Empty housing estates?

declamps

Myself and my wife were looking at property to buy in the city for the last few days. And I noticed a lot of empty houses in Knock na Carra. I dont want to mention the exact estates online but it was enough to put the fear of another bubble in my head.Even where we live at the moment there at least 3 empty houses. Has anyone else noticed this around where you live, I've been reading about housing shortages for the last couple of years so I was surprised to see in a matter of days the amount of empty houses not for sale in the city.
Has anyone else noticed anything similar where you live?

fergiesfolly

declamps wrote: »

Myself and my wife were looking at property to buy in the city for the last few days. And I noticed a lot of empty houses in Knock na Carra. I dont want to mention the exact estates online but it was enough to put the fear of another bubble in my head.Even where we live at the moment there at least 3 empty houses. Has anyone else noticed this around where you live, I've been reading about housing shortages for the last couple of years so I was surprised to see in a matter of days the amount of empty houses not for sale in the city.
Has anyone else noticed anything similar where you live?

Just mulling it over, with no proof of anything.
But could be landlords awaiting the return of students. Galway is student Mecca and they'll be back in droves from mid September onwards.

Storm 10

fergiesfolly wrote: »

Just mulling it over, with no proof of anything.
But could be landlords awaiting the return of students. Galway is student Mecca and they'll be back in droves from mid September onwards.

Students are back since the 1st week of September anyone not sorted by now is on trouble

ben.schlomo

fergiesfolly wrote: »

Just mulling it over, with no proof of anything.
But could be landlords awaiting the return of students. Galway is student Mecca and they'll be back in droves from mid September onwards.

Mid September?? You do realise it's the 26th today yes?

Op ive not noticed anything similar in other parts of the city. There's one empty for the last two years down the road from us but that's about the only one in the area.

Cheshire Cat

There are 20 houses in my road. 3 are let to students and 3 are empty. There are more empty houses in the adjoining roads. Good area, within walking distance of university and town.

Mrs OBumble

There are various things driving what you see:

Some property owners who are away short to medium term are now scared to let houses, because the government is making it more and more difficult to get rid of tenants (good or bad).

Also, rent increases have been limited in many areas, including Galway: If a landlord was letting at well below market rate, they are effectively trapped into letting at that rate plus 4% per year indefinitely. Unless the house is off the rental market for 2 years. So some are choosing to not rent, and just put the house on AirBnB for a few weeks each year, and so making as much as they were with less risk of overholding tenants.

When old people are in care under Fair Deal, the financial incentive is to leave their house empty rather than sell it.

There are some houses in Knockers which were abandoned in 2009/10 is when the recession was in fully swing. I'd suspect some are now uninhabitable due to deteriorating with no heating on.

And I'm sure there are more factors, too. I don't know that any are Galway-specific, though.

buzz11

You can 'report' vacant houses on this website;

https://vacanthomes.ie/


newspaper article about it here;

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/new-empty-houses-database-goes-live-as-national-homeless-crisis-worsens-36003998.html