEAR, when the rock band Tindersticks played in Dublin, they finished their set with The Not Knowing , a haunting ballad of love and denial. The words seemed especially apt and particularly poignant: "The not knowing is easy/ The suspecting, that's okay/ Just don't tell me for certain/ That our love has gone away." Replace "love" with "boom" and the sad song would be a three-hankie job. This time last year, the not knowing still came easy and even the strong suspicion that the good times were definitively over could be drowned in denial, excess or the mellow lullabies of "soft landings". Now we know for certain, and if there is to be comfort in 2009, we have to find it in t

A 50pc descent from peak to trough... IF there is one economic certainty for 2009 it is that Irish house prices will continue to fall just as the economy accelerates in reverse. Even the most bullish of commentators or indeed vested interests have pencilled in 2010 as the earliest date for a turnaround. According to the ESRI, which is now firmly in the bear's camp, prices are likely to end 2009 at the same level as the last half of 2003. This means anyone who bought from 2004 on is very likely to have a home worth less than they paid for it. With the economy set to decline by 5 per cent or more and employment to fall by as many as 140,000 jobs resulting in double digit unemployment figures, people will simply hold off on most purchases. According to Jim Power, chief economist at Friends First this deterioration in the labour market with massive job losses and increased job uncertainty as well as downward pressure on wages will keep sentiment pretty negative. The result, he says, wi

'No Irish need apply' - Polish builders get their own back... 'NO Irish need apply' - the signs are already going up on building sites abroad in a throwback to the grim days of the the last century. But this time they are starting to appear in Poland as that country takes its revenge for the way in which some unscrupulous Irish contractors treated their countrymen during the years of the Celtic Tiger. Trade union official Michael Kilcoyne - also president of the Consumers Association of Ireland - said it had recently been brought to his attention that the 'No Irish' signs had appeared on a couple of Polish building sites where workers were being sought. Mr Kilcoyne said: "The reality is that our international reputation as employers has been sullied. Many foreign people who have worked here, especially during our boom years, have had bad experiences. "The evidence of this is in the number of cases taken before the Labour Relations Commission over the l

New York, Hundreds of thousands of revelers rang in 2009 from frigid Times Square as the famous Waterford crystal ball dropped, signaling the end of a historic and troubled year that saw the election of the first black U.S. president and the worst economic crisis in decades. As the clock struck midnight, a ton of confetti rained down while the partygoers hugged and kissed. The wind chill made it feel like 1 degree (-17 Celsius) in the area, but that didn't deter the throngs who were cloaked in fur hats and sleeping bags. "We're worried about the economy but hoping for the best," said Lisa Mills, of Danville, Ohio, visiting Times Square on Wednesday night with her husband, Ken, and 17-year-old daughter, Kara. Former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Clinton, who will become President-elect Barack Obama's secretary of state on Jan. 21, helped Mayor Michael Bloomberg lower the the famous Waterford crystal ball atop 1 Times Square for the countdown to midnight.

AS CHRISTMAS and 2009 loom some vendors are cutting prices to get buyers off the fence . Number 7 Claremont Road in Howth has a new asking price of €3.75m, down from €4.8m, a drop of €1.05m or 22 per cent. For sale through Savills, the four-bed Georgian-style home first came on the market in August. It ticks all the boxes for a trophy home with 418sq m (4,500sq ft) of space and three large reception rooms. A large basement could be used as a gym, music room or home cinema. Gunne Residential is asking €1.95m for an Edwardian semi - 4 Proby Square off Carysfort Avenue in Blackrock, Co Dublin - which is a 29 per cent drop from the original price of €2.75m. The house has been on the market a number of times in the past five years. In September 2003 it sold for €1.625m with 0.25 acres of rear and side garden with development potential. The following year the house sold with a substantially reduced garden for €1.5m. The six-bed, 300sq m (3,200sq ft) house is in a cul-de-sac. Gunne Residentia

Try it, and if you like it, then buy it... Could a rent-to-buy housing scheme that helps first-time buyers get on the ladder help stabilise the new homes market, asks Róisín Carabine... A rent-to-buy scheme that allows prospective buyers to lease a new home with the option to buy later, using part of the rent towards the purchase, is growing in popularity with first-time buyers and developers as the credit crunch worsens and residential sales stagnate. Seán Power of Rent2Buy in Ballincollig, who first introduced the scheme to Ireland three years ago, says interest has more than doubled in the last few weeks, with 1,200 first-time buyers now registered on its database. "Of those who have recently signed up, the majority – around one in six – want to buy and live in and around Dublin. We've a number of buyers particularly interested in the Swords area," says Power, who plans to match 1,000 prospective buyers with homes in 2009. The scheme was first launched at The Beeches,

Falling prices represent new reality... At the end of last year, estate agents and vendors alike were reeling from the price drops that the market had experienced during 2007. But although they were shell-shocked, many industry experts were predicting that the rate at which prices were dropping would slow during 2008, and that prices would stabilise. Twelvemonths on, that now seems like nothing more than wishful thinking. The banking crisis, soaring unemployment and extremely poor consumer confidence have all resulted in the market having one of its worst years in living memory, a fact underlined last week by a survey which found that 80 per cent of estate agents were selling less than three properties a month. Even those potential buyers who are interested in buying are finding funding increasingly difficult to source, although observers are hopeful that the European Central Bank’s (ECB) policy of aggressive rate cuts will go some way towards alleviating that problem. With asking pric

Homes at a discount - but are they still a good buy? 2008 Review: AFFORDABLE HOMES: There are lots of apartments and houses for sale under the Government's Affordable Homes schemes, writes Frances O'Rourke AOIFE MACMAHON had been renting for years when she applied to Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council (DLRCOCO) for an affordable house in November 2005. "The property market was at its peak and my mum urged me to apply. A couple of weeks later I got a letter saying I was number 168 on the list." After that, Aoife - a single 36-year-old media buyer with an income under the €58,000 affordable eligibility threshold - forgot about her application. She was happy to go on renting her apartment near the Luas in Dundrum; she had lived there for over five years but buying "was off the radar - apartments cost from €600,000 up" and anyway she had always dreamed of living near the sea. In January 2007 she got a call from the council. "There was a two-bed unit avai

2008 Review: Buyers haven't gone away, you know, says Ronan O'Driscoll - but selling the 30,000 empty new homes will be a challenge... THANKFULLY, WE are coming to the end of the GUBU year for new homes in Ireland. It was unquestionably grotesque, unbelievable, bizarre and unprecedented. Whilst we entered 2008 with some degree of nervousness, we were hopeful that it would be a better year than the annus horribilis that was 2007. Sadly, the market went from bad to very much worse. Savills started the year in spectacular style, selling over 650 new homes between January and Easter, with very successful new launches virtually every week. This demand had been triggered by some of our leading developers who reduced prices significantly in the early part of the year. The market responded very positively to the value, with reductions of up to 25 per cent on some new Dublin projects. In January, we even had queues at three of our new developments for Manor Park Homebuilders, Capel Deve

Property spend plunges €40bn... Irish spend on property has crashed by 60pc in 2008 compared to last year, with expenditure down by a crushing 73pc -- or around €40bn -- since the market peaked in 2006. Our property spend is forecast to fall to €15bn this year -- down from €45bn in 2007 and a heady €54.4bn in 2006, according to the latest 'Property Outlook' from Savills. Joan Henry, head of Research at Savills Ireland says that all sectors of the property market have been affected -- most obviously the new homes area. The total spend on new homes is expected to fall from an estimated €23bn in 2007 to just €6bn this year. Spend in the Irish investment market is expected to be down as much as 75pc from last year's €2bn. Spend on domestic land is expected to fall by a staggering 80pc. In the new homes as in the second hand market, prices have fallen by as much as 30pc this year and maybe more if looked at on an individual basis. "Successive price reductions this year, cou

Budget will 'turn recession into depression' ... POLITICAL REACTION: Fine Gael deputy leader and spokesman on finance Richard Bruton said this evening the Budget announced by Brian Lenihan today will "threaten to turn a recession into a depression". “This is a Budget that is all about extra taxes for ordinary families, about extra charges for people, and about cutting capital spending,’’ said Mr Bruton. “You are looking to make it tougher for people who are struggling to get by,’’ he added. “There is no sign that you are aware of the pressure on people from fuel bills, the pressure on people who have lost their jobs.’ Labour leader Eamon Gilmore said it "mercilessly targets middle income families". Speaking shortly after the Minister for Finance presented the Budget in the Dáil, Mr Gilmore said Mr Lenihan had failed to take any significant steps to protect the poor and vulnerable in the face of the worst recession facing the country for decades. “Despite