"average Dublin house prices should fall to ‘the €300,000 mark" according to Many Lou McD.

Can someone just explain something to me from the nadir of the recession? I was abroad at the time and I'm genuinely interested in how mortgages worked back then.

So it's 2013. In order to get a mortgage you need 10% deposit, you can borrow 3.5 times your income.

Residential Property Price Register

Most of the homes in the areas on this here list I pulled out would today go from about 240k (ex council) to 305k to as high as 390k today.

Now, unemployment was at 15%, but was it as simple as "I've been in the same job for 10 years, it's going nowhere it's a solid industry neither construction nor MNC, throw us a mortgage there" or am I missing something? Was there next to nobody they would actually give a mortgage to, citing unpredictability of the job market?

Like, there's certain industries that in my mind are redundancy proof- nursing, teaching, Gardai.

I mean, you see houses there going for 73k. Assuming it wasn't a derelict, would absolutely anybody who had 7300 on them and even a very basic salary have qualified?

Obviously houses were going so cheap in part because banks were presumably slow to give mortgages, but they were giving some out, and only 15% of workers were unemployed so, how did it work?

But it's still like that.

Even in the darkest days of the recession 85% of adults had a job of some description.

The only industry almost entirely wiped out was construction (even at that, self employed domestic electricians always have call outs to do, glaziers always have broken windows to fix, locksmiths, roofs will always leak, etc etc. There was mass layoffs but a few self employed lads always kept head above water)

But aside from all that- the schools needed teachers, the buses needed drivers, and so on.

85% were working, it strikes me that the banks must have dragged serious feet to prevent most of them taking out a mortgage.

Sod all buyers= houses going for less than a high end EV would today.

Help to buy just inflates house prices by 30k or whatever the amount is.

If the government wanted, they could have made Help to Buy an annual tax refund payable over 5- 10 years. But sure the developers wouldn't get money off that.

I'm alright Jack so. Lovely people.

If houses were to return to an affordable level in my area, I'm saying about 220 to 260 for a standard 70s/80s 3 bed, about 180 to 220k for an ex council house, then the only people who would be in negative equity are a cohort who bought between circa 2005 to 2008 and 2021 to the present. Everyone else bought either at firesale prices or at a time when they were somewhat affordable.

6 years. For homes that have been around as many as 50 years.

What do we owe panic buyers in protecting their investments? If you were stupid enough to spend big money on a new build you

a- didn't need help to buy as you could easily have afforded a second hand place and,

b- want sectioning to buy an architectural monstrosity in a management fee estate with no front garden, allocated parking, management rules, being mugged off by 15% of your neighbours from the housing list, etc etc.

Higher prices= buyers having less children= less taxpayers, nurses and bus drivers when Im Alright Jack there gets old

In most of West Dublin from Tallaght to Blanch it was the standard price prior to the end of 2020, 220 to 260k for your average 3 bed semi. The prices then exploded through 2021 before somewhat stabilising by summer 2022 to a rate of slower growth.

Do you think it is right and fair that the market is now locked into where it is after years of relative stability by one massive 18 month jolt that has seen the price pushed to unrealistic levels?