Real estate investor Kennedy Wilson plans to build 320 apartments at two sites in Dublin, according to the managing director of its European business, Peter Collins.
Ahead of addressing Thursday’s Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland conference, Mr Collins said that Kennedy Wilson intends to build around 160 apartments at the Clancy Quay complex in Islandbridge that it bought in early 2013. “Hopefully we will be going on site next year to start building work,” he added.
The fund also intends to build a similar number of apartments at Central Park, the combined residential and office complex in Sandyford, Dublin that it acquired in partnership with real estate trust, Green REIT earlier this year.
Kennedy Wilson intends to rent all the apartments in both blocks over the long term. The group has considerable experience as a professional landlord, and manages around 18,000 properties globally. “It’s a big part of our business,” he said.
Commenting on the rate at which rents for privately let homes are rising, Mr Collins indicated that he believes that they are likely to continue growing, but at a more steady rate in the future.
Kennedy Wilson has been one of the more active investors in the Republic’s property market over the last two years.
Addressing the conference earlier today, economist Dr Pete Lunn, said that there is a strong case for using some system other than competitive multiple-bid auctions for selling residential property.
Dr Lunn, who works for the Economic and Social Research Institute, said that this approach can influence buyers to make poor financial decisions.
Instead, he argued that the State and the property industry should research other, more stable systems for property deals, such as the sealed-bid approach used in Scotland.
A the same conference Property professionals called on the Government and developers to collaborate on schemes to boost the supply of rental accommodation.
The Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI) released a report at its annual conference on Thursday – A new model for the private rented sector in Ireland – that proposes a number of measures aimed at tackling the squeeze on accommodation available for tenants.
The SCSI believes the current 9 per cent a year rate of increase in rents is not sustainable in the long term and says that the sector is too dependent on non-professional landlords as well as suffering from a lack of supply.
The report proposes that a “built to rent scheme”, similar to that operated in the UK, be introduced in the Republic. Under this system, developers and Government share the risk of providing specialist rented acccommodation, or the State provides bridging finance that allows such schemes to be built in the first place.
Society president, Pauline Daly, also called for an increase in the level of institutional investment in providing private rented accommodation.
“Previous tax treatments supported the entrance of private individuals into the rental market and we are now seeing the consequences with the high number of buy-to-let mortgages in arrears,” she said.
“We need to encourage more professional investors to enter the market such as pension funds,” Ms Daly argued. “Consideration should also be given to introducing and extending the 12.5 per cent rate of corporate tax for multi-unit rental companies.”
