Property Market 2017

Hollister11 wrote: »

There was a house my parents were looking at in 2011. It was a 3 story house in Howth, which was bought by various developers for 800K to 1.2M.

It was up for sale for 325K, and sold for 315K. Now it was on ruin, but with 150K, you had a great house for cheap enough

They didn't end up buying it, and deeply regret it.

We were looking at a place that was bought for 950K - ended up going for under 100K. The issue is that the site value and the house value are two different things (to home owners vs developers) and ruined houses can be money pits, especially for people without a trade. There are also only so many of these 'opportunities' about.

The_Conductor wrote: »

Guys- those prices are nutty- I don't like to be evil calling the market an overblown bubble- and indeed, there are plenty of people doing so- but those prices are crazy. If supply ever ramps up- which it is doing incrementally- the only thing property in a lot of these areas have going for them- is location, and in all honesty- while the areas are gentrified to a large extent, they're still far from being the most desirable of areas............

My only issue with this is where are they going to put this supply.

The Development at Ringsend is going to be apartments - and they'll be expensive.

Docklands - Apartments and they'll be eye wateringly expensive as they were previously.

Portmarnock/Swords - great but not everyone want to rely on the DART/Bus or live that far out.

I'm not overly familiar with South Dublin but I can't imagine there is going to be huge banks of land out there.

D15 is already an example of what happens when you over subscribe an area for housing and don't put in proper transport links.

I expect to see inner Dublin areas like D5/D8/D12 continue to gentrify and prices continue to rise although I do agree they are due a correction as there is a definite bubble going on, but it will be temporary pain if the economy continues to grow and Dublin expand.

Bob24 wrote: »

What kind of price do people expect for the Ringsend / Dockland apartments?

Going to have to back pedal a bit and say I assumed they were going to be apartments - actually doing some googling I'm not not so sure. However there is 3000 units going in and between 300-1000 of them will be social housing. I'm thinking much closer to 300, the 30% seems a bit of a pipe dream.

Pricewise I'd expect around 200K minimum for a one bed, 300K for a two bed and more for any houses. Docklands 2 beds - although they were big were coming in around 500K during the last boom, so possibly 450ish.

The mix of social housing should keep the prices in check with any luck. A bloody good reason to do mixed developments in of it self IMHO.

However take my suggestions with the massive pinch of salt, they're pure guess work. The only thing I would say is GCD is more desirable than rings end and closer to the DART.

The_Conductor wrote: »

Keep in mind the whole area has been designated as deprived- to the extent that the local national school (St. Mary's) is classified as a Deise school- so if you're putting 300 social housing units in there- even alongside 2000+ other properties- wholly aside from its proximity to Baggot Street/Ballsbridge- they will dampen possible prices (and this is regardless of the prices of the pre-existing housing stock in the area).

It is a designated area of deprivation- though its quite a funny area- you have millionaires and paupers with nothing to their names- living side by side.

The Docklands though? Definitely agreed there is a strange social mix in the area - but with plenty of highly paid jobs and many young professionals who are ready to spend a large chunk of their income in housing expenses to live within a few minutes from their office, apartments will get rented instantly and for very high rents. I might be wrong but I think this will sound very attractive to investors and push the prices of new units to the roof.

Actually I think I saw that apartments in what seems like the largest development - capital docks - won't even go for sale and will be retained by an investment fund for rental.

The_Conductor wrote: »

I hate to see this happening- its becoming more and more common though....... :mad:

How are 300 social units going to fit into the equation? The rule is they can't all be in the one block- they have to be scattered throughout- so it doesn't really add-up?

Sounds completely counter-productive to me as well.

This is what I was mentioning: http://capitaldock.ie/living.php

Kennedy Wilson is one of Dublin’s most important landlords with six premium city apartment schemes. Capital Dock occupiers will also get to offer employees privileged access to these rental properties.

So if I get it right the developer will retain the whole development including residential units, and rent them in priority to employees of companies occupying office spaces. Total privatisation of the rental units by a single owner, which not only won't go to the open market for sale, but possibly not even for rental!

If employment status makes it into the legislation specifically - it could be an interesting one. However this is only logical given the problem faced in Dublin. Work for us and you can get somewhere to live - it's also a taste of whats coming if (more like when) us 'crack of the arse' (as I was amsusingly called) paddy property investor landlords are finally driven out of the market.

Want to rent in Dublin, well great no problem as long as you works for one of about a dozen companies.

These wholly-owned rental buildings have been around for a while to some extent (a good few showed up during the crash as selling apartments became almost impossible). When I was renting I was in one for a while; definitely my best experience of renting, in that the management was competent, fixed things reasonably quickly, getting the deposit back was no problem, and generally none of the problems that come with amateur landlords.

From a longer-term sustainability point of view, there should also be no trouble with landlords not paying management fees etc, which does reputedly happen a fair bit and causes trouble for management companies.

Obviously, there are great single–property/small number of properties landlords out there, but it's really luck of the draw; you've no idea what you're getting til you move in. If this model becomes more popular, then the companies will build up reputations, and you'll at least have a good idea that renting with company X you don't have to worry about the heating not getting fixed for a month or whatever.

Got to say, if I was renting today I'd be inclined to go with one of the whole-building outfits. Obviously, in the current severely supply-constrained market there's opportunity for bad behaviour by them, but that's also true for private landlords.

On the priority access to employees of specific companies thing, I think that happens already to an extent, also. At one point when I was viewing a place to rent, I was asked if I worked for one of two large employers in the area; when I said I didn't, the estate agent more or less gave up on me. Not sure what was happening there; possibly a deal with the estate agent... IMO any priority access based on employer should be legislated against.

Presumably the private landlords could incorporate, in principle, and benefit from more favourable tax treatment. Of course, they'd still be taxed heavily on _removing_ money from the company (as salary or dividend or whatever), but that's presumably the same for the companies developing these buildings.

A flat tax on gross rent would make things very difficult for landlords with heavily mortgaged properties, I'd have thought, unless it was very low.

rsynnott wrote: »

These wholly-owned rental buildings have been around for a while to some extent (a good few showed up during the crash as selling apartments became almost impossible). When I was renting I was in one for a while; definitely my best experience of renting, in that the management was competent, fixed things reasonably quickly, getting the deposit back was no problem, and generally none of the problems that come with amateur landlords.

From a longer-term sustainability point of view, there should also be no trouble with landlords not paying management fees etc, which does reputedly happen a fair bit and causes trouble for management companies.

Obviously, there are great single–property/small number of properties landlords out there, but it's really luck of the draw; you've no idea what you're getting til you move in. If this model becomes more popular, then the companies will build up reputations, and you'll at least have a good idea that renting with company X you don't have to worry about the heating not getting fixed for a month or whatever.

Got to say, if I was renting today I'd be inclined to go with one of the whole-building outfits. Obviously, in the current severely supply-constrained market there's opportunity for bad behaviour by them, but that's also true for private landlords.

On the priority access to employees of specific companies thing, I think that happens already to an extent, also. At one point when I was viewing a place to rent, I was asked if I worked for one of two large employers in the area; when I said I didn't, the estate agent more or less gave up on me. Not sure what was happening there; possibly a deal with the estate agent... IMO any priority access based on employer should be legislated against.

In this case it is being pushed one step further though: the website is hinting at the fact that those units will be formally privatised for employees of certain partner companies.

I really don't think segregating the rental market like this will go well in the context of a housing crisis. Basically this is a bit like the luxury flip side of the same coin as dorms for factory workers in China: an economy whereby the only way to fulfil such a vital need as housing has to rely on the goodwill of you employer providing it for you (i.e. if you work for the wrong employer you're screwed and this gives employers a lot more leverage on employees).

And that is not to mention the tax distortion issue The Conductor alluded to, as well as the fact that letting large corporations control a large number of housing units in an area gives them a lot of control on the rental market and prevents people who could otherwise afford it from becoming owner-occupiers.

rsynnott wrote: »

Presumably the private landlords could incorporate, in principle, and benefit from more favourable tax treatment. Of course, they'd still be taxed heavily on _removing_ money from the company (as salary or dividend or whatever), but that's presumably the same for the companies developing these buildings.

A flat tax on gross rent would make things very difficult for landlords with heavily mortgaged properties, I'd have thought, unless it was very low.

It's very difficult to incorporate due to the loans involved.

Jan_de_Bakker wrote: »

So just heard Pat Kenny talking about those new houses in Portmarnock that sold out (people were queing) at €430,000.
Allready some are up for rent at €2,500 per month.

Can't believe this **** is happening again ...

I saw one of those ads. Available immediately apparently. Yet the houses are not. It's still a building site.
This is either a scam or canny marketing. (I suspect the latter, building hype)