Housing bubble starting to pop?

Sponge Bob

Overall % Of Empty Houses in Ireland as % Of Total for the last 35 Years With Nice Pyramidic Graphic


Empty Rates running at twice what they were during the mad boom of the late 1970s.

whizzbang

Sponge Bob wrote:

Overall % Of Empty Houses in Ireland as % Of Total for the last 35 Years With Nice Pyramidic Graphic


Empty Rates running at twice what they were during the mad boom of the late 1970s.

They look like Census dates, are these CSO figures?

Cantab.

Sponge Bob wrote:

Overall % Of Empty Houses in Ireland as % Of Total for the last 35 Years With Nice Pyramidic Graphic


Empty Rates running at twice what they were during the mad boom of the late 1970s.

Yeah, because using 3-D volumetric graphs where one geometric component is proportional to the quantity being measured, but the volume is not, really just proves that you are attempting to sensationalise things.

Also, please quote your source for the above stats.

Are you a spin doctor?

Sponge Bob

I am a spin doctor , yes.

The source is the CSO .

The sample is EVERY house in Ireland during a census

2006 figures, read any paper in June .

1971 to 2002 figures are all here (table 4)

Sponge Bob

raw data from table 4 and from initial census return reports in national media June 2006 .

        
  Occupied   Empty    Total Housing Stock   Vacant as % of Total       1971   709,360   80,685   790,045   10.2       1979   876,659   73,514   950,173   7.7       1981   910,700   85,004   995,704   8.5       1986   976,304   120,970   1,097,274   11       1991   1,029,084   131,165   1,160,249   11.3       1996   1,123,238   135,710   1,258,948   10.8       2002   1,287,958   170,152   1,458,110   11.7       2006   1,525,000   275,000   1,800,000   16

Occupied Empty Total Housing Stock Vacant as % of Total
1971 709,360 80,685 790,045 10.2
1979 876,659 73,514 950,173 7.7
1981 910,700 85,004 995,704 8.5
1986 976,304 120,970 1,097,274 11
1991 1,029,084 131,165 1,160,249 11.3
1996 1,123,238 135,710 1,258,948 10.8
2002 1,287,958 170,152 1,458,110 11.7
2006 1,525,000 275,000 1,800,000 16

whizzbang

Sponge Bob wrote:

raw data from table 4 and from initial census return reports in national media June 2006 .

Can't say fairer than that.

faceman

Ok heres a question. If there are so many vacant houses and there is an impending bubble burst as claimed by some. Why arent these houses up for sale??

Pa ElGrande

Sponge Bob wrote:

Empty Rates running at twice what they were during the mad boom of the late 1970s.

We've had net immigration for the last few years and the percentage vacant is at a record high, one of the arguments for high house prices is shortage of supply this seems to go against the grain of that argument. However the experience of many first time buyer's is that there is a shortage of affordable housing in areas with services.

Some of the conclusions I reach from this:

• Housing has been built in areas were there is little demand.
• Inappropriate or 'unattractive' property has been built.
• Housing has been bought by speculators for capital appreciation only.
• It would not surprise me if some speculators were withdrawing the equity that has built up in these empty properties :rolleyes:
• Housing is priced beyond the means of people who might use the house for its intended true purpose. i.e. shelter
• Some developers and individuals are shouldering the burden of these empty houses.
• In event of a downturn lenders will experience large scale defaults.

Subjective theory of value
Any goods that are in unlimited supply, or in a greater supply than that demanded, would have no value. In other words, those useful items that are of insufficient quantity to satisfy demand have a price, and those that exist in numbers superfluous to demand (or that satisfy no wants) are free.

The implication is that in the event of an economic downturn these houses effectively become worthless or the price falls into negative equity. This will create a huge burden for the specuvestor because the bank will not allow them to sell without recovering their capital, so they end up chasing the market down to the bottom, until either they cannot afford repayments or property prices recover to previous levels (which could take many years).

Highly geared specuvestors are in deep trouble if they hold these properties.

whizzbang

faceman wrote:

Ok heres a question. If there are so many vacant houses and there is an impending bubble burst as claimed by some. Why arent these houses up for sale??

People waiting for prices to go even higher. remember, house prices cannot go down!

Pa ElGrande

faceman wrote:

Ok heres a question. If there are so many vacant houses and there is an impending bubble burst as claimed by some. Why arent these houses up for sale??

Greed is a necessary part of the bubble cycle. The holders of these properties are euphoric about the paper gains they have made, they believe house prices only ever rise and it will end with a soft landing, so they have nothing to loose in their minds. In effect they are blind to the risk of negative equity.
You know most of the opinions expressed on this thread are a minority view, in fact your opinions are closer to what the majority in this country think regarding property at this point in time.

Reyman

Sponge Bob wrote:

raw data from table 4 and from initial census return reports in national media June 2006 .

        
  Occupied   Empty    Total Housing Stock   Vacant as % of Total       1971   709,360   80,685   790,045   10.2       1979   876,659   73,514   950,173   7.7       1981   910,700   85,004   995,704   8.5       1986   976,304   120,970   1,097,274   11       1991   1,029,084   131,165   1,160,249   11.3       1996   1,123,238   135,710   1,258,948   10.8       2002   1,287,958   170,152   1,458,110   11.7       2006   1,525,000   275,000   1,800,000   16

Occupied Empty Total Housing Stock Vacant as % of Total
1971 709,360 80,685 790,045 10.2
1979 876,659 73,514 950,173 7.7
1981 910,700 85,004 995,704 8.5
1986 976,304 120,970 1,097,274 11
1991 1,029,084 131,165 1,160,249 11.3
1996 1,123,238 135,710 1,258,948 10.8
2002 1,287,958 170,152 1,458,110 11.7
2006 1,525,000 275,000 1,800,000 16

Interesting table SB: Population in 1971 3m and in 2006 4m. 790k houses in 1971 and 1,800k in 2006

Population increased by 33% . Housing increased by 127%.

So where was everyone living in 1971 ?

And how come we only had 1 house for every 3.8 people in 1971 and now we need 1 house for every 2.2 people in 2006.

Is it possible we have too many houses ? Maybe they’ll be “giving them away in five years”

faceman

whizzbang wrote:

People waiting for prices to go even higher. remember, house prices cannot go down!

all the owners cant be missing something though? Do they know something that we dont?

Pa ElGrande

Reyman wrote:

Interesting table SB: Population in 1971 3m and in 2006 4m. 790k houses in 1971 and 1,800k in 2006

Population increased by 33% . Housing increased by 127%.

So where was everyone living in 1971 ?

And how come we only had 1 house for every 3.8 people in 1971 and now we need 1 house for every 2.2 people in 2006.

Is it possible we have too many houses ? Maybe they’ll be “giving them away in five years”

One of the factors are family sizes getting smaller, in the 70's having a stay at home mother, with 4 children was not unusual. In Ireland 2006, unless you are at the exteme ends of the income scale that's not very common. Also more single people are buying property.

Blackjack

Reyman wrote:

Interesting table SB: Population in 1971 3m and in 2006 4m. 790k houses in 1971 and 1,800k in 2006

Population increased by 33% . Housing increased by 127%.

So where was everyone living in 1971 ?

And how come we only had 1 house for every 3.8 people in 1971 and now we need 1 house for every 2.2 people in 2006.

Is it possible we have too many houses ? Maybe they’ll be “giving them away in five years”

I suspect that this would have had something to do with the Deographics, where people had larger families and the Children lived at home a lot longer than they do now, as well as 3 generations living in the same home. I'm probably explaining this incorrectly, but you'll get the gist I'm sure.

Pa ElGrande

faceman wrote:

all the owners cant be missing something though? Do they know something that we dont?

Dan McLaughlin (Bank of Ireland) says there will be 3% growth, not to be out done Austin Hughes (IIB) says there will be 7% growth next year, the high priests have been perceived to be right so far. Employment in construction is on the up, the property supplements are bigger than they've ever been. There will be a soft landing, it'll all be grand.

Edit: The older generation (50+) largely depends on the Irish Times for their information, the Independent has become a bit too sensationalist for them. They don't know about this thread and other threads.

whizzbang

faceman wrote:

all the owners cant be missing something though? Do they know something that we dont?

Unfortunatly when prices go up a huge amount the owners of these properties believe they made money through their skill and judgement. In fact they are such estute investors that they buy a few more proeprties and they go up even more! They now see themselves are property barrons and are happily well on their way to being millionaires.

Now with all this money they have earnt it time for them to start enjoying themselves with some equity release. A few holidays here, a nice new Merc there, a few trips abroad to investigate foreign properties that are excellent value as they are so cheap compared to Ireland!

Unfortunatly this self belief starts to blind them to the possibility of prices falling, they don't think they would be so stupid as to not get out at the right time. They think that their skill and eye on the market will allow them to time the market and sell before anything bad happenes. With all this talk of a soft landing they are even less scared of losing out and are all putiing off selling until the softlanding helps them maximise their money. After all, they have made millions or Euro right? They are the elite of property investors, wheelers dealers, they know how this industry works, they won't get caught out.

This is my own jealous/bitter opinion. Who knows if it is true or not, I doubt they are all in this situation.

Pa ElGrande

faceman wrote:

FTB's are not the only purchasers of new properties.

Agreed. The figure I mentioned is a combination of 39,542 first time buyer's and 28,046 buy to let's made up over the last 4 quarters (Q3 2005 through Q2 2006)

SimpleSam06

Its nothing to do with bitterness, jealousy or begrudgery, nor even to do with smaller family units or single people buying homes (can anyone actually do that anymore?). I already posted this over on AAM, but it bears repeating. Heres how it goes.

Its a vicious circle. Low interest rates mean larger loans for people earning less, enabling higher house prices (indeed the only thing that does, unless someone found an oil well suddenly in every home in the country), which speculators pay in the hope of capital appreciation and in the process artificially reducing supply, which builders take as licence to vastly increase construction output. Rinse, repeat.

Our economy is crap. You can't export houses. The next 35 years have been mortgaged away foolishly, and all the tax benefits have been squandered on the civil service (3x private sector pay rises, for the safest jobs - nice). The EU is wondering why we, one of the richest countries in the world, apparently, are still not a net contributor to the EU, so they aren't going to bail anyone out.

Its wiping out this country's future to line the pockets of the banks and the nouveau riche who will most likely become the nouveau poivre, and I'll be laughing my ass off when then do. The only tragedy in this is that a lot of struggling young families will suffer seriously when that happens.

Sponge Bob

Pa ElGrande wrote:

We've had net immigration for the last few years and the percentage vacant is at a record high

I would put that more strongly Pa. SBs wording

'Despite the massive historic demand for housing units in Ireland caused by record levels of household formation in historic terms and by immigration on a hitherto unknown scale we have NEVERTHELESS managed to build a historically very high level of unused inventory into that housing market.'

The late 1970s were a period of large scale in-migration during which the level of vacant properties as a % of the housing stock hit a historic low of c 8% . In the early 00s we are runnning at twice that rate of empties despite the demand.

We have overbuilt, plain and simple.

Pa ElGrande wrote:

Some of the conclusions I reach from this:

• Housing has been built in areas were there is little demand.

Tax relief fuelled schems such as seaside resorts and rural renewal (Leitrim/Sligo/Roscommon) fuelled construction have left those areas (add note 1 ) and ( note 2 ) with an inventory of perhaps 15,000 housing units that are tax shelters. As these tax schemes have not yet run their course this is unlikely to unravel until the end of the decade.

Nevertheless empty tax incentivised 'holiday homes' in April account for no more than 10% of the total empties in Ireland and are localised and locked off the market while the schemes run their course. They will be pretty worthless come 2012 .

• Inappropriate or 'unattractive' property has been built.

shoeboxes in Athy , semis in south central Laois and detached houses in rural Longford have been built to service a historically enormous Dublin commuter belt. They will be stranded in effect as that belt shrinks in the coming years .....once the construction boom peters out and most of the immigrants leave.

• Housing has been bought by speculators for capital appreciation only.

This is the single largest reason fro their being a large number of empties, in 1971 the single largest reason was that the houses were OLD, decrepit and in rural areas that were undergoing population contraction....and had been since the famine. The 1971 empties were not in Dublin or Galway , they were on hilltops in Leitrim where there was simply no demand.

We now have the 'wrong kind' of empties , owned by speculators and in areas where there is actual demand for housing.

• It would not surprise me if some speculators were withdrawing the equity that has built up in these empty properties :rolleyes:

or to get the deposit to get an IO mortgage to buy another empty mate

• Pa ElGrande wrote:

  Housing is priced beyond the means of people who might use the house for its intended true purpose. i.e. shelter

only if they buy it. Rent , relative to incomes in ireland, is pretty reasonable even in central Dublin .

• Some developers and individuals are shouldering the burden of these empty houses.

for the moment and as long as appreciation continues.

Pa ElGrande wrote:

• In event of a downturn lenders will experience large scale defaults.

yet to be seen. I am unsure as to what level of default will impair the banking system . I shall formulate an opinion on that anon or maybe very anon

Pa ElGrande wrote:

The implication is that in the event of an economic downturn these houses effectively become worthless or the price falls into negative equity. This will create a huge burden for the specuvestor because the bank will not allow them to sell without recovering their capital, so they end up chasing the market down to the bottom, until either they cannot afford repayments or property prices recover to previous levels (which could take many years).

this will certainly happen in ultra commuter belt areas where the ration of the asset to the outstanding loan will look bad. It will be much less of a problem in areas where there is demand....such as D4 . The banks will tailor their threats to local conditions .

Pa ElGrande wrote:

Highly geared specuvestors are in deep trouble if they hold these properties.

They are in trouble already and if they do not know that I am minded to be purely Darwinian in their cases.

D'Peoples Voice

faceman wrote:

chief, myself and even some of my debating adverseries have been reading the newspapers and news online. If you read the business section and the FULL articles on inflation rates rather than the first paragraph, there are plenty of recent examples where comments about future decreases in interest rates are made.

Clearly the European Central Bank is unaware of any such potential movements

Garganas is the fourth ECB policy maker in the past week to signal the bank may keep raising rates into 2007 to tame inflation in the 12 euro nations. President Jean-Claude Trichet has already indicated an increase is likely next month and council member Axel Weber said Sept. 5 the ECB hasn't decided to stop tightening monetary policy at the end of the year.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=aFIODdQJW.4E&refer=europe
After reading your post, I thought I would check up on interest rate futures to see what they are pricing in, and they are not pricing in a decrease. Also

Sept. 12 (Bloomberg) -- European bonds continued their decline, sending two-year yields to their highest since August 2002, after European Central Bank council member Nicholas Garganas said the bank is "very worried'' about inflation.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=a9uZjUqYIH_o&refer=europe
So it would seem that investors across Europe don't have the priviledge information that you have, so can you please supply your sources. I've always wanted to get rich and retire early, and seeing as how the financial markets are ALL gearing up for higher interest rates in the future, it would be great to speculate on lower interest rates.:D
I'm going to call your bluff and say that you have no source to back up your belief that the yield curve is in a state of backwardation!

faceman

D'Peoples Voice wrote:

Clearly the European Central Bank is unaware of any such potential movements

and seeing as how the financial markets are ALL gearing up for higher interest rates in the future, it would be great to speculate on lower interest rates.:D
I'm going to call your bluff and say that you have no source to back up your belief that the yield curve is in a state of backwardation!

Central bank never comments directly on future changes to rates.

I read my info in irish newspapers. Im not posting links to it but when i come across more i will.

Btw, i never said that there would be lower rates, i said that there was speculation that rates would rise and possibly start to decrease again late 2007.

Note link below on Ireland 's cheap corporation tax. No signs of an immediate change of policy and it was challenged in court... and failed. For as long as we have cheap corporate tax there will always be investment in ireland.

http://www.businessworld.ie/livenews.htm?a=1512740

http://www.breakingnews.ie/2006/09/12/story276508.html

Note link below on immigration.
http://www.businessworld.ie/livenews.htm?a=1512688

I would be curious to find out what percentage of immigrants purchase property. Anyone got any stats on that?

SimpleSam06

faceman wrote:

Note link below on Ireland 's cheap corporation tax.

Its not UK companies we need to worry about, its the American multinationals.

dazberry

This is an extract from an article by Pat McArdle (Ulsterbank) published in The Professional Insurance Broker Magazine - sorry I don't have a linky.

Over the past seven years, construction added 117,000 workers, more than one-quarter of all additional jobs.

Clearly, it cannot continue to expand at this pace and recent statistics reveal a significant slowdown in the rate of increase in employment. This is also evident in wage trends. The rate of increase in average weekly earnings, which hit highs of 15% in 1999, and was running at close to 10% just a year ago, was down to just 1% in the first quarter of 2006.

Non-nationals account for a growing share of construction employment. In Q1, some 27,000 were employed, an increase of 46% on a year earlier. There is, however, competition to get into construction. While half of all jobs created last year were filled by non-nationals, they accounted for a somewhat lesser, 40%, of the increase in construction jobs. It appears that Irish people still find the wage levels in the sector attractive. This, in turn, raises the interesting question of who would lose their jobs if there were to be a turndown - the relatively high-paid Irish or the lower paid non-nationals.

A shake out is inevitable. This year, new house completions will be above 90,000. While the sustainable long-term demand is hard to gauge, the ESRI put it somewhere between 60,000 and 70,000, depending on economic developments and immigration. Clearly, a lesser number of people will be required to build, say, 65,000 houses than is required for 95,000 - some estimates put the reduction in jobs as high as 50,000, hopefully over a number of years. Where will they go? Well, some should be redeployed into other construction jobs, notably civil engineering which is now expanding rapidly. However, this will require a shift in emphasis by the Government which, until recently at least, was contracting out to large overseas firms which frequently brought their own workforces with them. Then there is Northern Ireland - a major infrastructural programme is just getting off the ground and would provide a natural home for many Northern Irish who work south of the border. Finally, there is the London Olympics which will spawn much construction over the next few years. Also, non-nationals who lose their jobs are likely to be more mobile and may seek jobs abroad. For these reasons, I expect the impact of any downsizing on unemployment to be less than would be expected by reference to past experience when jobs elsewhere were not as plentiful.

Please note that the above outlook is based on an orderly slowdown in housing, not a collapse. Obviously, if a crisis were to occur, and I am not forecasting one, the above adjustments, which might occur over a number of years, would be telescoped into a much shorter period.

People can draw their own conclusions from this - to me it does seem to be attempting to very calmly lower expectations. Again no timescales are predicted - so maybe Dan McLaughlin or Austin Hughes may yet be proved right in the short-term, but a shake-out is inevitable?!.

The bit in red - i.e. the government ~will~ have to me more supportive of indigenous industry after the shake-out strikes a chord in that for the last 4+ years the IT industry have been calling for more indigenous contract awards - and as recently as last weekend Tony McGuire from System Dynamics was talking about this on Newstalk 106's Down to Business. Those sort of calls which are in essence to prop up a sector not doing too well generally (or preceived not to be in the future) I find pretty worrying.

D.

Pa ElGrande

Lots of good news for property bulls today.

• Irish job growth continues at 4.6 per cent, about 3 times the pace seen in the US and about 6 times that of the UK and Germany.
• Migrants and older workers mean labour supply also growing sharply.
• Public sector employment accelerates. Is this the economic or the political cycle?
• Construction and retailing also buoyant and reflect dramatic population growth.
• Members living here also growing much faster than elsewhere – about 4 times as fast as the rest of Europe.
• Migration the key and may still be understated.

more >>>

Irish Jobs and Population boom continue - - Austin Hughes, IIB Bank
http://www.finfacts.com/irelandbusinessnew..._10007266.shtml

recent trends in employment continue with main increases in construction and public sector, manufacturing still flat or declining.

The strength of migration into Ireland continues to underpin demand for property according to Sherry FitzGerald, Ireland’s largest estate agency.

Commenting on the latest estimates from the CSO for population and migration the chief economist with Sherry FitzGerald Group, Marian Finnegan noted that: “One of the key drivers of demand in the property market in recent years has been the strength of population growth.

"Such population growth continued with even greater vigour in 2006 with the latest data revealing that the total number of immigrants to Ireland reached 86,900 in the year to April 2006, notably the highest figure ever on record since the present series of annual migration estimates began in 1987.

"The impact of such strong levels of immigration on the property market is very direct. Even if one assumes that one third of all immigrants either buy or rent a property that suggests a requirement for just short of 30,000 units, almost a third of all new properties built in the same period.

Strength of migration 'underpins property demand'
http://breakingnews.iol.ie/news/story.asp?...amp;p=y95z3zz98

The CSO data is here

Population and Migration Estimates April 2006
http://www.cso.ie/releasespublications/documents/population/current/popmig.pdf

Quarterly National Household Survey, Quarter 2 2006
http://www.cso.ie/releasespublications/documents/labour_market/current/qnhs.pdf

Index of Employment in Construction July 2006
http://www.cso.ie/releasespublications/documents/construction/current/indexemp.pdf

"The rate of increase in housing output was broadly unchanged in August, as was that of the industry as a whole given that shifts in civil, down a bit, cancelled out commercial, which was up a bit."
Staffing
Staffing levels in the sector have increased every month since September 2003, in line with new orders, which also rose strongly in August.
Over 36pc of firms indicated that there was a rise in new work. However, there was also a rise in input prices for Irish constructors with metals and fuel costs rising.
Construction activity has been growing every month since the end of 2003, with late 2004 proving to be the peak of activity before a subsequent drop.

more >>

Building on the rise as order books are swelling
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=184&si=1686317&issue_id=14630 [free registration required]

All that debt and stamp duty has to go somewhere.

SimpleSam06

Pa ElGrande wrote:

Lots of good news for property bulls today.

Nice bit of devils advocacy there Pa!

Pa ElGrande wrote:

recent trends in employment continue with main increases in construction and public sector, manufacturing still flat or declining.

Does anything more need to be said, really? As I have said before, all the tax money is being wasted on the civil service, not on local industry and infrastructure, where it should be going. And construction employment is growing... Why are they toting this as a good thing?

Good to know that Sherry Fitz think the property boom will continue, though.

belly

SimpleSam06 wrote:

Erm its September. Theres a college and national uni in Galweh. Students are what, a quarter of the city population around here? Come back to me next April and tell me how demand is doing...

well quite strong if my property is anything to go by i put a semi d in knocknacarra up for rent in may and it was gone in 2 weeks

ronbyrne2005

GUNNE SEES PROPERTY BLAZE DYING OUT - Gunne has become the latest firm of auctioneers to call time on the roaring property market here. This morning it says the indications are that growth will ease considerably before the end of the year.

Managing director of Gunne's residential division, Declan Cassidy, said he hoped for a more stable market in the last four months of the year. He expected the market to be slower next year, though Budget measures to help first-time buyers may lead to a lift early in the year.

belly

SimpleSam06 wrote:

Nice bit of devils advocacy there Pa!

SimpleSam06 wrote:

Does anything more need to be said, really?

no you've got it all figured out the economy is crap galways employment is going into a nose dive. all the immigrants are running for the door. the goverments to blame its all bad, the end is coming and your gonna have the last laugh at all the fools who invested in property blah blah :rolleyes:

SimpleSam06 wrote:

As I have said before, all the tax money is being wasted on the civil service, not on local industry and infrastructure, where it should be going.

how is it all being wasted? bench marking maybe? or would we have been better off with our nurses and teachers etc striking for more money and bring our economic tiger to a grinding halt? maybe we should privatise more of the public sector and get rid of the problem altogether.

SimpleSam06 wrote:

And construction employment is growing... Why are they toting this as a good thing?

it means the demand is still there which is due to our continuing economic growth which of course is a good thing,

SimpleSam06 wrote:

Good to know that Sherry Fitz think the property boom will continue, though.

it is isnt it:)

Pa ElGrande

belly wrote:

no you've got it all figured out the economy is crap galways employment is going into a nose dive. all the immigrants are running for the door. the goverments to blame its all bad, the end is coming and your gonna have the last laugh at all the fools who invested in property blah blah :rolleyes:

The problem is our domestic economy is increasingly dependant on the construction sector and public sector for employment growth, both sectors which you would expect to do well as the population expands. Take away the construction boom and there is a €3 billion hole in government revenue.
Building houses does not create wealth in an economy, its a function of the transfer of wealth from one generation to another, almost entirely funded by borrowing that must be paid off well into the future.

belly wrote:

how is it all being wasted? bench marking maybe? or would we have been better off with our nurses and teachers etc striking for more money and bring our economic tiger to a grinding halt? maybe we should privatise more of the public sector and get rid of the problem altogether.

The real problem in the public sector is the fact it is a monopoly and is focused on building its own empire rather than delivering the best service. For discussion in another thread, the real problem in the health service is that the fundamental model is broken. A key observation of the investigations into the various scandals, is the lack of accountabilty, departmental scabbling and bad management. If they really wanted to solve the beds crises it can be done overnight, but it is simply used as a tool to extract more money from the government.

belly wrote:

it means the demand is still there which is due to our continuing economic growth which of course is a good thing,

Its funded by record private sector debt, for it to keep going banks must lend even more money. As the wages are generally high its taking more Irish people from the productive sector of the economy (that that generates wealth). Its a cruel confidence trick, since there is a limit to how long this level of borrowing can continue.

SimpleSam06

Pa ElGrande wrote:

Its funded by record private sector debt, for it to keep going banks must lend even more money. As the wages are generally high its taking more Irish people from the productive sector of the economy (that that generates wealth). Its a cruel confidence trick, since there is a limit to how long this level of borrowing can continue.

That limit has already been reached and exceeded, according to Fisk...

The rating agency Fitch said it now has five countries on watch for "macro-prudential stress", up from two last year, using a set of indicators. A mixed bag, they comprise Iceland, Azerbaijan, South Africa, Russia and, surprisingly, Ireland, where the ratio of private credit to GDP has reached 190pc, the world's highest. The denouement for Ireland may not be pretty, since it gave up control of monetary policy when it joined the euro.

But sure its perfectly normal for prices per square foot in Dublin to be as high as those in Manhattan. Sure so what if New York State has more than five times the population of this entire country. The prices here are perfectly right and natural. Thats just common sense, so who needs links to back up bullish arguments? In fact who needs anything, just accept it!