Daft Property - Irish Property News

Grinding despair of negative-equity generation hangs over all our lives... All truth passes through three stages. First it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. Arthur Schopenhauer Ireland, 2031. A teenager and his teacher are walking out of an economics class. "My God, what lunacy," says the teen. "I can't believe that the banks were allowed to behave like that." "I know," answers his lecturer. "Imagine, they were able to sell full-recourse mortgages to naive first-time buyers, often way over 100 per cent, without any risk to themselves whatsoever. No wonder they all went mad and pushed money on any poor sod they could." "And then when the crash came, all the big property borrowers and the banks were protected by the Government via Nama and the bank guarantee, while all the small homeowners were screwed?" "Correct, son." "That's not capitalism,

For sale: the post-bubble rubble. €4,000 or nearest offer... SMALL PRINT: ON TUESDAY, an intriguing notice appeared in the small ads section on the back page of this newspaper. It read: “Arch for sale. This arch was built by artist Emma Houlihan. It was part of a Nama-related art project and built from the reconstituted rubble of a destroyed Leitrim house. Custom built. Perfect for gardens and spaces. Can function as a sculpture or a functional object.” There was a number listed to call, for queries about “cost and shipping”. Emma Houlihan was in Stockholm this week, where a number of interested parties had already called her number, although no solid offers of purchase had so far been made. What is this “arch” she is selling? “It’s a project I undertook while artist-in-residence for the Leitrim Sculpture Centre last summer,” she says. “It struck me that Leitrim was the ghost estate capital of Ireland, and I wanted to make a piece of art connected with that fact. I was mostly i

Thousands of Irish people who bought homes abroad, for their holidays or as a pension, are selling up – if they can UP TO HALF or more of the Irish people who bought properties abroad during the Celtic Tiger years may now be trying to sell them, according to estimates by estate agents. Their success or failure – and whether they sell at a loss – depends on where they bought and when. “Of the 250 Irish people who bought properties through us between 2003 and 2008 along the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, between 50 per cent and 60 per cent are now selling them or have sold them,” according to Kirkor Ajderhanyan, director of Agence 107 Promenade, an agency which specialises in selling properties with sea views on Nice’s seafront. “There were so many of them that we used to call it the Promenade des Irlandais at the time. But most will make an average gain of 25 to 30 per cent,” he claims. On the other hand, Irish agent Hilary Larkin, who sells properties in nearby Cannes, says tha

Repossessions at all-time high but crisis to deepen... REPOSSESSION orders granted by the courts have risen almost six-fold since the peak of the property boom. Figures released by the Courts Service show that the number of orders granted by the High Court and Circuit Courts for the repossession of lands and premises were at their highest last year, a figure that is set to rise as lenders increase their interest rates. Some 70,000 homeowners are struggling to pay their mortgages, according to Central Bank figures, including up of 40,000 people who have not made a payment for three months or more, and 30,000 who are making interest-only payments. The 70,000 figure includes around 12,000 homeowners who have not made any payments for a year or more. The vast majority of repossession orders granted in the courts are for residential properties, with some 263 of the 306 properties seized by the banks in the Circuit Court last year granted on foot of defaults on home loans. Althou

WHEN he first began his photographic project documenting the departure of young emigrants in early 2010, David Monahan had no way of knowing a mass exodus was about to take place. But with more than 65,000 emigrating from here last year alone, Mr Monahan’s project, Leaving Dublin, is tapping into the mood of a generation. The Dublin photographer first got the idea when talking to a young couple in their 20s — he was an electrician, she a beautician, and both have been out of work for a long time — who were leaving for Australia. From that one conversation, David decided to begin a series of shots which document emigration in modern Ireland. He advertised to photograph people of all nationalities, who had made the decision to move from Ireland for economic reasons. The pictures, which can be seen on davidmonahan.viewbook.com, are not just random images, but highly stylised and conceptualised shots which will form a series which Monahan hopes to display in a public arena which th

Nation might take 15 years to recover Economy has shrunk by 'catastrophic' 22pc on peak, figures reveal. Ireland's economy has "fallen off a cliff" and could take more than 15 years to recover as new figures reveal it has shrunk by 22 per cent from its peak. A loss of more than a fifth of the country's domestic trade, particularly in the retail sector, in such a short period of time has been branded a catastrophe by the opposition and by the Irish Small and Medium Enterprises Association (ISME). The domestic economy, the day-to-day business of trading, has been decimated and to a far greater extent than previously thought. According to official CSO quarterly National Accounts figures, since the peak of Ireland's economic wealth creation in the first quarter of 2007, Ireland's economy has reduced by a frightening 22 per cent. From that peak period in early 2007, GNP figures (the domestic economy) had plummeted by just under 25 per cent in mi

Up to 300,000 homeowners in negative equity Further 30,000 will struggle with mortgage payments after Budget tax increases kick in... THE spectacular fall in property prices is even worse than was stated by a government economic think tank last week -- up to 300,000 homeowners are now in negative equity. Expected interest rate hikes will mean another 30,000 people -- roughly the population of Dundalk -- will struggle to meet their mortgage payments by the end of the year. The recession, joblessness and rising interest rates already mean that 70,000 borrowers have missed payments or renegotiated their mortgages. Now financial institutions are expected to increase their standard variable rates. It is also widely expected that the European Central Bank will increase its interest rate before the end of the year. This would also hit those on tracker mortgages. Michael Dowling, of the Independent Mortgage Advisors Federation (IMAF), said: "With rising unemployment, higher