One in four houses lying empty

ALMOST a quarter of all dwellings in Kerry are lying vacant for most of the year according to preliminary census results released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).

The census figures show that there are currently 18,257 houses that can be classed as vacant in the county. That represents 24 per cent of the counties entire 75,319 unit housing stock.

According to the figures Kerry now has the third highest vacancy rate in the country coming just behind Leitrim and Donegal.

The highest vacancy rates are centred in the west Kerry peninsula, and in South Kerry.

These figures seem to be driven by the large number of unoccupied holiday homes in the areas.

Holiday homes account for almost half of Kerry’s 18,000 vacant dwellings.

The Derrynane and Caherdaniel area in south Kerry has the highest vacancy rate of any electoral division in Kerry at almost 70 percent, but 177 of its 199 unoccupied houses are holiday homes the majority of which are typically occupied in the summer months and over holiday periods.

This a characteristic shared with other electoral divisions who have similarly high vacancy rates.

In spite of the large number of vacant properties in the county the census revealed that the number of vacant housing units in Kerry actually dropped since 2011.

There are now 1,462 fewer vacant units in the county than there were at the time of the 2011 census. Nationally the number of vacant units fell by 13 per cent in the last five years while Ireland housing stock rose to 2.023 million units.

File photo Derrynane in South Kerry. The popular holiday destination has the highest level of vacant housing in the county. This is due to the large proportion of holiday homes that are in the area.