THE NUMBER OF homes available to buy nationwide on 1 March 2024 stood at below 10,500 while prices continue to rise, according to the latest Daft.ie House Price report.
The number of available homes is down 24% year-on-year and represents a new all-time low for the series which extends back to January 2007.
The number of homes available to buy currently is just 40% of the 2019 average.
The fall in availability affects all major regions of the country and started in mid-2023, after 12 consecutive months of recovering availability following Covid-19 lockdowns.
In the first three months of this year, housing prices nationally rose by an average of 1.8%.
The typical listed price nationwide in the first quarter of 2024 was €326,469, 5.8% higher than in the same period a year earlier and 30% higher than at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Prices in the capital were 3.2% higher (€437,125) in the first quarter of 2024 than a year previously, while in the rest of Leinster, the increase was 5%.
Increases in Waterford and Limerick cities were both just over 10% (€247,064 and €274,427 respectively).
Cork City saw prices rise by 7.3% (€347,409) year-on-year, while Galway city saw an increase of 9.4% (€378,504).
Elsewhere, prices in Munster (outside the cities) were 10.9% higher and up 6.7% in Connacht-Ulster in early 2024 compared to a year earlier.
Commenting on the report, its author Ronan Lyons, economist at Trinity College Dublin, said the new low in homes available to buy is being “driven by the second-hand segment and highlights the very tight conditions in the second-hand market across the country since Covid-19″.
Lyons noted that the number of homes being built has “risen steadily”, but added that interest rate increases have “affected the recovery of the second-hand market”.
“As interest rates peak and then fall, and in particular as sitting homeowners roll of fixed rate mortgages, there should be an improvement in second-hand supply,” he said.
“Nonetheless, availability is well below half the levels seen pre-Covid-19, meaning it may take years for second-hand supply to recover to normal levels.”
Sinn Féin’s housing spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin described the drop in homes available to buy as “worrying” and said the Government’s housing plan is “not working”.
“The supply of second hand homes in contracting. The supply of new homes for sale on the market is not increasing, and the government is not delivering a meaningful supply of affordable homes to buy,” he said.
“The longer Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are in office, the worse the housing crisis will get.”
Note: Journal Media Ltd has shareholders in common with Daft.ie publisher Distilled Media Group.
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