Is housing really that bad or is it just another hyped up 'crisis'?

micosoft

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120241313#Comment_120241313

One of the many things people who critique current government policy get wrong is the idea that renters/homeless/etc are all from a fixed pool. You realise that children turn into adults and leave home every year right? That we have immigration? It simply does not mean one less renter. It just means at aggregate a smaller number of rental properties available to the renter community.

Just like people thinking taking one rough sleeper off the streets or even a thousand does not permanently remove that number of rough sleepers. Governments face a conveyor belt. In our case the housing supply conveyor belt is moving too slowly and will have to over supply for a few years to reach equilibrium.

micosoft

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120241263#Comment_120241263

There seems to be massive confusion amongst people that ostensibly calling themselves socialist or left wing calling for mass government house building of social housing and painting an entirely untrue rosy picture of the past when.

Mass social housing in Ireland, the UK, France and pretty much every country it was tried was a catastrophic failure leading to sink estates resulting in multigenerational poverty and deprivation.

The best solution is to mix different socio-economic groups together. That is what Social & Affordable housing and HAP does. Instead of creating another Ballymun or Jobstown you mix communities leading to significantly better outcomes for the poor as they have access to the same amenities and environment as richer socio-economic groups. It's far form perfect but it is much much much cheaper than the previous disaster.

There is a huge irony that FG and FF are carrying out better and more thoughtful policies than the old and toxic policies being floated, turning a short term challenge into a multi decade disaster. I find it incredible folk talking about what happened in the sixties and seventies as being good policies especially when we are still dealing with these dreadful (if not global) policy decisions.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120252587#Comment_120252587

Just an interesting add on. This article is in today's indo. Dublin LA paid 40% too much for houses build by themselves

https://m.independent.ie/regionals/dublin/dublin-news/dublin-city-council-overpaid-by-40pc-to-build-social-homes-report-finds-42345317.html

as well as many of us have pointed out if LA build they will reduce private build supply by drawing labour from it

micosoft

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248794#Comment_120248794

Literally demonstrating that despite the fact that our housing is not an outlier a group have hijacked policy in this area and people are building up arrears because they can as there are no personal consequences for them. This is why we have some of the highest mortgage rates in Ireland. Giving a certain very loud minority (of natives) in this country is passing massive costs to the taxpayer/mortgage payer.

Fred Cryton

I recently became a landlord - rented an apartment out in Dublin city centre. The agent had a daft ad up but he said he never even looked at the responses on daft. He just used "relocation agents" - ie agents involved in moving tech and finance workers into Ireland.

So in a way this is a problem of economic success. Those foreign tech and finance workers will pay a lot of taxes here and are obviously welcome, but you have to feel sorry for the ordinary Irish worker if the agent is not even bothering to look at your application. The real problem is Dublin city council and thier insane planning and height limit requirements for apartments. If there were dozens of apartment blocks containing throusands of apartments coming onto the market each year, there is no way I would get away with letting the apartment at that insane rent. But, because of the leftward turn in Irish politics, I would need that sort of rent to make the risk worthwhile of not being able to get the tenants out. I could just as easily sell the place. It's just typical Irish stupidity that caused this im afraid

YFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120241685#Comment_120241685

For a room?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120258236#Comment_120258236

No it would appear he was looking for an entire property on quite a limited budget, while he stated he was willing to move and did find a property but the location wasn't for him. He also had an unusual working arrangement in that he paid no tax. The same person also rents out a property. There were a number of factors at play in that one.

YFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120264029#Comment_120264029

Revenue should have a talk with him.

YFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120238595#Comment_120238595

When a room is advertised. Say you would pay 20% above asking price. The landlord will bite the hand off you.

Grayson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247814#Comment_120247814

8 stories is high in Dublin, that's the problem.

Where I'm living right now in germany, every single building is at least 6 stories tall. The entire block is apartment buildings and the big area in the middle is all gardens and trees. My apt is on the third floor and there's trees growing just outside that go up a story or two above my apartment. I see birds and squirrels. It's a really relaxing place. I know in Ireland the apts would be capped at 3-4 stories and the garden space would be seen as a place where they could build another load of apartments.

YFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120238787#Comment_120238787

Exactly, he has no reason. Has financial resources higher than most.

MegamanBoo

I'm not normally one for being overly sensitive about language and terminology but recently I was listening to a pretty unrelated podcast and I heard someone use the term 'unhoused' for the first time.

It struck my that 'homeless' does suggest some wrongdoing or failure on the part of the individual, like clueless, witless etc.

Whereas 'unhoused' really gets to the nub of the problem, that we, as a very wealthy country, have utterly failed to build enough houses for the people who live here.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120273809#Comment_120273809

Dose unhoused get to the nub of the matter. Really!. The truth isa bit different. There is a section of homeless people that are that way by choice. Often they will not be let into the homeless shelters because they are high on drugs or drunk.

Yes there is a section that is homeless through no fault of there own. However virtually any cases really highlighted by the press always had back stories. Remember the couple with kids that were living in a tent because they would not live in the hotel. The story died because he was a dealer

There has been other. There is a reason that there might be a stigma attached to it. But in 3-4 years time unhoused will be similar. What will we move to then No Roofers, Slateless, Bedroom Minuses, Bedless.

MegamanBoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120273982#Comment_120273982

By your own acknowledgement there are people who are unhoused through no fault of their own.

Can we talk about that?

Rather than bringing the conversation back to alcohol and drugs. Where I'm guessing a lot of people will be slipping into addiction problems because they are unhoused, rather than the other way around.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274115#Comment_120274115

Can we not talk about the fact that there will be stigma attached to unhoused within 2-3 years so a other word which will have to change.

Housing is not the reason people slip into drug or drink use. Actually any research shows it the other way around.

If people are homeless they are homeless. The couple that pulled there kids out of a hotel into a tent on the estate green were they homeless or unhoused. Was it the state's fault they were unroofed and Bedless.

They made a choice that left them Slateless and tilekess.

MegamanBoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274145#Comment_120274145

I missed the part where those kids chose to grow up in a hotel or a tent?

Can you explain that to me a bit better?

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274263#Comment_120274263

Is it the state or the parents fault

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274115#Comment_120274115

...whats the fcuking point, some are just too ignorant to engage with over such matters!

MegamanBoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274367#Comment_120274367

When it comes to children I would say first the parents have responsibility, then the state.

Both have failed in this situation.

I'd like to talk about unhoused kids whose parents are not drug addicts too.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274506#Comment_120274506

....what happens when some parents are simply mental too unwell to provide themselves and their kid, with their needs!

MegamanBoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274565#Comment_120274565

I've no recent direct experience of this but I'd guess very little.

Plenty of tragic stories of signs of parents mental health struggles being ignored, leading to awful outcomes.

I'm sure there's plenty that don't end in awful dramatic circumstances, probably some cope with help from family or friends, or they can afford private therapy. Some parents and children will be left suffer long term.

Being unhoused on top of that would only make it a lot worse.

But plenty want to label all unhoused as drug addicts and put the blame on the individual.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274695#Comment_120274695

....thats cause some just want to remain extremely ignorant of our reality, engaging with them is pointless, many are highly narcissistic, and simply wont have their views changed, so....

notAMember

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120239650#Comment_120239650

Your point is about credit? You honestly think that rental companies never use business loans, and hotelier never have any credit to run their business?

That level of business ignorance is really quite astonishing. Thanks for clarifying. I completely understand your cognitive dissonance now. The supply reality of housing must really seem like a parallel universe to you. The suppliers have to be able to earn an income for it to make sense to build and supply, but you think they must all somehow have some "other" income in parallel. While that is the common understanding, the wrong policy decisions will always be made.

AlanG

One of the reasons there is not more outrage is that rents have gone up remarkabally little for most renters. Most of the increase is for new renters. For those renting from the council or in long term accommodation the increase over 15 / 20 years ago is very small. that is why you will alwasy see figures as the increase in asking rents since 2013 (when rents were extremely low), not 2008 or 2002. Those figures make good headlines.

the rent freeze means the Gov has stopped new renters from competing with incumbents so many incumbents will stay in their 3 or 4 bed house at 2013 rents with a couple of empty rooms.

Gov measures to help incumbent renters have made a massive crisis for those new to the market.

MegamanBoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274717#Comment_120274717

It's true that private suppliers must always earn an income. But where excessive costs have been identified, what has been done to verify and reduce them if necessary?

And housing will never be a 'free market' in the economic sense. If the state is to intervene, which I believe it must, that will be most effective by building up a long term capacity to supply housing. Otherwise we'll keep having shortage, and I think the shortage will worsen.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274263#Comment_120274263

The other choice is remove the children from there parent. But then we are into a different scenario. The state can support so much. It cannot hold people hand from cradle to grave.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274565#Comment_120274565

90%++of the time there is an element of drugs and drink involved as well.

The big problem now is that drug dealers are willing to let addicts build up debt. Then they try try to force parents to pay this debt. Recently a lad in his late twenties was unhoused locally. The dealers were banging on his mother's house demanding payment. She was a widow she could not put up with that sh!t do he is homeless.... sorry unhoused now.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274695#Comment_120274695

Families can cope with mental health difficulties, but usually it accomplied by a drink.ot drug issue nowadays. Again how far can the state or society support this.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274705#Comment_120274705

No not really but you have to deal.witn reality as well. The state can only afford to support individuals so far. After that you have to help yourself.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274717#Comment_120274717

80-90 years ago the state provided housing to people ( mainly low income working people). These people in paid a modest rent. But they maintained these houses. They painted, cleaned gutters, fixed leaks etc. Actually they were supplied only with a basic house they supplied all the furniture and decorations themselves.

There was a certain amount of personal responsibility by these people. Nowadays you give a houses with ever essential to a cohort and within 20 years you have to give them another house.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274784#Comment_120274784

This is the quandary now the state finds itself in. Labour, Mary Lou...sorry SF and other socialist left wing parties are starting to push the rental termination....... Sorry they refer to it as an eviction ban.... similar to unhoused/homeless wording. Back to rental control and eviction bans it is only to the benefit of those in accommodation now. As Y present any LL when a house becomes vacant now they have to make a decision whether to relet it or not. A large cohort ate deciding not to. However the issue is most of these are smaller LL and a substantial subsection are not sell these houses but leaving them vacant.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120274791#Comment_120274791

What excessive costs please explain.

MegamanBoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120277661#Comment_120277661

I won't engage with this blame the individual nonsense other than to briefly point out that the numbers just don't add up.

There hasn't been an increase in 'individual' problems in line with the increase in numbers unhoused.

Even by the highly massaged government figures, numbers can raise by 23% in year. Show me where alcohol and drug use have increased that much?

From what I see among friends and locally the figure of 'hidden homeless' in Ireland of 290,000 is probably accurate. This wasn't at nearly the same extent 10 years ago, and doesn't correlate with any massive worsening in drugs use at the time.

In 2007 you could have maybe made a case that anyone unemployed at the time wasn't looking for work. In 2009 the same argument wouldn't have held up. Unemployment jumped I think from about 4.5% to around 12%, not because 7.5% of the working age population individually decided not to work, or became alcoholics or junkies or whatever else. The same principle applies here.

As for your question on costs, I see it repeated that the cost of building in Ireland is excessive because of land costs, limitations on building height, planning delays or labor shortages. My question is what has been done by FFG to verify whether these claims are true and if so to remedy them?

MEGA BRO WOLF 5000

Turned down multiple times for a mortgage. Public service worker. 33k on paper but closer to 50k with the shifts I do. Single, no dependants. Can't get a place. My only option here is to leave a job I love to go back into an industry I hate to make more money...and even at that, I'm f**ked. Can't rent, or more like I refuse to because I'm saving for said mortgage that may or may not ever arrive. Living with family at 40 is a disaster but out of options barring I live in a van...and that's increasingly likely come summer.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120280251#Comment_120280251

Well that is the exception. It's costing me about 2 months rent per house in running costs.

Property tax, plumber because of a leak, replaced a shower ( triton shower thermostat gone new thermostat 180 euro, new shower 280. Last year an oil leak because her you g lads were kicking the ball against the side wall of the house. Another time I spend an hour trying to get oil to the burner to find that someone had switched off the tap on the oil tank.

Electrical cert every 5 years that costs 500 euro. Property tax 225 euro, replace smoke and monoxide alarms every 8-10 years ( they have a date stamped on them). Repainting a house between tenant's 2k if you get a painter to do it.

Washing machines last about 8ish years. Usually a cattle box of rubbish has to be got rid of as well.

Money invested long-term. If I invested 200k in a long fund the return would be 4-5% per anum compounded that is 8-10k/year

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120280436#Comment_120280436

Rent is sub 1k per month.