Assessing price sustainability in the Irish housing market: a county-level analysis. ESRI Research Notes 2019/4/1

In the wake of a number of high profile property crashes, a question that has come to the fore recently is; are housing booms and busts clustered in specific areas within countries or do they tend to be more pan-regional? Within the United States for example, considerable variation in the boom-bust cycle has been experienced with the so-called ‘sand states’ (California, Florida, Arizona, and Nevada) showing much greater fluctuations in prices than other regions following the financial crisis.2 In an Irish context, a significant issue of interest is the apparent divergence between the Dublin property market and other regional markets as well as the difference between urban and rural areas

A county-level perspective on housing affordability in Ireland. ESRI Research Notes 2019/4/2

The issue of housing affordability in Ireland has come to the fore in recent years as house prices have increased significantly following the recovery. In a recent survey, Corrigan et al. (2019a) find that 86.5 per cent of renters expressed a preference for homeownership. However, rising house prices have led to serious concerns about the ability of first time buyers (FTB) to enter the housing market. This group has been cited as one particular pressure point in recent assessments of market affordability (Housing Agency, 2017). Analysis published in the ESRI Quarterly Economic Commentary (McQuinn et al., 2018) finds that house price growth has been uneven across the distribution, with cheaper properties growing at faster rates than more expensive properties. This is likely to further exacerbate the affordability concerns of first time buyers, who typically enter the housing market at lower house price levels than second and subsequent borrowers

Quarterly Economic Commentary Winter 2019

No Abstract

Property prices and COVID-19 related administrative closures: What are the implications? ESRI Working Paper 661 May 2020.

In this paper we examine the implications for the Irish housing market of the economic slowdown due to the Covid-19 virus. While necessary from a public health perspective, the administrative closure implemented by the Irish authorities in March 2020 has had several significant repercussions for the domestic residential market. As hundreds of thousands of workers lose their jobs over a short period of time, income levels in general are set to fall across the economy, with knock-on implications for affordability and housing demand. Additionally, the nature of the administrative closedown will also impact the residential market through the collapse in housing related activity for the period in question. In this paper we augment an inverted demand function for housing to include a residential market activity variable and estimate the impact on house prices of the decline in economic activity due to the virus-related measures. We also examine the likely future path of house prices based on two different recovery scenarios with a series of house price forecasts to the end of 2021

Comparing two recessions in Ireland: Global Financial Crisis vs COVID-19. ESRI QEC Research Note 20200401 December 2020.

The QEC Research Note ‘Comparing two recessions in Ireland: Global Financial Crisis vs COVID-19’ compares the evolution of key economic indicators across the two most recent recessions in the Irish economy. We compare and contrast three types of indicators, hard indicators which measure realised outcomes, soft indicators which measure sentiments and expectations and policy responses

Quarterly Economic Commentary, Autumn 2019.

Although the Irish economy continues to perform in a robust manner, a number of considerations arise given the present growth performance. Firstly, due to certain multinational related activities, a divergence is likely once again between headline and underlying output growth for the present year. While we are revising upwards our forecast of headline GDP to just less than 5 per cent for 2019, certain underlying data would suggest the growth outlook has moderated somewhat as we move through the present year. Secondly, a number of significant international related risks are on the horizon for the Irish economy. As with previous Commentaries, our forecasts, unless otherwise stated, are subject to the technical assumption that the United Kingdom remains part of the European Union

The RTB Rent Index, Quarter 3 2020. ESRI Indices Report December 2020.

This report is produced by the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB) and the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) and provides rental indicators (the Rent Index) generated to track price developments in the Irish market. The analysis in this report presents rental indices on a quarterly basis covering the period between Q3 2007 and Q3 2020. It must be noted that the period since the onset of the pandemic has seen the introduction and easing of restrictions around rental price growth in line with the public health measures. This is likely to have had an effect on the trend between the second and third quarters

Assessing the impacts of COVID-19 on the Irish property market: An overview of the issues. ESRI QEC Special Article September 2020.

In this paper we examine some of the potential channels through which COVID-19 is likely to impact the Irish housing market and discuss some policy areas which may need refocusing or re-evaluation. Building on existing work by ESRI researchers, we examine the implications under the headings of housing demand, housing supply, affordability of prices and the rental market. While there is likely to be a significant number of effects across a wide variety of headings, the most long-lasting impact of the crisis is the potential exacerbation of the imbalance between housing demand and supply which already exists in the market. The most efficient policy response in that context is for an increase in the State provision of social and affordable housing over the short to medium term

Sovereign debt after COVID-19: How the involvement of the ECB can impact the recovery path of a Member State. ESRI QEC Special Article December 2020.

The QEC Special Article Sovereign debt after COVID-19: How the involvement of the ECB can impact the recovery path of a member state explores how ECB purchases of Irish sovereign bonds can impact the recovery path of the Irish economy over the next 10 years. The model used examines how policy intervention can mitigate the negative effects of the pandemic

Quarterly Economic Commentary, Summer 2019.

While a number of international concerns continue to cast a shadow on the domestic economy, both taxation receipts and labour market indicators suggest that the Irish economy continues to perform strongly in 2019. Output is still forecast to grow by 4.0 per cent in 2019 before moderating somewhat at 3.2 per cent in 2020. Unemployment is set to fall to 4.5 per cent by the end of the present year and to 4.1 per cent at the end of the next year. All forecasts, unless otherwise stated, maintain the Commentary’s baseline assumption that the trading status of the United Kingdom remains equivalent to that of a full European Union Member State