120,000 derelict or empty buildings
Amid a sharp drop in homes to rent, almost 100,000 are lying vacant
ALMOST 100,000 homes across the country are vacant or derelict during a record decline in properties available to rent, the Irish Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Despite the unprecedented housing shortage, 98,916 homes that could be developed for housing are vacant or derelict. This does not include holiday or second homes. And 23,460 business premises are also lying idle, according to the latest figures from GeoDirectory, a data gathering service provided by An Post.
Ending the blight of derelict homes and business premises in towns and rural areas was one of the pillars of the last government’s response to the housing crisis. But five years on from the Rebuilding Ireland launch, the Government maintains it does not have an accurate count of vacant or derelict buildings that could be transformed into much-needed housing.
The MoS has also learned that the Government has thus far appointed only three ‘vacant sites
‘The Government is not taking this seriously’
officers’ to the country’s 31 local authorities.
A major spat erupted in the Dáil last week when Government chief whip and Junior Minister Jack Chambers, whose brief includes the Central Statistics Office, was unable to provide figures for the number of derelict sites in the country.
The Departments of Housing and of An Taoiseach were also unable to provide a figure on the number of empty homes across the country when asked by the MoS.
This is despite the recent launch of the Town Centre First policy by Rural Affairs Minister Heather Humphreys, which aims to redevelop main streets in urban areas. And it comes as Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien prepares to announce a flagship programme called the Croí Cónaithe Fund, part of which will provide grants to people to refurbish derelict properties.
Sinn Féin housing spokesman Eoin Ó Broin said it is ‘an absolute scandal’ that the Government is unable to provide detailed figures on the scale of the problem: ‘The first principle of fixing a problem is finding out what the number is.’
The Government’s inability to provide figures is all the more baffling considering the amount of data contained in the GeoDirectory system and previously published CSO figures.
In 2016, the CSO found Ireland’s overall housing stock had a vacancy rate of 9.1%, the 10th-highest in the world at the time.
Referring to the 98,916 vacant or derelict homes identified by GeoDirectory, Mr Ó Broin said: ‘If even half or 25% could be rebuilt, that is a significant number. The great value in rebuilding derelict homes is that they are quicker, cheaper and more climate-friendly.’
He said this ‘makes it all the more concerning’ that the Government is unable to provide figures,
adding it indicates ‘they are not taking this issue seriously’.
Social Democrats housing spokesman Cian O’Callaghan said ‘there is simply no excuse at all for the Government not acting swiftly to tackle vacancy and dereliction to bring empty buildings and houses back into use’.
He told the MoS:
‘This would have immediate benefits for making more homes available and would bring life back into areas that have fallen into decay. The Government has been talking about tackling vacancy and dereliction for years but we have yet to see concrete action.’ Labour’s housing spokeswoman Senator Rebecca Moynihan criticised the failure of the
Coalition and local authorities to tackle the issue, saying they are guilty of ‘State-owned and Statesponsored dereliction’.
She told the MoS: ‘They are in charge of entire rows of derelict houses. It took a decade for example to release the John Player site in Dublin. It is a dereliction of duty.’
She hit out at the rules on vacant sites, noting they are riddled with ‘excuses and get-out clauses’.
‘Developers are now painting false windows and doors on derelict sites so they can legally evade the derelict site tax,’ she said.
Green Party chair of the Housing Committee Steven Matthews recently launched a separate Bill to tackle the issue of derelict homes.
Working off previous estimates, Mr Matthews referred to his Vacancy, Dereliction and Regeneration Bill in the Dáil: ‘Time is of the essence. We know there are at least 90,000 vacant homes left idle across the country and our villages, towns and cities are blighted with neglected and derelict buildings.’
Under the Bill, Mr Matthews said homes empty for at least 180 days in the preceding year would be subject
‘excuses’:
to a vacant home tax of 3% of the property’s market value, which would be collected by Revenue as part of the Local Property Tax.
Meanwhile, demand for rental accommodation is through the roof and the number of available properties has dropped sharply.
And according to an expert involved in the most recent ESRI report on the rental market, price hikes will continue. Researcher Rachel Slaymaker said: ‘We’ve seen very strong rental growth of 8.3% year on year, but probably the most startling thing from our report was the substantial decline in the number of tenancies that are being registered.
‘At a national level there was a fall of 31% in the number of new tenancies registered but we saw a proportionately greater fall in the smaller markets in places like Leitrim, Longford, Sligo, Clare and Donegal, where there was a fall of 43% to 52%.
Ms Slaymaker said the steep drop was unprecedented. ‘We certainly haven’t seen a big drop like that before…We’re also seeing a huge increase in the price alongside that and that’s likely to continue, unfortunately, because availability issues are very difficult to resolve and they are not short-term issues.’
The Department of Housing said ‘addressing vacancy and maximising the use of existing housing stock is a primary concern of this Government’.
A spokesman said: ‘Work is under way by the Department of Finance through the current Local Property Tax returns to assess the vacancy situation.’