Ikea is entering the housing market in Ireland with a €73 million investment in 169 new homes in Dublin 15.
Ingka Investments, the group that owns Ikea, will provide the investment through Aurium Capital for the building of one, two and three-bedroom apartments and duplexes at the Rathborne Crossing development in Ashtown, Dublin 15.
The new homes will be built by Castlethorn and will consist of 86 social homes and 83 apartments for sale on the open market.
Dublin City Council will acquire the 86 social homes on completion, with funding from the Department of Housing.
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The 83 private sale units will avail of the Croí Cónaithe (Cities) Scheme, a Government grant to developers to fund the viability gap between the cost of building apartments and the price achievable on the open market.
The first block of the development, located in Rathborne village, is expected to be completed in November 2026, with the final phase ready in 2027.
In 2022, Ingka Investments announced it was committing €100 million to fund the development of more than 250 social housing units across the greater Dublin area.
Upon completion, the new homes would be leased on a long-term basis to the relevant local authority.
The Ingka Group said it would treat the rental payments it collects as mortgage repayments, allowing the transfer of all 150 homes to the local authorities at the end of the lease term at an estimated no additional cost.
“This project demonstrates the commitment to contributing to the communities in which it operates, aligning with the IKEA vision to create a better everyday life for the many people,” a statement by Aurium Capital, Castlethorn, and Dublin City Council said.
Speaking at a launch event for the development on Wednesday, Minister for Housing James Browne said the development was “made possible” by the Croí Cónaithe Cities scheme.
“Demand for homes delivered under this scheme has already been strong, with units in south Dublin and Cork seeing rapid uptake from homebuyers,” Mr Browne said.
When questioned about the grant after the event, however, the Minister could not say if the Department would reach its target of 5,000 apartments under the scheme by 2026.
The Croi Conaithe cities scheme has been criticised by market experts, who have said it is not as effective in practice as envisaged, largely because the grant is paid when the apartment is sold, and not earlier in the building process.
As of June, contracts for just over 1,000 apartments had been signed, leaving the scheme on track to miss its target by a significant margin.
Speaking on Wednesday, the Minister said he was “very encouraged” by the response to the most recent call for expressions of interest in the scheme which was put out in June.
While he could not say if any new contracts had been signed on the back of this, the Department is currently “analysing those expressions of interest” and will “move on those now as quickly as possible”.
When asked about addressing child homelessness, after a record 5,000 children were found to be homeless at the end of August, Mr Browne said the Department was “taking very targeted measures to get children off those lists”.
“I think what has happened in the past is that homelessness has been dealt with as a kind of a homogeneous group.
“We’re going down into a granular level, looking at why different people are becoming homeless. Somebody becoming homeless as a result of addiction issues is very different to somebody who becomes homeless as a result of domestic violence versus somebody who’s got a notice to quit on their home.
“In terms of those children, we want to ensure to get them down as quickly as possible through targeted measures,” Mr Browne said.
