Asking prices for homes rose 3.1% in third quarter - Daft

Asking prices for homes across the country rose 3.1% between July and September, according to listings website Daft.ie.

It brought the typical listed price for a property here to €344,848.

That is an increase of 6.2% compared to the same period last year and more than a third more than at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Supply remains a big driver of rising asking prices, with the number of second-hand homes available to buy nationwide on 1 September standing at less than 11,900.

That is 12% lower that at the same point last year, the 15th month of contracting supply.

Just over 51,000 homes came on to the market in the 12 months to September, Daft said, compared to almost 57,000 a year ago.

However, Daft is not the only platform on which houses for sale are listed and not all homes changing hands are advertised for sale.

"While the volume of new homes being built and bought has largely held up in recent quarters, despite rising interest rates, the same cannot be said of the second-hand market," said the report author Ronan Lyons, who is also an economist at Trinity College Dublin.

"The number of homes coming on to the second-hand market remains very weak. The resulting scarcity of homes has pushed prices up, especially in Dublin, where new homes are being built," he said.

Daft said asking price increases during the period were recorded across the country, but the percentage rises were highest in Dublin.

There prices climbed by 4.1% between June and September, which is the largest three-month increase in the capital since early 2017.

That means that prices there are on average more than 6% higher than year ago.

"The typical second-hand home bought in Dublin between June and September sold for 7.6% above its listed price, the biggest gap since records began in 2010," said Mr Lyons.

"Conditions elsewhere are similar, with a record average premium of 5.4% above the listed price nationally," he added.

Outside of the capital, in Cork, Galway and Waterford cities, prices in the period were around 4% higher than a year ago.

Inflation in Limerick city was even higher though at 9.7%.

The average rise outside the cities in the year to the third quarter was 6.3%.

Mr Lyons said: "The Government can take some credit for overseeing a doubling of the professional construction sector in the last few years.

"But the true number of homes needed each year, if the housing deficit is to be addressed as well as new needs, is close to twice what was built last year.

"Ensuring housing supply is responsive to underlying requirements will very likely be the dominant issue for the next Government as it has been for this one."