{"id":342124,"date":"2026-03-12T09:24:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T09:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/342124\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T09:24:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T09:24:09","slug":"future-housing-supply-under-threat-after-new-builds-fall-by-more-than-75-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/342124\/","title":{"rendered":"Future housing supply under threat after new builds fall by more than 75% \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

New housing starts <\/a>fell by more than three-quarters last year, with activity slowing by almost 84 per cent in the key local authority areas of Fingal County Council and South Dublin County Council, according to a new report from the Irish banks.<\/p>\n

The latest housing market monitor from Banking and Payments Federation Ireland <\/a>(BPFI), which covers the final quarter of 2025, shows there were just over 16,000 housing commencements <\/a>during the year, down from more than 69,300 in 2024.<\/p>\n

BPFI chief economist Ali U\u011fur said the \u201csteep decline\u201d during 2025 presents \u201crisks to future supply\u201d beyond this year in the absence of a \u201csignificant rebound\u201d in scheme and apartment commencements in 2026<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"\u2018Over a billion eyeballs will be on the parade\u2019: St Patrick\u2019s festival chief executive Richard Tierney<\/p>\n

He said the low level of commencements last year, particularly the 12,600 housing estate homes and apartments<\/a>, points to a \u201clikely reduction in output\u201d in early 2027.<\/p>\n

U\u011fur said the drop in commencements last year could be attributed to a surge in activity in 2024 as developers <\/a>rushed to build in advance of the expiry of development-levy waivers.<\/p>\n

Commencements fell sharply in key local authorities, particularly Dublin City Council, Fingal County Council and South Dublin County Council, with activity declining by almost 84 per cent in Fingal and South Dublin. <\/p>\n

One-off dwellings accounted for 23 per cent of all starts, which was the highest share since 2018. <\/p>\n

About 5,900 housing units were started in the last three months of the year, a year-on-year drop of 65.5 per cent.<\/p>\n

On a more positive note, almost 12,000 new dwellings were completed in the last quarter of 2025. That represented a year-on-year increase of 38.5 per cent. <\/p>\n

There were 36,284 housing completions <\/a>in the year as a whole, which was 20.4 per cent more than in 2024 and the highest annual volume since the 12 months ending June 2009.<\/p>\n

More than half of the annual increase was driven by a sharp rise in apartment completions \u2013 primarily in Dublin \u2013 where apartment output rose by over 46 per cent to more than 9,600 units. <\/p>\n

One-off homes represented just over 16 per cent of national completions<\/a>. However, in nine counties, they accounted for at least 40 per cent of all new dwellings.<\/p>\n

U\u011fur said homes started in 2024 must be completed by the end of this year to qualify for levy waivers, so he expects overall housing output to reach nearly 39,000 homes in 2026 as long as \u201cthe strong momentum in construction continues\u201d.<\/p>\n

The data also show the number of residential units granted planning permission rose by 29.4 per cent to 11,142 in the third quarter of last year, the highest number since the second quarter of 2023.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0More than 1,300 applications received for 56 cost-rental homes in DublinOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

In terms of home sales, the number of existing properties sold fell for the third straight year to 38,502, the lowest level since 2020.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost home buyers purchase second-hand properties, with existing properties accounting for 76.1 per cent of household market purchases of residential property in 2025,\u201d said U\u011fur.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis implies that fewer second-hand homes are available to buy than in recent years but also that more homeowners may be staying in, and investing in, their current homes rather than moving.\u201d<\/p>\n

Residential property prices were up by 7 per cent in the year to December, following an 8.9 per cent increase in 2024. The median new dwelling price of \u20ac440,000 in December was about \u20ac85,000 higher than a year earlier.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New housing starts fell by more than three-quarters last year, with activity slowing by almost 84 per cent…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":342125,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[8582,72,3662,61,60],"class_list":["post-342124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-banking-and-payments-federation-ireland","tag-business","tag-housing-crisis","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=342124"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342124\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/342125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}