Dublin’s apartment building boom resumes after Covid hiatus

More than half the new homes completed in Dublin in the third quarter were apartments, according to the Central Statistics Office (CSO).

The agency’s latest new dwelling completion figures come amid an influx of foreign investment into the real estate sector here. Most of it has financed or is invested in the building of apartments in urban areas, where high rents generate strong returns for investors.

The CSO figures show there were 1,000 apartments completed nationally between July and September this year. This was 40 per cent up on the number of apartments completed in the same period last year.

The figures also show apartments accounted for 674 or 54 per cent of all the dwelling types completed in Dublin.

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Goodbody analyst Dermot O’Leary noted that permission had been granted for around 57,000 apartments since the start of 2019. “Although many of these will not be built it is clear that the demand from the built-to-rent sector coupled with Government policy to encourage densification will lead to apartments representing a larger share of output in the coming years.”

Overall the figures show new dwelling completions nationally were down nearly 8 per cent at 4,656 in the third quarter.

There were decreases in both single (-18.1 per cent) and scheme dwellings (-14.3 per cent) compared with the same quarter last year.

Kildare had the highest number of completions (541) by a local authority. Regionally, six out of the eight regions saw a decrease of new dwelling completions.

Housing output

Goodbody is forecasting that housing output will grow to about 30,000 a year over the next 18 months.

“While housing output has effectively stalled at an annual pace of about 21,000 since the pandemic, the surge in housing starts suggests that output will grow to above 30,000 in the next 18 months,” Mr O’Leary said.

New data was published at the end of last week showing that housing commencements grew by 14 per cent in the third quarter compared with 2019, while the total in the year to date amounts to about 24,000, up 22 per cent relative to 2019. Dublin is seeing the largest increase.

“While we do not get the breakdown between apartments and houses, it is likely that apartment construction is once again part of the story here, although given the long order books of the main home-builders, housing scheme developments are also likely to be part of the picture too,” Mr O’Leary said.