Desperate buyers are bidding up to €200k over asking price for a home in capital
HOUSING is in such short supply in the capital and its surrounds that some homes are attracting bids of up to €200,000 above the asking price with desperate buyers scrambling to secure a home from the lowest levels of stock ever witnessed.
Analysis by the Irish Daily Mail showed potential buyers consistently bidding more than €100,000 over the asking price, with offers soaring above what similar properties in the area have sold for in recent years.
In Sandyford Downs, Dublin 18 – which estate agents describe as a cul-de-sac in an upmarket family area – prices have taken off.
In 2020, data from the Property Price Register (PPR) showed a three-bed home sold for €495,000 while today, bids are coming in at €656,000 for a similar three-bed – more than €100,000 over the asking price of €545,000.
Meanwhile, a two-bed home in Saint John’s Cottages, Kilmainham, Dublin 8, was advertised with an asking price of €345,000 but in just over a week, a bidding war has seen offers on the house rise to €535,000 – up 55%.
The house has a master bedroom and a smaller bedroom which can be used as an office or a music room.
The man behind Offr, an independent technology platform for house bidders, believes he is not fuelling the housing frenzy, but is rather ‘taking the heat off it’.
Robert Hoban, 42, has more than 100 estate agents using his online bidding system after he launched the company in September 2019 – and they have recently expanded to Britain and South Africa too.
Asked whether his bidding site
was fuelling the rise in house prices, Mr Hoban told the Mail: ‘It’s completely the opposite. All those offers were still going to be coming in regardless, but they were going to be coming in a totally unregulated environment.
‘If anything, this takes the heat out of it, because only those that are fully qualified and approved are able to get involved – it eliminates tyre-kickers.’
Buyers must provide identity documents and proof of funds to place a bid. Mr Hoban, whose company has processed 20,000 offers to date, said: ‘Without technology like this, anybody can ring an estate agent and place an offer over the phone.
‘It eliminates all possibility of somebody trying to maliciously or malevolently place an offer.’
A property on Herberton Road, Rialto, Dublin 8, which is described as an ‘attractive four-bedroom end-of-terrace house’, has bids coming in at €542,000 despite the asking price being €450,000. Records show that in 2020, another Herberton Road home sold for €350,000.
Meanwhile, a four-bed home on Riverwood Court, Castleknock, Dublin 15, with a €640,000 asking price, reached €810,000 after bidders contested for the property described as a ‘stunning four-bedroom semidetached family home, situated in a mature, tree-lined cul-desac, close to open green spaces’.
The property bidding wars are not just being seen in the capital either. In neighbouring Co. Wicklow, a five-bed home sold for €705,000 on Rocky Valley Crescent in Kilmacanogue in 2020, according to the PPR.
But this year, bids for a five-bed on the same road have rocketed from €875,000 to €1,005,000.
The property, described as ‘an absolutely pristine, modern detached five-bedroom family home’, has a double garage and lies over 342 sq.m.
The Mail also discovered records that showed a two-bed home sold for €325,000 on West Terrace, Inchicore, Dublin 8 in 2019.
Today, Offr shows bids at €466,000 for the two-bed house next door despite an asking price of €375,000. The refurbished home has been described as a stylish property that has been tastefully decorated.
Mr Hoban sees no end in sight for Ireland’s soaring house prices.
He said: ‘In Ireland, there are around 50,000 residential properties sold every year, but there’s a lot more than 50,000 people trying to buy property.’
Mr Hoban said that the rate of housing supply tends to be slow and the time between planning and development can take up to three years.
He said: ‘You’re not going to get the sudden splurge of secondhand sellers, or new properties coming to market at once, which would cause a big oversupply that could potentially fuel a crash or a big dip. I think the very slow rate of supply over the next few years would probably prevent any large decline in prices.’
Mr Hoban believes the property market will continue to rise for the foreseeable future because while many predicted that working from home would drive people to rural areas, it has not materialised.
‘Slow rate of supply over next few years’