Only four homes built per 1,000 people in Dublin in 2021

A new study from property advisor Savills Ireland has revealed that just four homes per 1,000 people were built in Dublin in 2021.

Experts heavily criticised the National Planning Framework (NFP), arguing that the "fundamentally flawed" document will strangle Dublin's housing supply. The NFP determines how Ireland will develop over the long-term out to 2040.

The research carried out by Savills Ireland shows that there has been a large reduction of zoned residential land available for development within the Greater Dublin Area (Dublin, Meath, Kildare, Wicklow), which would have had the capacity to accommodate over 100,000 units. This number is equivalent to 10 years of housing supply, according to the firm's Residential Land Supply Study 2022.

Researchers concluded that elements of the framework, which was introduced in 2018, will impede “the roll-out of a residential housing development strategy” that will deliver “sufficient homes in the right locations”.

“Rather than using the baseline spatial population scenario produced by the ESRI (Economic and Social Research Institute),” the report highlights, “the NPF uses the 50:50 balanced growth scenario. More a policy goal rather than likely outcome, this envisages growth to be equally split between the mideast region (which incorporates Dublin) and the rest of the country."

Today we release our landmark Residential Land Supply Study, which reveals that there has been a reduction of zoned residential land with potential capacity for over 100,000 units within the Greater Dublin Area.

Read now: https://t.co/nMF0kFZPeC pic.twitter.com/LdwJXnmGGc

— Savills Ireland (@SavillsIreland) October 4, 2022

John Ring, Director of Research at Savills Ireland said: "After a lost decade of housing delivery, we are producing just four homes per 1,000 people in Dublin, less than half of the nine per 1,000 recorded going back twenty-five years ago and just a quarter of the output of 2006.

"Similarly, in the Greater Dublin Area, we are producing seven homes per 1,000 compared to 12 per 1,000 people in 1996 and 23 in 2006. We need to implement stretch targets at this time to reflect the urgency of the situation, rather than limiting our ambitions to goals that are likely to fail.”

The firm continued by stating that the population projection and forecasting models were "flawed".

According to John Ring, the current projection envisages a 20% and 25% growth by 2024 for Dublin City compared to a 50% growth for cities of Cork, Limerick, Galway, and Waterford.

"Basing planning on these growth patterns is flawed because they are unlikely to come to fruition," the Director of Research added. "Incoming foreign direct investment will not consult the goals of the NPF when deciding if and where to locate in Ireland. The majority will continue to go to Dublin where the talent pool is deepest."

Elsewhere, Savills stated that the quantum of land zoned for residential development contained within the various development plans is too little to realistically deliver the required housing, even at the low targets prescribed by the HNDAs.

A total of 40% of the delivery of new homes must take place on brownfield sites (sites already within urban areas), but Savills believe that these sites are more expensive to develop as a result of logistical and environmental factors.

"We need to implement stretch targets at this time to reflect the urgency of the situation, rather than limiting our ambitions to goals that are likely to fail," Mr Ring concluded.

“Ireland’s residential housing market is already fraught with challenges and problems, but if we can’t get things right at a national level then the trickle-down effect of these mistakes means we are destined to fail no matter what resolutions we may find to the building and development issues.”