Good morning. Property dominates the business news this mornings with reports that work on up to 5,000 social and affordable homes has been stalled by the failure of the Department of Housing to clear funding for over six months. Eoin Burke-Kennedy has the details.
Separately, Harry McGee reports on new research showing that thousands of homeowners whose mortgages are held by nonbank non-lenders, sometimes known as “vulture funds”, are paying between 8.5 and 10 per cent interest on those loans at a time when most banks are charging less than half that amount. And they cannot switch to a better rate.
Meanwhile, estate agents say that property price rises this year will match the almost 10 per cent recorded last year unless the Government takes steps to improve supply. Conor Pope reports.
In our Opinion slot, Banking & Payments Federation boss Brian Hayes says there is a compelling rationale for some form of credit guarantee scheme for small builders, partly underwritten by the State, to advance finance to developers with viable projects but insufficient equity if we are to hit the generally agreed target to build at least 50,000 homes annually over the next five years.
And Eoin Burke-Kennedy also focuses on the issue in his column, examining how Government in its efforts to improve housing supply while incentivising property purchase has become, in some eyes, a meddlesome beast, laden in bureaucracy and prone to changing policy on a whim.
At a time when the pubs sector is in the news, the Matt The Thresher group has added a third outlet to its stable, the Lime Kiln “gastropub” in the Co Meath village of Julianstown, writes Laura Slattery.
In her column, Pilita Clark runs a concerned eye over new research which suggests that nearly every second adult in countries across the world thinks it is job done on female equality. Far from it, she argues, though she adds that gender equality cannot be seen as a zero-sum game that women can win only at the expense of men.
Ciarán Hancock writes that Lucinda Creighton’s Vulcan Consulting has established an office in Belfast to add to its existing operations in Dublin and Brussels, with solicitor, businessman and one-time chief executive of the SDLP, Conor Houston, as its local director.
Finally, generic drugmaker Hikma is eyeing up a slice of the rapidly growing market for obesity drugs as patents on Novo Nordisk’s blockbuster diabetes and weight loss drugs Ozempic and Wegovy start expiring in some markets as soon as next year. Meanwhile, Wegovy has not yet entered the Irish market.
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