Daft Property - Irish Property News

The lost decade: prices now back to 2001 level... The property industry felt it could walk on water during the first half of the noughties, but after 2006, it all began to go terribly wrong. SO HOW did it all go so wrong in the property market? For a while there, mid-noughties, people in the property business felt they could walk on water. Now, with almost a decade of growth wiped off the value of Irish homes, both buyers and sellers are asking, how low can we go? Are we still in freefall, bumping along the bottom, or seeing the beginnings of recovery? Nobody wants to make the call. Surprisingly, they were asking the same questions back in 2001. “Now that the boom is over, everyone wants to know what is going to happen to property prices. Is now a good time to buy, will values drop even more in the spring? Should sellers wait?” this supplement asked in December 2001. After six consecutive years of growth since the mid-1990s, and the euphoria of the millennium, 2001 proved a tough year ...

We must demand greater accountability from politicians, regulators and business... PICTURE THE scene: greedy executives, shady solicitors, lying politicians, child- abusing priests, cover-ups, fraud and lots of brown envelopes. It sounds like an episode of US cops and corruption show The Wire, but it's actually the horrifying reality show known as Noughties Ireland . The first series of Noughties Ireland in 2007 delivered scheming property developers and government officials happy to look the other way . Series two featured a shamed taoiseach, several dodgy solicitors, the Fás scandal and questionable banking practices. This year's series sees paedophile priests and bishops who damn children to a lifelong personal hell. Fraud is also likely to make an appearance this year. Paddy Power is taking bets on which Irish sector will be charged with the biggest fraud in 2009. The odds favour banking, property and the legal sector , with telecoms and State/semi-State bodies next in line...