Irish Property Market chat II - *read mod note post #1 before posting*

https://www.myhome.ie/residential/brochure/1-beaumont-lawn-beaumont-cork/4783431

4 bed semi d (4th "bedroom" doesn't fit an actual bed) in Marina Village Greystones sold in August and now up on Property price register that it went for 945k. These were 600k 3 years ago and originally 470k ish when built. A rated etc, but basic design and slightly awkward for family with kids as just one reception room off kitchen so no additional room for teenagers to gather.

Is this peak would anyone say?

As long as the population is growing and the magic money printing-press is churning out the funny-money, there will be no peak. If there is to be a crash, it will come only if the population declines and the state has no ability to inflate the market directly.

If the buyers had no savings and were first time buyers, they would need a combined salary of just over 190k.

It would be interesting to see a graph of median salary for the last 20years with the median house sales during the same period.

The not sustainable comment is bit plucked from top of my head. They could be people trading down or trading up and carrying in lot of equity.

This house price is driven up by cost of doer uppers. A run down semi D in that area going for 550k to 600k. Allowing for the large site size and great aspect its prob worth 650k plus pre being done up. Costs of renovating so high and takes a year so you arent long arriving at 850k is justifiable to buyers.

Ive been most surprised to date in housing market that cost of renovation/extension costs seem to have done nothing to hit run up in doer upper house prices.

I think what happened in Cork is post Covid you have people moving to Cork with Dublin/London salaries (or wealth fromm selling homes) and in tight supply market they are happy to bid up as still much cheaper relative to market they came from.

They could be people trading down or trading up and carrying in lot of equity.

And it is most likely the case. People that could buy a house when the affordability was better and are now able to afford this one. The question is: If they were first time buyer for their current house, would they be able to afford it now?

You can't just look at what a new build was bought and sold for and put the increase down purely to house price inflation. It may have been bought for 570k but that's a house with no floors, blinds, curtains etc and possibly no kitchen/bathroom tiling or appliances. So add in the cost of all that which could be anything depending on quality plus any landscaping, attic flooring etc and the cost price will be a lot more than 570k.

It's unlikely that someone on that level of income would have no savings. You'd have to work very hard to waste that much money.

Fundamental issue is, that Irish property prices were/are just far too low. This is one of the easiest Western countries to get on the ladder for middle income earners if you have realistic expectations.

US, Canada, Germany are far worse.

I for one can't wait until we suffer similar social issues as USA and Canada due to lack of affordable housing.

All those homeless people really add a lot of culture to the cities

Yet the most unproductive sector in the economy (construction) are able to increase margins by up to 20% in the last 12 months

Plenty of countries who are far better. We don't need to follow the countries which are far worse.

We should strive to follow the countries who do better at housing and other areas like health and infrastructure.

A slum lord could well buy that.