Real estate and building are on a roll, by Tina-Marie O’Neill

The Sunday Business Post, Sunday, January 3rd 2016

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In Dublin, Owen Reilly, who established his estate agency in Dublin’s Docklands in 2008 and handles properties throughout South Dublin said: “I am optimistic about 2016; I believe the market is now in a phase beyond recovery and has reached a welcome state of equilibrium.

To generate increased activity in 2016 a solution is required to the gridlock that hinders construction of new homes for first-time buyers and that, in its turn, is hindering the middle market to trade up and the upper end to trade down. All over Dublin City and Docklands developers have planning permissions but construction is slow to start and, in most cases, commercial elements of schemes will be provided in advance of residential.

The supply problem aside, I expect increased sales activity during the first half of the year that will be motivated by banks offering some flexibility on lending regulations up to set quotas. To capture this, a number of our clients will sell early in 2016.”

While Reilly believes prices in general have aligned with values, he expects price growth in areas where there is an imbalance in supply/demand such as Dublin city centre and Docklands and prime areas of North and South Dublin.

“2016 could be the first ‘normal’ year in the Dublin property market in a generation – with price growth of 3 to 5 per cent,” he said.

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To read the full article on-line, please click here here.

The Sunday Business Post, Sunday, January 3rd 2016