The housing shortage is one of the biggest problems we face and it reflects how our population has grown rapidly over recent decades. In the six years to 2022 alone, our population grew 8 per cent.
Because it has taken so long to ramp up house building since the financial crisis at a time when the economy and the population were already growing rapidly, the Housing Commission estimates that there is a lot of catching up to do. Last year we built more than 30,000 new homes but over the coming decade the commission suggests a need for up to 56,000 a year to reduce the backlog.
If it will be challenging to pay for additional public sector housing investment over the coming decade, it will be a bigger challenge to raise the necessary private finance to fund new building and the purchase of those homes in the private market. An estimated €8 billion a year of private finance will be needed.
As has happened in cities such as Stockholm and Berlin, rent controls have led to major cuts in such investment, and have reduced the supply of rental accommodation