Daft Property - Irish Property News

Bailout will total more than the EU ever gave us... Noonan says interest rate must be renegotiated by next government: THE €85bn IMF-EU bailout will come to more than the total amount of payments received since we joined Europe in 1973, the Sunday Independent can reveal. Fine Gael's Michael Noonan said yesterday that this stark fact showed why the interest rate levied on Ireland must be renegotiated and that any new government's hand will be strengthened by this revelation. In cash terms, Ireland has received €63.7bn from Europe in various agricultural, social and cohesion funding -- far less than the bailout forced on the Irish by Jean Claude Trichet's European Central Bank in late November. When those payments are adjusted for inflation, they total €99bn -- that is fractionally more than the total cost of the bailout when the penal interest rates are factored in. When Ireland's payments to Europe are subtracted, our net receipts from the EU budget amount t

FF's parting gift of corporate welfare will sink the country... A farmer told me he had just taken €53,000 out of the local bank and put it under his bed YESTERDAY was the feast of the Immaculate Conception. In many other Catholic countries, particularly in Belgium and southern Holland, this is also the week that Santa comes and leaves presents in children's shoes. For many, both the Immaculate Conception and Santa Claus are simply not believable. For me as a child, December 8 was a day off school and that's all that counted. What would Christmas be without Santa, or Catholicism without the Immaculate Conception? You can't have one without the other. Even if you don't believe, sometimes it is easier to pretend. The Budget was akin to the Government playing a big game of 'let's pretend'. Let's pretend that the banks are solvent. Let's pretend that the problem in Ireland is 'social' welfare rather than 'corporate' welfare (because t

Cowen accepts the bailout but not the responsibility... As a result of an ill-judged edit, viewers of the national broadcaster missed the liveliest and most telling part of the press conference held tonight at Government Buildings by the current Taoiseach Brian Cowen and the current Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan. TV3 host and Irish Times columnist Vincent Browne asked Cowen if he accepted that he was to blame for “screwing up the country”; that he more than anyone else was responsible for Ireland’s economic catastrophe and that his continued presence in office was “a liability” to the nation. “I don’t accept that at all,” replied Cowen, grumpily. “I don’t accept your contention [or] the premise to your question that I’m the bogeyman you’re looking for.” Minutes earlier, a Bloomberg television journalist who asked if Cowen had ever thought of packing it in was told that the process of electing a Taoiseach was a parliamentary matter… mumble, jargon, mumble. As for whether or not he

A nation's outrage to drive Cowen out... Poll: public welcomes the IMF but roundly furious at government ‘lies’ THE Taoiseach, Brian Cowen, and his Government are at risk of being ignominiously driven from office, such is the level of anger sweeping the country this weekend. The people have broadly welcomed the arrival of the IMF, are largely indifferent to emotive sentiment associated with a perceived loss of national sovereignty, but are roundly furious at the manner in which the Government has “lied” about the unprecedented events of last week. As the Government now strives to further “spin” itself out of what is, by any measure, a glaringly obvious credibility deficit, its efforts to do so will be hampered by a disintegration of cohesion within its own ranks. This weekend, the Taoiseach is at odds with the governor of the Central Bank; the Minister for Finance is in agreement with the governor and, therefore, at odds with the Taoiseach; and at least two senior Cabinet ministers

"If you thought the bank bailout was bad, wait until the mortgage defaults hit home." THE BIG PICTURE: Ireland is effectively insolvent – the next crisis will be mass home mortgage default, writes MORGAN KELLY ... SAD NEWS just in from Our Lady of the Eurozone Hospital: After a sudden worsening in her condition, the Irish Patient, formerly known as the Irish Republic, has been moved into intensive care and put on artificial ventilation. While a hospital spokesman, Jean-Claude Trichet, tried to sound upbeat, there is no prospect that the Patient will recover. It will be remembered that, after a lengthy period of poverty following her acrimonious divorce from her English partner, in the 1990s Ireland succeeded in turning her life around, educating herself, and holding down a steady job. Although her increasingly riotous lifestyle over the last decade had raised some concerns, the Irish Patient’s fate was sealed by a botched emergency intervention on September 29th, 2008 followe

The taxpayer saved the banks, so now they turn the screw on mortgage rates... When the European Central Bank this week kept its key interest rate at one per cent, worried mortgage holders who are struggling to meet their repayments breathed a collective sigh of relief across euro land. Except in Ireland, that is. In Fair Eire, allegedly the land of a thousand welcomes, mortgage interest rates are actually going up. Economists say the main message from the ECB monthly press conference last Thursday was that the first hike in official rates is a relatively comfortable amount of time away -- probably no earlier than late 2011. That gives most people space to put bread on the table, squirrel away some extra cash and pay off their credit cards. Not so here, however, where public sector workers have seen their wages slashed and, as unemployment rises in the private sector, the public has watched helplessly as billions of euro of taxpayers' money has been used to prop up the banks. Billio

Cuts, tax and emigration the harshest medicine... IT'S often been said that the best cure for poverty and unemployment is a job. But the reality of the modern Irish economy is that the best cure is emigration. The Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) said yesterday that 100,000 people would leave Ireland this year and next, keeping a lid on already high unemployment and helping to relieve some of the budgetary pressures on the Government. The loss of 100,000 mainly young people is hardly something to celebrate, but the reality is that without this safety valve the Irish economy would be mired in levels of unemployment last witnessed in the 1980s. The ESRI calculated yesterday that if the amount of people in the labour market had not fallen over the last year via emigration, the rate of unemployment would be about 16pc not the current 13.4pc. Ireland is shipping out its young people to countries like Canada, the US, Australia and the UK, thereby easing the pressure on the e

Blow for homeowners as BoI to hike mortgage rate... BANK of Ireland will today reveal that it is increasing mortgage rates for thousands of hard-pressed homeowners. The move comes despite the European Central Bank (ECB) leaving its rates unchanged yesterday -- for the 11th month in a row. Homeowners who are vulnerable to rising mortgage rates are now being warned that they have seven days to act. Experts are advising new buyers -- as well as those who are coming off a fixed rate or are on a standard-variable rate -- that they should lock in now. Bank of Ireland (BoI) and its subsidiary, ICS -- which between them have one in four mortgages in the country -- are to announce that they are increasing their standard-variable rates for existing customers by 0.5pc. They are also raising fixed rates by up to 0.7pc for existing customers who want to fix, the Irish Independent has learned. The change in the standard-variable rates will add €80 a month to the repayments of someone on a €300,000 m

Ireland’s share of an EU sponsored bailout of Greece would be between €200 million and €400 million, according to an exercise carried out for a European think tank. Open Europe, a broadly Eurosceptic think tank based in London, has estimated what each EU country would be required to pay if Greece was unable to refinance its debts, of which €20 billion to €25 billion will mature in the coming two months. Under a series of possible systems, it estimated that Ireland’s share of the bill would be between €227 million and €406 million. The broad range was accounted for by uncertainty of the size of the bailout and the system used for calculating the contribution. Open Europe said that meeting the cost of the bailout could be either spread among all members of the European Union or confined to those who used the euro as a currency. Ireland’s largest exposure - of about €400 million - would arise if only eurozone countries were required to pay. Under the system, Germany could be required to p

THE average price of a house in Ireland is now €70,000 less than at the peak of the property boom, according to new figures. Dublin and commuter belt homeowners have been particularly badly hit by the ongoing downturn in house prices. The latest Permanent tsb/ESRI monthly figures on house sales show the average price of a house nationally in June was just over €240,000. This is down from €311,000 in February 2007 when the market peaked. In Dublin, the average price of a home is now just under €320,000. This is a drop of over 15pc on the same time last year, considerably worse than the 10pc average fall outside of the capital. It is expected that the trend will continue for the immediate future, said a spokesperson for Permanent TSB. "The index today confirms the pattern of recent months. Poor demand and significant oversupply have combined to cancel out the benefits of lower interest rates to mean that prices continue to weaken. This pattern is likely to persist for some time,&qu

Government to publish Nama legislation today... The Government will today publish legislation setting up the controversial National Asset Management Agency (Nama), the State’s new toxic assets agency. The €90 billion “bad bank” scheme will use Government bonds to buy property loans at a discount from banks, which will then be able to cash the bonds with the European Central Bank. The draft legislation will be published at 5pm today on the Department of Finance website, but the Government intends to amend it next month when it is debated by the Oireachtas. The complex draft laws run to 150 pages and contains more than 200 sections. Nama will operate under the aegis of the National Treasury Management Agency. Banks will have one chance to appeal the price put on their loans by Nama to “a valuations panel”, which will advise the Minister of Finance Brian Lenihan, but the final decision will be his, the Department of Finance has said. Officials expect that loans to the 50 largest property

Underwater mortgages: a guide to survival... Latest estimates suggest that as many as 340,000 home-owners, or one in five homes, are stuck in negative equity... HINDSIGHT IS a wonderful thing. Looking back at the prices people paid for Irish property during the boom, it’s easy to see how unsustainable they were. However at the time, despite warnings from everyone from the Central Bank to the Economist magazine that Ireland’s property market was a bubble which had to burst, banks and consumers ignored the advice and ploughed money into property, propping up prices until the inevitable collapse during 2008. Now, latest estimates suggest that as many as 340,000 home owners, or one in five homes, are stuck in negative equity and prices are still sliding . If this is the case, then people who purchased property as far back as 2003 with loan-to-values (LTVs) of more than 80 per cent, will discover that they owe more to the bank than what their house is worth. For example, at the peak of the

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

It's Dire Straits and and new tune called "Time To Tighten Belts In Ireland!" The Irish Independent reports "Double trouble on fuel, house prices... Last night economists warned that consumers will have to "tighten their belts" and avoid all luxury purchases if they want to ride out the economic slowdown. Figures from the latest Permanent tsb/ESRI index revealed that house prices fell by 1.1pc in April, bringing the annual decline in property prices to 9.2pc. And an Irish Independent survey showed that the price of diesel has shot through the €1.40 barrier -- it has now increased by an average of 9c a litre in just two weeks. Friends First chief economist Jim Power said: "I wouldn't be recommending to anybody to be going out there taking debt on board at the moment or living beyond their means. "Definitely we are in a belt-tightening environment for the next couple of years. Anybody who behaves differently is being very naive and foolish."

Looks like Interest Rates in Ireland rates will be dropping. According to a report, in The Irish Independent Newspaper (www.independent.ie), The European Central Bank (ECB) yesterday paved the way for the first cuts in nearly five years! ECB president Jean Claude Trichet left rates unchanged when the ECB met yesterday and there was no mention of increases. David Tilson of Bank of Ireland, said: "The ECB has effectively dropped its threat to raise interest rates." Skip the Champagne... Don't start celebrating yet - most of top analysts believe there will be no rate drops until the second half of 2008 (at the earliest)!