Shift to more apartments and urban living sees fall in size of average home

OUR homes are shrinking. New homes completed so far this year are almost a third smaller than their equivalent 10 years ago.

That is only partly accounted for by the fact that a new home is now more likely to be an apartment than previously. Single houses have fallen in size by 25pc and houses in schemes of two or more units by 14pc.

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) findings point to a move towards higher-density living, which is encouraged as it makes better use of available land and reduces the sprawl that leads to long commutes and congestion.

But they also provide food for thought as hundreds of thousands of workers now struggle to make space to work from home, and face doing so for a further prolonged period.

A single house completed 10 years ago had an average floor space of 229 sq m, 50 sq m bigger than its equivalent today.

Average size grew further to 237 sq m in 2013 before falling gradually to 179 sq m. This was the average for one-off houses completed between January and March this year.

Houses in schemes were at their largest in 2014 when they averaged 142 sq m, but that has fallen to 123 sq m.

Apartment size rose and fell in alternate years for the first half of the decade, but they have seen a gentle rise to 85 sq m since 2016.

While apartment size has grown, so too has the number of apartments displacing the traditional family home.

Some 75pc more were completed in the first three months of this year compared to the same period last year.

Home building in general had its best start to a year for at least a decade with almost 5,000 new dwellings completed in the first three months, even taking into account that construction sites shut before the end of March.

Of the 4,986 homes completed, 1,094 were single houses, 2,848 were houses in schemes and 1,044 were apartments.

In total, that was a 17pc increase on 2019.

Had that pace continued, with the anticipated surge that normally happens later in the year, it was expected that more than 20,000 new homes would have been completed by the end of the year.

With an almost two-month shutdown, however, and restricted working practices to be observed when sites reopen on May 18, progress in completing developments is expected to slow significantly.

The CSO’s figures show a clear urban-rural divide in house building with 81.3pc of all completions in urban areas and just 18.8pc in rural areas.

Dublin accounted for 33pc of all completions and also for 80pc of all new apartments.

Just over half of all dwellings completed in Dublin were apartments and that proportion rose to more than 90pc in the city centre.

Of all the local authority areas in the country, Dublin city had the greatest number of new dwelling completions with 684, while Leitrim had the lowest at just five.

It comes amid claims as few as 18,000 homes may be built this year due to coronavirus restrictions, 7,000 short of the government target.

The estimate was made by Fianna Fáil TD Darragh O’Brien as the Dáil debated the impact of the emergency on the existing housing crisis.

Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy said 5,000 homes had been built in the first quarter of the year before construction work was halted.